Venture capital roundup: Which Philly companies raised the most in 2022?

Following Philly’s best-ever year for venture capital in 2021, 2022 was more on track with where the trend was heading in years prior. Though we’ll be waiting for final Q4 numbers for a few more weeks, trends from Q3 show that the region has pulled nearly $5 billion in venture capital through October of this year. Biotech and life sciences companies are a huge driver in VC dollars, data from PitchBook and the National Venture Capital Association’s PitchBook-NVCA Venture Monitor show.

Public offerings have also been affected over the last year as many companies that had been prepping for IPOs are waiting out a recession: “IPOs continued to be essentially nonexistent for VC-backed companies in 2022,” the Q2 Venture Monitor report said, “with only 22 closed during the first half of the year, relative to 183 in 2021, and 108 in 2020.”

So, who in 2022 has raised the most? Here’s a snapshot of some of the year’s largest VC rounds for Philly-area companies, based on Venture Monitor reports and Technical.ly’s own reporting. Did we miss any? Email philly@technical.ly to let us know.

10. Savana’s $45 million Series A

The 2009-founded fintech company in Malvern, which makes a unified banking operations platform for its clients, this summer raised a $45 million Series A led by Toronto-based Georgian. Its CTO said then that the company would be focused on continued expansion of its platform and talent acquisition for the rest of 2022.

9. Swan Bio’s $56 million Series B

In May, the Bala Cynwyd gene therapy company announced a Series B led by founding investors Syncona Limited and Mass General Brigham Ventures, bringing its total funding to $133 million. The funds aimed to support the company’s ongoing evolution to a research and development organization, with an initial focus on the clinical advancement of its main drug, SBT101.

8. iECURE’s $65 million Series A-1

University of Pennsylvania gene-editing spinout iECURE raised a $65 million Series A-1 this quarter. The majority of the round will go toward advancing the company’s lead program, GTP-506, including funding Investigational New Drug-enabling studies, starting clinical trials following regulatory approval, and achieving early human data readouts. It’ll also fuel further progress on iECURE’s portfolio of gene-editing products for the treatment of patients with rare liver diseases.

7. Vitara Biomedical’s $75 million Series B

In September, the Center City medical device company that serves infant health, raised a $75 million Series B led by Sands Capital and joined by new investors Google Ventures, Khosla Ventures, First Spark Ventures, CHOP, Flerie Invest, a VAS Ventures Special Purpose Vehicle led by Martin Varsavsky, and Fry’s Path Capital. The funding went toward developing its technology, the CEO said in a statement.

6. Orchestra Biomed’s $110 million Series D

In July, the New Hope-based biomedical company partnered with Medtronic and snagged $110 million in a Series D funding round. The partnership will work to develop a potential treatment for patients with hypertension who have a cardiac pacemaker, and the round is expected to fund operations through 2026, the company said in a statement.

5. Castle Creek Biosciences’ $112.8 million

The Exton-based cell and gene therapy company uses two lentiviral platforms to develop and commercialize therapies for genetic diseases. In May, it raised $112.8 million to fund its completion of a Phase 3 study of its product addressing recessive dystrophic epidermolysis bullosa, a debilitating rare genetic skin disorder.

4. Mineralys’ $118 million Series B

The clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company, which is developing a therapy for the treatment of hypertension, raised a $118 million Series B in June. The funds were aimed at advancing MLS-101, a  aldosterone synthase inhibitor which was being evaluated in a Phase 2 clinical trial.

3. Houwzer’s $118 million Series B

The real estate tech company raised a $118 million Series B in February — $18 million in equity and a $100 million warehouse line of credit — with the aim of launching of three new consumer products. Last week the company acquired next-gen brokerage Trelora in a move that expands Houwzer’s footprint to 14 states as it makes a move from mortgage broker to fully delegated lender.

2. dbt Labs’ $222 million Series D

In February, the local-ish analytics engineering company raised a $222 million Series D at a $4.2 billion valuation. At the start of 2022, dbt said it had 9,000 companies using its open source, SQL-based data analytics tool, and that this round of funding would allow it to build the “next layer in the modern data stack.”

1. Gopuff’s $1.5 billion

Though instant needs delivery company Gopuff has had quite the year of layoffs, it’s also the Philly-area company that raised the most capital in 2022, like in previous years: The Venture Monitor report from Q2 noted a $1.5 billion investment in the company in May. Though the company didn’t publicly comment on the raise, a Gopuff spokesperson confirmed to Technical.ly in July that the company had filed this year to raise up to $1.5 billion.