bit.bio raises USD 25m Series D as demand for human cell models hits records
With manufacturing already in place, the company will expand its portfolio of more than 50 human cell types built on the opti-ox platform.
Cambridge human cell programming company bit.bio has secured USD 25 million in Series D funding as demand for its cell models reaches record levels. Existing investor M&G Investments and Dr Jonathan Milner, founder and former CEO of Abcam, backed the round, which follows a Series C earlier in 2026.
Paid vial volumes rose 76% year to date in 2026, orders were up 34%, active customers up 40% and academic customers up 63%, according to the company. Tech.eu said proceeds will expand the portfolio and widen access for pharma, biotech and research customers.
Commercial momentum
bit.bio said manufacturing capacity is already established, so the priority is bringing more human cell types to market and turning demand into further commercial growth. CEO Dr Emma Pepperell framed the moment as an inflection point where AI speeds candidate discovery while animal-testing alternatives push researchers toward models that better reflect human biology.
"What these fundamental shifts have in common is the need for vast quantities of consistent human cell models. Someone needs to be able to supply those cells at scale and our investors believe bit.bio is the company capable of achieving that aim," Pepperell said in the company release.
She added that the investment is a vote of confidence in becoming a major supplier of the human cells that the next generation of drug development will depend on.
opti-ox and the product portfolio
bit.bio's proprietary opti-ox platform is designed to produce defined human cell types consistently and at scale, addressing donor variability and limited supply. The portfolio now spans more than 50 human cell types, including models of the heart, liver and central nervous system, for disease research, functional genomics, drug discovery and toxicology.
As AI changes how candidates are identified and designed, reproducible human biology becomes a bottleneck for testing. That is the commercial thesis behind a Series D that emphasises portfolio breadth rather than building more factories.
Investor view
Cornel Chiriac, investment director of Crossover at M&G Investments, said M&G's Crossover strategy backs ambitious businesses as they move into the next phase of commercial growth. "It has proven technology, established manufacturing capability and growing demand from customers. As the way medicines are discovered and tested evolves, we see significant potential for bit.bio to scale globally and establish human cell models as an increasingly important part of life sciences research," he said.
Dr Jonathan Milner compared the opportunity to Abcam's path of becoming indispensable to researchers: "I see bit.bio doing that for human cells. Biology is becoming increasingly central to how medicines are discovered and developed, but progress depends on having the right human cells, in the right quantities, with the consistency researchers can trust."
Why it matters for European founders and investors
European life-science tools companies that can industrialise a scarce biological input are scarce themselves. bit.bio's metrics (vial volumes, orders, academic customer growth) give a clearer commercial signal than many platform biotechs that raise on science alone. For related UK and European life-science capital, see Biograil's EUR 20m raise and FluoRok's Series A, plus our funding section.
The round also shows existing investors doubling down after a Series C earlier in the year. That continuity can matter when customers need multi-year supply confidence for assay platforms.
Business Weekly and other UK coverage also noted the Cambridge company push to make human cell models a standard research tool, aligning with broader moves away from animal testing in drug development. bit.bio positions itself as a supplier of consistent cells rather than a therapeutics developer, which keeps the story in the life-science tools category that investors already understand from Abcam history.
What happens next
bit.bio will expand the cell types it offers and make models more accessible to pharmaceutical companies, biotechnology businesses and research organisations. No valuation was disclosed in the primary release.
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