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Sera Prognostics raises USD36m Series D financing led by Blue Ox

Sera Prognostics (Sera), a health diagnostics company dedicated to improving the lives of women and babies through individualised prenatal care, has raised USD36 million in a Series D financing round led by Blue Ox Healthcare Partners (Blue Ox), alongside two strategic healthcare companies.

Proceeds from the Series D financing will be used to increase commercialisation of Sera’s PreTRM test and to measure real-world clinical improvements and economic savings in collaboration with top health plans and providers.
 
Sera’s products focus on the early prediction of a woman’s individualised risk of preterm birth and other pregnancy complications. The Company’s PreTRM® test is the only clinically-validated, commercially available biomarker blood test to accurately assess a woman’s individualised risk of premature delivery. The PreTRM® test enables earlier, more proactive clinical decisions designed to prolong gestation, improve the health of the baby and lower healthcare costs. As evidenced by a key scientific publication recently released online in Obstetrics & Gynaecology (December 2019; volume 134, issue 6), Sera is the leading authority in biomarker preterm birth risk prediction.
 
“Preterm birth – the leading cause of infant mortality – is an unaddressed global crisis, accounting for over USD30 billion in excess annual spending in the US alone. Blue Ox’s investment in Sera is a testament to the industry’s confidence in PreTRM and Sera’s mission of improving the health of pregnant women and newborns while reducing the cost of treatments for premature birth,” says Gregory C Critchfield, MD, MS, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Sera. “We are thrilled to have innovative healthcare investor Blue Ox, a major US healthcare company, and an international diagnostics manufacturer join our strong investor syndicate, and look forward to leveraging their combined strategic, financial, operational and healthcare industry expertise as we commercialise personalised medicine innovations in pregnancy care and scale our business.”
 
“Sera’s leading-edge platform reflects healthcare’s move towards individualised, value-based care and underscores Blue Ox’s commitment to supporting companies targeting this transformation and poised for tremendous growth. Sera’s PreTRM® test is revolutionising pregnancy care by accurately identifying a woman’s individualised risk for preterm birth and supporting better outcomes at lower costs,” adds Charles D Kennedy, MD, Managing Partner at Blue Ox. “Importantly, PreTRM is the only commercially available blood test that arms practitioners with critical risk information they need to identify and treat patients at elevated risk of premature delivery using proactive interventions and guideline-based therapies. As a result, we believe PreTRM will be the go-to solution for commercial plans, Medicaid programs, employers and risk-based providers seeking to effectively manage the clinical and economic epidemic of preterm birth. We are pleased to support Sera at this pivotal point in its evolution.”
 
Existing investors Domain Associates, InterWest Partners, Laboratory Corporation of America Holdings, Catalyst Health Ventures, and Chione Ltd also participated in the Series D investment round.
 

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