Genoox raises $6M to make genetic data analysis more accessible for clinics

Genoox, a startup that wants to make it easier for medical professionals to use genomic data in patient care, has raised $6 million in funding. The capital includes a seed round from Inimiti Capital Partners and a Series A round led by Glilot Capital Partners.

Genoox’s software is already used in many of the top genetic medicine institutes and commercial labs in Israel; earlier this year, it was also contracted by the Israeli government to help analyze genomic data from more than 100,000 citizens, in a project similar to the 100,000 Genomes Project in the U.K. The company will use its funding for expansion into the U.S.

CEO Amir Trabelsi, who founded Genoox in 2014 with CTO Moshe Einhorn, says its technology, which uses machine-learning algorithms to analyze rare genetic mutations and predict the probability they are responsible for a condition, makes it less time-consuming and expensive for clinics to handle data from genetic screening. While next-generation sequencing technologies, which can sequence entire genomes within a day, are currently accessible to only a few facilities, Genoox’s founders want their tools to make a routine part of patient care.

“Deep data analytics has the capacity to impact so many fields, and medicine is certainly included, but there seems to be a gap in innovation between the scientific developments surrounding genetics and the speed at which advancements are being made to make genetic sequencing accessible to treating clinicians,” Trabelsi says. “With Genoox, our mission is to close this gap by making genetic sequencing more accessible for the masses.”

Genoox’s current platform can examine data from both whole-genome sequencing (WGS), which sequences all the base pairs in a genome at one time, as well as whole-exome sequencing (WES), a less costly alternative to whole-genome sequencing that sequences exons, which make up about one percent of the human genome.

Both are important tools for diagnosing hereditary genetic disorders, especially for rare childhood diseases, Trabelsi says, which require both known and rare mutations to be examined. The company also plans to create new applications for tests to determine if a person is a carrier for inherited genetic disorders, prenatal testing, and genetic testing for cancer.