Failed Biotech Startups
180 venture-backed biotech startups have shut down after raising $21.2B combined — about 8% of the entire graveyard. The biggest cohort last raised in 2022, and the most common final round was Other.
Biotech is binary in a way software never is: a failed trial can end a company overnight regardless of how much was raised. This section of the graveyard includes some of the largest single losses in the dataset.
The Damage, by the Numbers
$46.9M
Median raised before shutdown
$117.8M
Average raised — the big flameouts drag it up
64
Died holding $100M+ in funding
1
Raised $1B+ and still closed
Class of the crash
Closed biotech startups by year of their final funding round
48
65
42
20
2021
$5.7B
2022
$6.3B
2023
$5.9B
2024
$2.7B
How far they got
Last round raised before shutting down
Pre-Seed
3
Seed
25
Series A
23
Series B
20
Series C+
5
Post-IPO
41
Debt & Notes
11
Other
52
Based on the last five years of fundraising data tracked in the VCbacked database.
The Graveyard
Showing 100 of 180 closed startups
Company | Raised | Last Round | What They Did | Location | Founders | Site | Contact |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
EQRx | $1.9B | Post-IPO | EQRx is a biotechnology company that focuses on re-engineering the process of drug discovery to make them affordable. | Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States | Alexis Borisy | Reveal | |
Global Blood Therapeutics | $969.5M | Post-IPO | GBT is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company developing a therapy for sickle cell disease. | South San Francisco, California, United States | Andrej Sali | Reveal | |
ACELYRIN | $558.0M | Series C | ACELYRIN is a biopharma company that identifies, acquires, and accelerates the development and commercialization of life-changing therapies. | Los Angeles, California, United States | Robert Carey | Reveal | |
Dice Therapeutics | $532.4M | Post-IPO | Dice Therapeutics is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company that makes medicines for chronic autoimmune and inflammatory diseases. | San Francisco, California, United States | Kevin Judice | Reveal | |
Provention Bio | $498.5M | Post-IPO | Provention Bio is a clinical stage biopharmaceutical dedicated to sourcing, developing, and commercializing novel therapeutics. | Red Bank, New Jersey, United States | Ashleigh Palmer | Reveal | |
scPharmaceuticals | $456.6M | Post-IPO | ScPharmaceuticals is a biopharmaceutical company developing a portfolio of transformative pharmaceutical products for subcutaneous delivery. | Lexington, Massachusetts, United States | Pieter Muntendam | Reveal | |
Poseida Therapeutics | $435.5M | Post-IPO | Poseida Therapeutics is a biopharmaceutical company utilizing gene engineering capabilities to develop targeted therapeutics. | San Diego, California, United States | Eric Ostertag | Reveal | |
Scorpion Therapeutics | $420.0M | Series C | Scorpion Therapeutics is a clinical-stage oncology company that specializes in precision medicine for cancer patients. | Boston, Massachusetts, United States | Gaddy Getz | Reveal | |
CinCor Pharma | $418.0M | Post-IPO | CinCor is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company that develops treatments for cardiovascular diseases. | Cincinnati, Ohio, United States | Catherine Pearce | Reveal | |
Kalaris Therapeutics (formerly AlloVir) | $410.6M | Post-IPO | AlloVir focuses on the development of cell therapies and focuses on restoring natural immunity against the virus-associated diseases. | Houston, Texas, United States | Ann Leen | Reveal | |
Pear Therapeutics | $409.0M | Post-IPO | Pear Therapeutics is a software-based digital therapeutics platform designed to treat disease and enhance the efficacy of pharmaceuticals. | Boston, Massachusetts, United States | Stephen Smith | Reveal | |
VectivBio | $399.0M | Post-IPO | VectivBio is a biotechnology company committed to making innovative treatments for patients suffering from serious rare diseases. | Basel, Basel-Stadt, Switzerland | Luca Santarelli | Reveal | |
Exscientia | $376.7M | Grant | Exscientia is a pharmatech company that uses an end-to-end AI platform to design and discover new drugs. | Oxford, Oxfordshire, United Kingdom | Andrew Hopkins | Reveal | |
ITeos Therapeutics | $369.7M | Post-IPO | ITeos Therapeutics is a biotechnology company that specializes in tumor immunology, cancer immunotherapy, and drug discovery. | Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States | Michel Detheux | Reveal | |
PhenomeX | $357.6M | Debt | PhenomeX is a provider of life sciences that have the era of the phenome as the next revolution in biology and medicine unfolds. | Emeryville, California, United States | Bill Davidow | Reveal | |
Inozyme | $353.1M | Post-IPO | Inozyme is a biopharmaceutical company developing therapeutics for rare diseases, with a focus on bone health. | Boston, Massachusetts, United States | Axel Bolte | Reveal | |
Center for Breakthrough Medicines | $350.0M | Corporate | Center for Breakthrough Medicines is an innovative cell and gene therapy focusing on contract development and manufacturing organization. | King Of Prussia, Pennsylvania, United States | Audrey Greenberg | Reveal | |
MindMaze Group (Legacy) | $340.7M | Venture | MindMaze Group (Legacy) provides digital assessments and therapeutics to treat and rehab patients. | Lausanne, Vaud, Switzerland | Tej Tadi | Reveal | |
2seventy bio | $315.0M | Post-IPO | 2seventy bio is an immuno-oncology cell therapy company that discovers and develops cancer therapies. | Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States | — | Reveal | |
Point Biopharma | $310.0M | Post-IPO | Point Biopharma focused on the development and commercialization of radioligand therapies for the treatment of cancer. | Indianapolis, Indiana, United States | Howard Glase | Reveal | |
CARGO Therapeutics | $310.0M | Post-IPO | CARGO Therapeutics develops an adoptive cell therapy to benefit patients from potentially curative treatment options. | San Mateo, California, United States | Crystal Mackall | Reveal | |
Senda Biosciences | $309.0M | Series C | Senda Biosciences is a therapeutics platform company leveraging unprecedented insights into the molecular connections between humans. | Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States | Ignacio Martinez | Reveal | |
ReNAgade Therapeutics | $300.0M | Series A | ReNAgade Therapeutics focuses on the boundless potential of RNA therapeutics to treat disease. | Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States | Brian Goodman | Reveal | |
AmplifyBio | $279.8M | Venture | AmplifyBio is a biotechnology company that develops and advances treatments and cures for disease via cutting-edge technology and research. | West Jefferson, Ohio, United States | J. Kelly Ganjei | Reveal | |
Chinook Therapeutics | $276.0M | Post-IPO | Chinook Therapeutics is a biotechnology company that specializes in the fields of therapeutics and life science. | Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada | Ross Haghighat | Reveal | |
Gyroscope Therapeutics | $269.5M | Corporate | Gyroscope Therapeutics is a clinical-stage gene therapy company focused on developing therapies and treating diseases of the eye. | Stevenage, Herefordshire, United Kingdom | Andrew Lotery | Reveal | |
Chroma Medicine | $260.0M | Series B | Chroma Medicine is a biotechnology company that develops genetic medicines for the treatment of genetic disorders. | Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States | Angelo Lombardo | Reveal | |
Ribon Therapeutics | $259.0M | Venture | Ribon Therapeutics is a biotechnology company focused on the development of therapeutics treatments targeting stress support pathways. | Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States | Paul Chang | Reveal | |
Codiak Biosciences | $257.4M | Post-IPO | Codiak is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company focused on pioneering the development of exosome-based therapeutics. | San Francisco, California, United States | Eric Lander | Reveal | |
Effector Therapeutics | $242.5M | Post-IPO | Effector Therapeutics is an early-stage company focused on the discovery and development of small molecule cancer therapeutics. | San Diego, California, United States | Siegfried Reich | Reveal | |
Icosavax | $235.3M | Post-IPO | Icosavax is focused on developing safe and effective vaccines against infectious diseases that address important unmet medical needs. | Seattle, Washington, United States | Adam Simpson | Reveal | |
HilleVax | $235.0M | Post-IPO | HilleVax is a biopharmaceutical company that focuses on the development and commercialization of novel vaccines. | Boston, Massachusetts, United States | David Socks | Reveal | |
The Valens Company | $223.3M | Post-IPO | The Valens Company is a biotechnology company focused on extraction and the commercialization of cannabinoid-based consumer products. | Kelowna, British Columbia, Canada | Tyler Robson | Reveal | |
Reneo Pharmaceuticals | $220.0M | Post-IPO | Reneo Pharmaceuticals is an operator of a pharmaceutical company used to develop therapies for patients with orphan metabolic diseases. | San Diego, California, United States | Michael Grey | Reveal | |
Oncorus | $218.5M | Post-IPO | Oncorus is an immuno-oncology company developing oncolytic viruses to fight cancer. | Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States | Cyrus Mozayeni | Reveal | |
Tome Biosciences | $213.0M | Series A | Tome Biosciences is a biotechnology company that develops programmable gene insertion technology. | Watertown, Massachusetts, United States | Jonathan Gootenberg, Omar Abudayyeh | Reveal | |
Ikena Oncology | $209.0M | Post-IPO | Ikena Oncology develops differentiated therapies to target cancer growth and resistance, focusing on Hippo and RAS signaling pathways. | Boston, Massachusetts, United States | Karen McGovern | Reveal | |
Elevation Oncology | $197.5M | Post-IPO | Elevation Oncology is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company focused on the development of precision medicines for patients. | New York, New York, United States | Shawn Leland | Reveal | |
Ambys Medicines | $187.0M | Series A | Ambys Medicines is a biotechnology company focused on discovering and developing regenerative and restorative therapies. | South San Francisco, California, United States | Holger Willenbring | Reveal | |
Axcella | $185.5M | Post-IPO | Axcella is a biotechnology company that treats diseases using endogenous metabolic modulators. | Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States | David Berry | Reveal | |
Frequency Therapeutics | $180.3M | Post-IPO | Frequency Therapeutics develops small molecule drugs that activate progenitor cells within the body to restore healthy tissue. | Lexington, Massachusetts, United States | Chris Loose | Reveal | |
Vigil Neuroscience | $180.0M | Post-IPO | Vigil Neuroscience is a biotechnology company that develops novel therapeutics for neurodegenerative diseases. | Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States | Ivana Magovčević-Liebisch | Reveal | |
Beckley Psytech | $164.2M | Undisclosed | Beckley Psytech is a biotechnology company developing psychedelic-based medicines for mental health conditions. | Beckley, Oxfordshire, United Kingdom | Cosmo Feilding Mellen | Reveal | |
Just - Evotec Biologics | $162.6M | Grant | Designing innovative technologies focused on accelerating global access to biotherapeutics. | Seattle, Washington, United States | Dean K. Pettit | Reveal | |
Mindstrong Health | $160.2M | Grant | Mindstrong is a virtual mental health platform. | Menlo Park, California, United States | Paul Dagum | Reveal | |
Better Therapeutics | $150.5M | Post-IPO | Better Therapeutics develops prescription software for treating cardiometabolic diseases. | San Francisco, California, United States | David Perry | Reveal | |
Tarveda Therapeutics | $148.4M | Venture | Tarveda Therapeutics is a developer of miniature drug conjugates designed for the treatment of patients with a wide range of solid tumors. | Watertown, Massachusetts, United States | Omid Farokhzad | Reveal | |
Imara | $144.8M | Post-IPO | Imara is provider of novel therapeutics for the people living with sickle cell disease and hemoglobinopathies. | Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States | James McArthur | Reveal | |
SalioGen Therapeutics | $135.0M | Series B | SalioGen Therapeutics is a gene coding company that develops potentially curative therapies for patients with inherited disorders. | Burlington, Massachusetts, United States | Joseph Higgins | Reveal | |
Aerami Therapeutics | $133.5M | Series B | Aerami Therapeutics focuses on developing novel inhaled therapies for the treatment of chronic diseases. | Durham, North Carolina, United States | John S. Patton | Reveal | |
Kintara Therapeutics | $132.8M | Grant | Kintara Therapeutics is engaged in developing and commercializing therapies for the treatment of cancer patients. | Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada | Dennis M. Brown | Reveal | |
Turnstone Biologics | $132.7M | Series D | Turnstone Biologics is a privately-held clinical stage biotech company. | La Jolla, California, United States | Brian Lichty | Reveal | |
Adaptive Phage Therapeutics | $131.7M | Series B | Adaptive Phage Therapeutics provides therapeutic services intended to treat multi-drug resistant pathogenic bacteria. | Bethesda, Maryland, United States | Greg Merril | Reveal | |
Hound Labs | $130.1M | Debt | Hound Labs has developed the first cannabis breath test that limits detection to the workday giving employers + employees a fair solution. | Oakland, California, United States | Jenny Lynn | Reveal | |
Eyebiotech | $130.0M | Series A | Eyebiotech is an ophthalmology biotechnology company that specializes in therapies for eye diseases. | New York, New York, United States | Anthony P. Adamis, David Guyer | Reveal | |
9 Meters Biopharma | $129.5M | Post-IPO | 9 Meters Biopharma is a gastrointestinal platform company focusing on patients with rare disorders and unmet needs. | Raleigh, North Carolina, United States | Jay Madan | Reveal | |
Akoya Biosciences | $127.0M | Post-IPO | Akoya Biosciences is a spatial biology company offering solutions for high-parameter tissue analysis from biomarker discovery to validation. | Marlborough, Massachusetts, United States | Garry Nolan | Reveal | |
Pardes Biosciences | $126.6M | Post-IPO | Pardes Biosciences is a biotechnology company that develops and commercializes direct-acting antivirals for the treatment of coronavirus. | Carlsbad, California, United States | Uri Lopatin | Reveal | |
OncXerna Therapeutics | $126.5M | Venture | OncXerna Therapeutics offers precision medicine using an innovative RNA-based biomarker platform. | Waltham, Massachusetts, United States | Laura E. Benjamin | Reveal | |
SwanBio Therapeutics | $118.0M | Venture | SwanBio Therapeutics is a gene therapy company focused on the development and commercialisation of genetically defined therapies. | Bala Cynwyd, Pennsylvania, United States | Florian Eichler, Karen Kozarsky, Rachel Salzman | Reveal | |
Aristea Therapeutics | $117.6M | Series B | Aristea Therapeutics is a developer of novel therapies created for autoimmune diseases. | San Diego, California, United States | James Mackay | Reveal | |
Ultivue | $110.6M | Venture | Ultivue is a biotechnology company that specializes in tissue imaging, diagnostics, and multiplexing. | Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States | David R. Walt | Reveal | |
Odyssey Therapeutics | $101.6M | Series A | Odyssey Therapeutics is a computational immunology company that develops novel therapeutics for patients with autoimmune diseases. | San Francisco, California, United States | Kiran Singh | Reveal | |
Nvelop Therapeutics | $100.0M | Seed | Nvelop Therapeutics is a biotechnology company that developes genetic medicines for patients with severe genetic diseases. | Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States | J. Keith Joung | Reveal | |
AgeX Therapeutics | $99.8M | Post-IPO | AgeX is a biotechnology company that develops novel therapeutics for age-related degenerative diseases. | Alameda, California, United States | Michael D West | Reveal | |
54gene | $94.7M | Note | 54gene is a healthcare startup that offers a genetics testing platform. | Washington, District of Columbia, United States | Abasi Ene-Obong | Reveal | |
Glympse Bio | $93.3M | Venture | Glympse Bio is a biotechnology company that transforms disease detection and predict treatment response. | Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States | Gabe Kwong | Reveal | |
Clade Therapeutics | $87.0M | Series A | Clade Therapeutics discovers and delivers next-generation cell medicines to improve the lives of patients. | Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States | Chad Cowan | Reveal | |
Novome Biotechnologies | $83.1M | Series B | Novome Biotechnologies is a biotechnology company focused on engineering defined activities into the human. | South San Francisco, California, United States | Weston Whitaker | Reveal | |
Spotlight Therapeutics | $80.7M | Series B | Spotlight Therapeutics is a biotechnology company that develops biologics targeted to specific cell populations in gene editing. | Hayward, California, United States | Alexander Marson | Reveal | |
Intergalactic Therapeutics | $75.0M | Series A | Intergalactic Therapeutics is an ATP company, is revolutionizing gene therapies with a novel non-viral platform. | Boston, Massachusetts, United States | Michael Ehlers | Reveal | |
TFF Pharmaceuticals | $72.9M | Post-IPO | TFF Pharmaceuticals is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company that develops drug products. | Austin, Texas, United States | Glenn Mattes | Reveal | |
Calyxt | $72.3M | Post-IPO | Calyxt is an agbiotech company that focuses on developing healthier crops. | Minnesota City, Minnesota, United States | Dan Voytas | Reveal | |
Palette Life Sciences | $70.0M | Debt | Palette Life Sciences is a medical device company that provides a wide range of products and services for patients. | Santa Barbara, California, United States | Arne Folke Brodin | Reveal | |
INNOVO by Atlantic Therapeutics | $69.2M | Venture | INNOVO by Atlantic Therapeutics is a medical technology firm that develops pelvic floor muscle strengthening and nerve stimulation products. | Galway, Galway, Ireland | — | Reveal | |
AllStripes | $67.1M | Series B | AllStripes is a healthcare technology company that accelerates drug development and research for the treatment of rare diseases. | San Francisco, California, United States | Nancy Yu | Reveal | |
Ascend Gene & Cell Therapies | $65.9M | Series A | Ascend Gene & Cell Therapies is a model for gene and cell therapy manufacturing. | Potters Bar, Hertford, United Kingdom | — | Reveal | |
Day Zero Diagnostics | $63.0M | Venture | The future of infectious disease diagnostics starts at Day Zero. | Boston, Massachusetts, United States | Doug Kwon, Dougal Maclaurin, Jong Lee, Melis Anahtar, Miriam Huntley | Reveal | |
CODA Biotherapeutics | $62.7M | Venture | CODA Biotherapeutics develops a chemogenetic platform designed to modulate neuronal activity. | South San Francisco, California, United States | Cyrus Mozayeni | Reveal | |
Scout Bio | $62.3M | Series B | Scout Bi is a biotechnology company that specializes in veterinary, animal health, and gene therapy. | Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States | Krishna Polu | Reveal | |
EIP Pharma | $59.6M | Grant | EIP Pharma is a clinical stage therapeutics company developing drugs to treat neurodegenerative diseases. | Boston, Massachusetts, United States | John Alam | Reveal | |
Sonnet BioTherapeutics | $59.2M | Post-IPO | Sonnet BioTherapeutics is a biotechnology company for innovating biologic drugs of the single or bispecific mechanism of action. | Princeton, New Jersey, United States | John K. Cini | Reveal | |
Visus Therapeutics | $56.0M | Debt | Visus Therapeutics is a clinical-stage company developing innovative medicines. | Seattle, Washington, United States | Ben Bergo | Reveal | |
Catalog | $54.3M | Series B | Catalog is a developer of a data conversion and storage platform used to offer the next generation of digital data archives. | Boston, Massachusetts, United States | Hyunjun Park | Reveal | |
Trace Genomics | $50.2M | Series B | Trace Genomics provides genetic insights into soil, helping farmers optimize their agricultural practices for better crop yield. | Burlingame, California, United States | Diane Wu | Reveal | |
XinThera | $50.0M | Series B | XinThera is a drug discovery company focused on building small molecule oncology and immunology pipeline. | San Diego, California, United States | Gene Hung | Reveal | |
Pattern Ag | $50.0M | Series B | Pattern Ag provides soil microbiome analysis and recommendations for input optimization on farms. | Emeryville, California, United States | Adam Kerr | Reveal | |
Cardionomic | $49.8M | Debt | Cardionomic is a medical device developer that treats reduced cardiac output. | Forest Lake, Minnesota, United States | Steve Goedeke | Reveal | |
Embody | $47.8M | Series C | Embody specializes in biofabrication techniques and biologic products that help repair tendon and ligament injuries. | Norfolk, Virginia, United States | Jeff Conroy | Reveal | |
Blue Note Therapeutics | $46.9M | Series A | Blue Note Therapeutics is a prescription digital therapeutics company that merges deep scientific and clinical expertise. | San Francisco, California, United States | Elan Tye | Reveal | |
Alucent Biomedical | $46.6M | Venture | Alucent Biomedical is a biomedical company that develops a combination drug-device therapy for the treatment of vascular diseases. | Salt Lake City, Utah, United States | Ron Utecht | Reveal | |
Vibliome | $46.0M | Series A | Vibliome is developing a new family of therapeutics for the treatment of cancer, contraception and other indications. | Bozeman, Montana, United States | Gary Flynn | Reveal | |
OncoVerity | $44.0M | Series A | OncoVerity focuses on optimizing and advancing the development of cusatuzumab, a novel anti-CD70 antibody. | Aurora, Colorado, United States | — | Reveal | |
SCiFi Foods | $38.7M | Series A | SCiFi Foods is racing to be the first to bring cultivated beef to market with an advanced synbio platform & cutting-edge tools like CRISPR. | San Francisco, California, United States | Jess Krieger | Reveal | |
NuChem Sciences | $37.6M | Venture | NuChem Sciences is a drug discovery in chemistry contract research organization (CRO) located in Montréal and Lévis. | Quebec, Quebec, Canada | Daniel Guay | Reveal | |
Uncommon | $33.5M | Series A | Uncommon is about providing with that juicy, tender, and delicious meat they love but without harming their health, planet, and animals. | Cambridge, Cambridgeshire, United Kingdom | Benjamina Bollag | Reveal | |
Ultimovacs | $32.3M | Post-IPO | Ultimovacs is a pharmaceutical company developing novel immunotherapies against cancer. | Oslo, Oslo, Norway | Øyvind K. Arnesen | Reveal | |
MorphImmune | $32.1M | Venture | MorphImmune is a preclinical biotechnology company that targets small-molecule therapeutics. | West Lafayette, Indiana, United States | Bruce Turner | Reveal | |
New Age Meats | $32.0M | Series A | New Age Meats is a biotechnology company that develops healthy cultivated meat grown from animal cells instead of animal slaughter. | Berkeley, California, United States | Andra Necula | Reveal | |
PredictImmune | $31.4M | Grant | Providing tools to physicians in the treatment of patients with immune-mediated disease, through prediction of long term clinical prognosis. | Cambridge, Cambridgeshire, United Kingdom | Eoin McKinney | Reveal |
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many biotech startups have failed?
The VCbacked Startup Graveyard currently tracks 180 venture-backed biotech startups that have shut down, collectively raising $21.2B before closing. That is roughly 8 percent of all closed companies in the database, which is based on the last five years of fundraising data.
What is the biggest biotech startup failure?
By total capital raised, the largest biotech failure in the database is EQRx, which raised $1.9B before shutting down.
Why do biotech startups fail?
Biotech is binary in a way software never is: a failed trial can end a company overnight regardless of how much was raised. This section of the graveyard includes some of the largest single losses in the dataset. Across the dataset, the most common last round before shutdown in biotech was Other, and the largest cohort of failures last raised in 2022.
Can I contact founders of failed biotech startups?
Founder names are shown free on this page for every closed biotech company. VCbacked paid plans reveal verified founder contact details where available and unlock CSV export.