Annoroad Raises $105M in Funding Round

The Chinese next-generation sequencing company Annoroad this week announced it had netted $105 million in a Series C funding round. Ping An Ventures and the Shenzhen GTJA Investment Group led the round, with additional money coming from SoftBank China Venture Capital.

The company, known widely for its fertility and tumor tests, is among the largest genomics firms in China. In 2015, Annoroad announced plans to co-develop a prenatal DNA diagnostic with Illumina, combining the American company’s sequencing technology with its own nucleic acid extraction and data analysis. That resulted in NextSeq550AR, a sequencing platform

In a statement, the company said the windfall will partly go toward developing its overseas business efforts, though it didn’t elaborate.

It will also use the investment to improve research and development, hire talent, and increase efficiency and sustainability. Some of the money will be diverted to SolarGenomics, a cloud-based platform the company launched 3 months ago for bioinformatics and research storage.

Annoroad CEO Chongjian Chen called the funding “fresh impetus” for the company to implement more sustainable practices.

“With the mission of enhancing life value, based on gene technology, Annoroad is aiming at bringing more further social benefits, serving human health and accelerating the discoveries in life science,” Chen said.

The Chinese consumer genomics giant is not the first in its field to receive a 9-figure investment this year. 23andMe famously received $250 million earlier this year, reflecting global confidence in a genomics market that is expected to grow to $340 million worldwide in the next 5 years.