Freiburg — The cy-Clone, cytena’s newest innovation, is a laboratory device that

enables the gentle separation of cells. In order to set up its marketing and distribution

channels and to standardize its production processes, the company required start-up capital.

“During our fundraising we greatly benefitted from the fact that since 2010 our laboratory

units have helped a number of our partners to simplify their processes. In addition, cytena

has already been generating revenue”, says Jonas Schöndube, founding member and

managing director of cytena, adding, “This very convincingly proved that there is a real need

for our technology.”

The seed capital raised will enable the company to make the most of their technological

advantage over competing technologies and to transition from producing each cy-Clone unit

and its consumables individually to serial production. At the same time, cytena’s marketing

and distribution channels will be widened more rapidly.

“Currently, we are in particularly close contact with cell line development units in the

pharmaceutical industry e. g. for biologicals and with researchers in the field of single-cell

analyses. Obviously, efficiency and cell viability are key, but quite often these customers also

need to fulfill the requirements set by regulatory bodies such as the FDA,” says André Gross,

founding member and technical director of cytena. “Our competitors’ systems are complex

and expensive, and cannot prove clonality or safeguard against cross-contamination. In

addition, a substantial amount of training is required to operate them. Users wanting to avoid

all of these complications and inconveniences should use our unique technology.”

“The global market potential for single-cell technologies is estimated to top EUR 360 million.

Moving forward, cytena will focus on further developing the platform technology for cancer

and prenatal testing units as well as units for the production of cell therapeutic drugs. These

areas of application will unlock a much larger market,” says Dr. Sebastian Schöfer,

explaining HTGF’s reasoning to invest.

About cytena GmbH

For the past four years, Jonas Schöndube and André Gross, two engineers from Freiburg,

have been focussing on single-cell printing technologies. They partnered with the inventor of

the technology Dr. Peter Koltay, economist Benjamin Steimle and BioFluidix GmbH to found

April 29, 2015 Press release

cytena GmbH www.cytena.com 2

cytena, a University of Freiburg spin-off company sponsored by the German federal support

program EXIST.

Single cells are required for the development of state-of-the-art drugs, so-called biologicals

as well as for the genetic analysis of single cells for cancer and stem cell research. The cyClone

is supported by an automated imaging process to encapsulate cells in droplets, which

are delivered to any type of substrate. Thanks to this particularly gentle delivery method, the

cells are able to survive post printing and can either be analyzed thereafter or grown into

clonal colonies. To determine clonality, multiple images are recorded during the process.

Cross-contamination is avoided by the use of disposable parts.

www.cytena.com

About High-Tech Gruenderfonds

High-Tech Gruenderfonds invests in young, high potential high-tech start-ups. The seed

financing provided is designed to enable start-ups to take an idea through prototyping and to

market launch. Typically, High-Tech Gruenderfonds invests EUR 500,000 in the seed stage,

with the potential for up to a total of EUR 2 million per portfolio company in follow-on

financing. Investors in this public/private partnership include the Federal Ministry of

Economics and Energy, the KfW Banking Group, as well as strategic corporate investors

including ALTANA, BASF, Bayer, B. Braun, Robert Bosch, CEWE, Daimler, Deutsche Post

DHL, Deutsche Telekom, Evonik, Lanxess, media + more venture Beteiligungs GmbH & Co.

KG, METRO, Qiagen, RWE Innogy, SAP, Tengelmann and Carl Zeiss. High-Tech

Gruenderfonds has about EUR 576 million under management in two funds (EUR 272 million

HTGF I, EUR 304 million HTGF II).

Contact:

High-Tech Gründerfonds Management GmbH

Schlegelstraße 2

53113 Bonn

Dr. Sebastian Schöfer

Tel: +49 (228) 823 00-100

Fax: +49 (228) 823 000-50

s.schoefer@htgf.de

www.high-tech-gruenderfond