Teckro, a Limerick-based life sciences technology startup, announced today that it has raised $6m (€5.4m) in a Series A funding round, led by a San Francisco VC firm called Founders Fund.
Enterprise Ireland and private investors also took part in the fundraising – EI previously put €350,000 into Teckro in December 2015. CRO filings show that the company raised €1.2m in August 2015. In all, Teckro claims to have raised €7m to date.
Teckro was formed in 2015 by Gary Hughes, Jacek Skryzpiec and Nigel Hughes. They were previously co-founders of Firecrest Clinical, which was acquired by ICON in 2011.
Teckro is chaired by Peter Gray, former CEO of ICON, who is also chairman of UDG Healthcare, and a director of Jazz Pharmaceuticals and Aptuit.
Machine Learning
Teckro uses information retrieval and machine learning technologies to improve the speed and accuracy of trial conduct. The technology has already been adopted by a number of big pharma companies.
In Association with
According to CEO Gary Hughes: “We set out to make a difference, to make it easier for drug developers, research staff and patients to connect, and to simplify every interaction in the conduct of a clinical trial.
“The funding will be used to expand our product development team as we continue to digitise clinical research services.”
Hughes continued: “Fundamentally, the clinical trial landscape has changed and physicians struggle with the current method of conducting clinical trials. The funding we are announcing today validates our unique approach, and the growth potential of the company.”
Scott Nolan, partner at Founders Fund, commented: “We’re really impressed by the Teckro team and their vision for clinical research.
“There’s a clear opportunity in modernising how clinical trials are run, and Teckro’s mobile-first solution is informed by a first-hand understanding of the challenges involved in conducting global clinical trials.”
Founders Fund is best known as one of the early backers of Facebook and Airbnb.
Teckro's Limerick headquarters is fun central
