Wobble is a spin-out from the University of Edinburgh’s Roslin Institute, was founded by CEO Richard Kuo in April 2021, and has developed a range of hardware and software tools that give scientists and clinicians a more detailed picture of underlying biology.

Wobble is already conducting trials with some of the world’s largest RNA sequencing organisations, and the investment is supporting the expansion of the Wobble team, strengthening its Intellectual Property (IP), and will help to drive sales and demonstrate Wobble’s ability to improve clinical outcomes.

St Andrews-based Eos leads the investment round alongside the University of Edinburgh’s in-house venture investment fund Old College Capital. This investment will form part of a £2.15m seed-round including a deeptech venture capital firm, and a small number of private investors.

Richard Kuo, CEO and founder of Wobble Genomics, said: “There is a huge global market of scientists and clinicians who would buy our products as part of their sequencing work. On top of this, we plan to target a higher value market by leveraging our existing technologies with the overall aim of being the first global company to build a picture of disease states that are encoded in RNA.”

Andrew McNeill, managing partner, Eos Advisory, added: “Richard is already a globally respected researcher in RNA sequencing, and now has the ability to build a team to commercialise novel approaches that address the big issues and understanding of this exciting field of life science.

“The importance of RNA sequencing and its role in enabling clinicians to understand disease has only just been recognised over the last couple of years. This investment sits at the heart of what Eos works for – backing the very latest and most promising innovations that have the potential to have a positive impact globally.”

Nicola Broughton, formerly an investment director at Mercia Asset Management PLC with over 20 years’ experience of working in leadership positions in the life sciences sector, and a specialist in university spin-outs, was heavily involved in Wobble’s spin-out process and investment raise, and was appointed Wobble’s chair in July. Also, John Duncan, founding director of Alba Equity, took up the role of finance director in April.

Wobble Genomics marks the first investment from the newly raised Eos EIS Innovation Fund, which invested alongside the Eos Syndicate. This marks an important evolution for the St Andrews-based investment firm, which has had a successful year to date with its portfolio, including Enough (previously 3FBio) securing a global deal with Unilever, and a £42 million Series B investment round. Eos is also actively building its venture partnership model, sharing deal flow with like-minded investors from larger commercial markets.

Andrew McNeill added: “Our firm’s focus is on impact investment in Scottish science, engineering and technology innovation, whilst bringing inward investment that allows local companies to scale into global markets faster.”

Wobble Genomics has been supported by Edinburgh Innovations, the University of Edinburgh’s commercialisation service, since 2019.

Wobble received a £100,000 grant and licensing support from Scottish Enterprise’s High-Growth Spin-Out Programme in 2020, and recently secured a £300,000 grant from Innovate UK.