Swedish medtech start-up Capitainer has closed a share issue of SEK34 million (US$3.38 million) to capitalise on growing interest in homesampling with its new qDBS dried blood spot testing system. The investment round, led by Sciety, brought in both existing and new industry specialist investors and several board members and the CEO.

Capitainer has now firmly established that the home sampling system works for clinical use, with an impressive success rate with first time users. Patients can use Capitainer’s qDBS system to collect their own blood sample for diagnostic testing as a dried blood spot in the privacy of their home. The patented technology ensures exact sample volumes of 10µl with low CV, independent of haematocrit. Patients simply apply one drop of capillary blood from a finger prick to the inlet port on the qDBS card which automatically fills a microchannel with the required amount and discards any excess. The potential for human error is thus significantly reduced. Subsequently, the blood volume contained in the microchannel automatically transfers to the specimen collection disc, forming a high-quality dried blood spot sample, preserved for quantitative bioanalysis. The filled card can then be safely transported to the point of testing without the need for refrigeration or specialised packaging.

Ernst Westman, Capitainer chairman commented: “Once again we are delighted to have secured such strong support from experienced medtech and diagnostics industry investors. COVID-19 presented us with an unexpected obstacle, but also a welcomed opportunity to prove the utility of our products. This success has generated unprecedented interest world-wide and the new funding will enable us to accelerate both our product development and commercialisation efforts.” Christopher Aulin, CEO, said: “Our home-sampling products have generated interest across the whole spectrum of diagnostic testing. From drugs of abuse to metabolic disorders, we are being contacted by leading specialists in Europe and the US interested in exploring different applications for qDBS. However, this is only half the story, as we will also use this new funding to accelerate our product development to broaden our product platform to include plasma and urine sample collection.”

Capitainer AB was founded in 2016 and is a supplier of intelligent solutions for collecting an exact amount of blood, plasma or urine using capillary sampling and then saving the samples in dried form. The application is available in many market segments, such as therapeutic drug monitoring, biomarkers, genomics, drug development, drug abuse testing and doping.