We at Invitris
Closing the protein gap
Encoded in DNA, proteins are the building blocks of biology. However, developing novel proteins and producing them at scale is a major technology issue. We are here to solve this issue. For better health and a better life.
One the biggest impact is with antimicrobial proteins: one of our largest health-economic burden is antimicrobial resistance (AMR). AMR is predicted to cause 10 million deaths per year – or 25% more deaths than cancer. This is the future predicted by an expert panel if we do not create new drugs against AMR NOW!
Particularly, drug-resistant bacteria are threatening to catapult our global societies back into the pre-antibiotic era, inhibiting not only the successful treatment of common infections but also all therapies that rely on infection control, including surgeries and cancer therapy. Besides this endless suffering, this may cause an economic burden of several trillions of US Dollars to healthcare systems worldwide.
Highly complex multiprotein structures, such as bacteriophages, endolysins, and tailocins, can be solution – we’re here to create them. For human health, veterinary, agriculture, and food.
Our Vision
A world, where the next generation of proteins are available for any industry, anywhere and anytime.
Our Mission
Eradicate antimicrobial resistance and other human diseases by leveraging cell-free expression with automation technology and AI to deliver personalized therapeutic proteins, such as bacteriophages and antibodies, to patients directly, on-demand and on-site.
Our Story
We are a spin-off of the successful iGEM (“international Genetically Engineered Machine Competition”) Munich Team of 2018, Phactory, which was hosted by the lab of Prof. Simmel. We started our journey in early 2018 by the formation of our iGEM Team supported by the Chair of Physics of Synthetic Biological Systems. After several rounds of brainstorming, we came up with our project idea to leverage cell-free technology to assemble phages, started to build our first prototypes, worked hard, and organized the European Meetup with more than 200 participants. Finally, in October, all iGEM teams from around the world met in Boston to present their results. That is where we won the first runner-up award among 350 other teams and were awarded several prizes, including “Best in Entrepreneurship”.
Motivated by this success, we formed a core team, acquired 2 million US dollars in non-dilutive capital, expanded our team, and are now working relentlessly to develop and validate novel drugs against therapeutic indications with a high unmet need.
Our Founders
Our Team
