Adela bags $48M in Series A1 to advance methylation-based head and neck cancer test

Adela has raised $48 million in a Series A1 round backed by new investor and diagnostic giant Labcorp to fund a test for monitoring minimal residual disease (MRD) in head and neck cancer (HNC).

The round was backed by existing investors, including F-Prime Capital, OrbiMed and Deerfield Management, bringing Adela’s total capital raised to date to $108 million. Labcorp, which operates a US network of more than 30 primary laboratories, also pitched in.

“Labcorp is obviously a leading player in the field, and separate from the investment, we see opportunities to potentially pursue collaborations with regard to a commercial approach,” Adela interim CEO Lisa Alderson told Endpoints News in an interview.

The proceeds will help advance Adela’s genome-wide methylome platform, and develop and commercialize its test for MRD in HNC with a launch planned for 2025, Alderson said.

Anne-Renee Hartman

The platform isolates methylated regions of the genome through high-affinity enrichment, capturing more genomic material for sequencing than enzymatic or chemical methods.

“Different cancer types have unique methylation signals, but cancer, in general, has many shared methylation signals … so this approach can detect many kinds of cancer simultaneously,” chief medical officer Anne-Renee Hartman told Endpoints.

The proceeds should also help Adela develop a multi-cancer early detection (MCED) product.

Unlike mutation-based tests, “our platform has been shown to be able to identify the subtype of a [particular] cancer” and provide other information on its underlying biology, Hartman explained. The MCED product could, therefore, revolutionize the way early-stage cancer is detected.

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