(Editor's note: This press release was originally published on Innovation Origins on June 12, 2023.)
EINDHOVEN, The Netherlands, June 7, 2023 –Gilbert Technologies, an early stage medical device company developing a next generation soft mist inhalation device to improve treatment for difficult to treat lung conditions, today announced the completion of its €7 million Seed – and Series A investment round.
The investment rounds are led by Dutch deep-tech investor DeepTechXL and joined by existing shareholders NanoCorp and Delft Enterprises. With the transaction also Brabant Startup Fonds has become a shareholder, through conversion of its start-up loan to the company. The equity financing of €4 million is supplemented by the Netherlands Enterprise Agency.
Proceeds of the funding will be used to advance Gilbert’s customizable electrospray drug delivery platform, utilizing its proprietary electro hydrodynamic atomization (EHDA) technology, into a smart handheld medical inhaler device which offers the potential to significantly improve effectiveness of therapies for lung patients and to reduce the burden on the health systems.
Gilbert is an emerging player in the field of respiratory medical devices, offering a breakthrough solution for more precise pulmonary administration of advanced pharmaceutical compounds. Generating a customizable monodispersed aerosol, the Gilbert electrospray technology promises the ability to target a high concentration of the drug to the diseased areas of the respiratory tract. An additional aim is to replace systemic administration (oral, IV, subcutaneous) of costly therapies with local administration by inhalation to improve patient outcomes for difficult to treat respiratory and other conditions and to reduce medical costs.
Prof. Dr. P.N.R. (Richard) Dekhuijzen, Emeritus Professor of Pulmonology, Radboud University Medical Center Nijmegen:“Chronic lung diseases remain the third leading cause of death and disability worldwide. More than 4 million people die each year from a lung disease and this number has been increasing substantially over the last few years since the Covid-19 pandemic. (source: WHO). Inhaled drug delivery is the cornerstone in the management of patients across a spectrum of respiratory diseases. Today’s inhalers are the result of decades of research, design and innovative engineering and have improved the quality of life of hundreds of millions of people worldwide over this time. Considerable challenges still remain to be overcome to continually innovate and improve targeted drug delivery to the lungs. Gilbert’s electrospray technology has the potential to offer unique benefits to patients for aerosolized medication targeting of more complex and advanced molecular entities for respiratory diseases and for pulmonary administration of molecules for other disease areas.”
As a first target the company wants to improve anti-infective, biological, and oncological treatments with their smart precision inhaler solution in joint development with biopharmaceutical company partners.
Maurits Huigen, CEO of Gilbert, said: “We are privileged that our new esteemed partners join us on our mission to redefine treatment for lung patients, together with our existing loyal shareholders. This financing round validates our vision to make medical treatment easier and more effective, to save lives and help patients live the life they want, while reducing the burden on healthcare systems. We are looking forward to the next wave of growth that lies ahead from becoming a clinical stage - towards commercial stage company bygetting to key inflection points on the development of our investigational device and partnerships with pharmaceutical companies for our first drug-device combination.”
Ron Maurer, Partner of DeeptechXL, said: “We are excited to lead this investment rounds and to invest in the further development of the EHDA technology. We do this with support from our Dutch and international network partners. With this investment, Gilbert can accelerate the development of its intelligent precision inhaler and thus create significant societal impact by improving the quality of life to the growing global number of lung patients.
About Gilbert Technologies Gilbert Technologies is a Dutch spin-off company of Delft University of Technology, that designs and develops disruptive medical devices to improve health care and patient care to offer a better quality of life through innovative and disruptive sustainable health technologies.
About DeepTechXL DeepTechXL launched the €100 million DeepTechXL Fund I in 2022 with partners ASML, Philips, PME Pension Fund, Invest-NL, Brabantse Ontwikkelings Maatschappij (BOM), research institute TNO and several family offices. The fund also received a €9 million Seed Capital loan from the Dutch government institute RVO (Netherlands Enterprise Agency), specifically allocated for early-stage investments.
