SBIR/STTR Recipient

Spotlight Therapeutics

Brief Description

Developer of next-generation gene editing therapeutics in a preclinical pipeline. The company creates programmable nucleases that selectively target and edit specific cell populations directly in the body. These engineered nucleases will enable direct intervention in vivo like a true administered biologic. Spotlight Therapeutics co-founders include Dr. Patrick Hsu, a UC Berkeley Assistant Professor of Bioengineering and co-founder of the Arc Institute.

Timeline 2017. Company founded. Inventors

Colleen McGourty, Lorena de Onate, Ross...

Imprint Energy, Inc.

Brief Description

Imprint Energy aims to reshape the battery landscape. Currently available battery technologies limit the pace of improvement in design and functionality of portable electronic devices. Imprint Energy will address these shortcomings with its breakthrough zinc-based rechargeable battery technology, ZincPolyª. ZincPolyª battery technology removes longstanding limitations on the rechargeability of zinc-based batteries and enables the production of ultrathin, flexible, high energy density rechargeable batteries for significantly lower cost and without the design limitations or...

Ansa Biotechnologies

Brief Description

With synthetic DNA fueling innovation in biological research, therapeutics, diagnostics, and biomanufacturing, there is an urgent need for faster and more accurate DNA synthesis. Currently, DNA is manufactured via a chemical method that has remained essentially unchanged for 35 years and has approached a plateau. Ansa Biotechnologies is developing a faster, more accurate, and cleaner enzyme-based DNA synthesis technology. The technique promises to dramatically accelerate innovation in biological research and engineering.

The approach is based on polymerase-...

Sonera Magnetics

Brief Description

Magnetometers are nearly ubiquitous in today’s world, fueling applications as diverse as medical diagnostics and self-driving cars. The most sensitive magnetometers, however, can only operate at extreme temperatures and in a shielded environment that isolates the sensor from ambient magnetic fields. Sonera Magnetics is developing a magnetometer that can operate at room temperature and in portable form factors with sensitivity comparable to the best magnetic sensors available today, dramatically increasing potential applications.

Co-founders Dominic Labanowski and...

Pow.Bio

Brief Description

Pow.Bio provides intelligent fermentation services for industrial and synthetic biology. The company has built an AI platform that rapidly identified better-performing process conditions, increasing output 2–3x from existing infrastructure within just 100 days. The company's services combine continuous fermentation with advanced control methodology to quickly optimize the fermentation process and deliver high yields at low cost. The scale runs from 1-100 liter capacity for bacteria, yeast, and filamentous fungi. The first-of-its-kind fermentation technology solves the...

SirenOpt

Brief Description

SirenOpt provides manufacturing intelligence solutions that accelerate research and development and enable cost-effective manufacturing of high-performance micro- and nano-materials, including lithium-ion batteries, membranes, semiconductors, flexible electronics, packaging materials, and many others. The company's real-time manufacturing intelligence platform, designed for cost-effective manufacturing of thin films, utilizes cold atmospheric plasma and physics-informed machine learning to collect critical manufacturing data and improve manufacturing quality and output....

ChemFinity Technologies

Brief Description

ChemFinity Technologies is tackling one of the most urgent challenges of the energy transition: the critical mineral shortage. The company leverages highly tunable porous polymer sorbents that selectively extract more than 20 different metals and other elements from liquids and gases. ChemFinity has developed two forms of materials: sorbent beads, which function like a Brita filter but target specific metals, and membranes that purify water while simultaneously capturing valuable metals. The technology has the potential to efficiently recover metal from various waste...

Calyx

Brief Description

Calyx is a materials science company that harnesses biology to provide low cost and highly accurate sensors for real-time detection and analysis of air chemicals in a variety of industries, including safety, healthcare, transportation, and food. The company offers commercial customers phage-based sensing and analysis of multiple gasses.

Company co-founders Ray Chiu and Benson Fan developed the company’s founding technology as a capstone project while they were students in the UC Berkeley-UCSF Masters in Bioengineering program. With the encouragement of UC Berkeley...

MuMec, Inc.

Brief Description

MuMec builds wireless transceiver technologies that drastically reduce power consumption for use with Bluetooth LE (BLE) and LoRa/Sigfox protocols. Founded by researchers from UC Berkeley, MuMec integrates Radio Frequency MEMS technology with CMOS design, offering a 10-100x reduction in power consumption, enabling consumer devices and IoT applications to extend battery life, enable always-on wireless connectivity, and operate entirely on scavenged power.

The company is disrupting the wireless communication market by offering the truly ultra-low power wireless ICs...

Nanosys

Brief Description SiNANOdeª, a silicon-graphite anode material, improves the performance of lithium-ion batteries: Significant increase over existing solutions in full cell energy density and cycle life. Manufacturing process compatible with existing graphite-anode electrode production equipment. Scalable SiNANOdeª production processes available now for technology transfer and licensing. Timeline 2001. Company founded 2023. Acquired by Shoei Chemical, as an operating subsidiary Inventors

Ali Shakouri, Arunava Majumdar, Peidong Yang, Yiying Wu...