Bioscience company receives $15 million in funding

A bioscience company born in Lakewood Ranch 15 years ago that, more recently, merged with a California firm, has hit a major milestone: it received $15 million in funding. 

The funds are for Lumos Diagnostics, a Carlsbad, Calif. company that merged with Lakewood Ranch-based RPS Diagnostics in May. Founded in 2004, RPS, now under the Lumos name, is a commercial developer, manufacturer and marketer of diagnostic tests, with a focus on commercializing products for infectious and inflammatory diseases. Lumos develops digital readers for the same technology; the company maintains an operating headquarters in Lakewood Ranch. 

The capital is from Planet Innovation, an Australia-based health tech innovation and commercialization company, according to a statement. Lumos is a also subsidiary of Planet Innovation. 

The $15 million, according to the statement, will support the international commercial expansion of the firm's FebriDx rapid point-of-care test. It will also provide additional development and manufacturing resources for the company’s expanding point-of-care business,  the release adds.

“Planet Innovation is focused on breakthrough technology and making investments that will have a global impact on healthcare," says Sam Lanyon, chairman of the board for Lumos Diagnostics and co-CEO for Planet Innovation, in the statement. "It is obvious that Lumos Diagnostics is poised for rapid growth and Planet Innovation is keen to support and accelerate the process.”

The FebriDx test has received HealthCanada approval, Saudi Arabia FDA clearance, Singapore HSA registration, Pakistan DRAP registration and is CE marked for sale in Europe, the release states. FebriDx hasn't received U.S. Food and Drug Administration clearance and is not commercially available in the U.S. 

"The novel digital reader technology that Lumos offers as part of our complete POC service solution will be used in the next generation digital FebriDx test, providing faster time to results, identification of the rare co-infection and enhanced objectivity of test result interpretations," says Dr. Robert Sambursky, who founded RPS Diagnostics and was named president and CEO of Lumos Diagnostics after the merger.