High-Tech Gründerfonds invests together with KI Kapital GmbH in newly established SAW Instruments GmbH

SAW Instruments has an innovative analysis technology for the life science markets. The company sells biosensors for research at the highest level. Such systems have already been sold to leading research facilities in Germany and Switzerland, and are being used there with great success.

SAW Instruments GmbH goes back to a research project at the center of advanced european studies and research (caesar). SAW Instruments GmbH’s technological basis is the successful combination of Surface Acoustic Wave (SAW) sensors and biochemical analysis methods. Particularly in medical and pharmaceutical research, but also in diagnostics and the various biotechnology segments, such systems can identify a wide variety of substances and analyse their physical mechanisms with high precision and without the influence of disruptive marker molecules.

“The users of our products appreciate particularly their robustness and ease of use. The systems combine maximum sensitivity with a significantly wider range of application compared with the competition,” states Dr. Markus Perpeet, SAW Instruments’ technical director. “Customer proximity is important to us,” he says, adding “we regard ourselves as a systems provider. All the development of hardware and software stems from within our company; the same applies to the biochemical applications. As a business and in an application-specific way, we can thereby at all times provide our customers with advice and support that fully encompasses our products’ range of performance.”

“We are pleased, especially in economically challenging times, to have convinced committed investors about our plans,” says Sabine Bois, SAW Instruments’s commercial director; “investors who provide our company not only with the financial footing for business success and the targeted growth, but who also assist us in giving strategic advice. We are convinced that, in this way, we will meet our business objectives, which we have initially directed especially towards the research market, on schedule.”

Dr. Bernd Goergen, Senior Investment Manager at High-Tech Gründerfonds, adds: “We are very pleased to be contributing with this finance to the faster development and broader marketing of a technology that has already been tried and tested by customers. The clear advantages of the SAW-based method versus competing products in the area of marker-free detection of molecular interaction hold out the prospect of a leading position in the research market. Furthermore, they allow promising expansion of the business activity into numerous other markets as well.”

About SAW Instruments:
SAW Instruments GmbH develops, produces and distributes innovative analysis systems for the life science markets. The devices enable marker-free analysis of bio-molecular interaction and combine robustness as well as ease of use with maximum sensitivity.  Leading research facilities in Germany and Switzerland are already successfully using the products that SAW Instruments provides.

Contact:
SAW Instruments GmbH
Sabine Bois
Commercial Director
Ludwig-Erhard-Allee 2
53175 Bonn / Deutschland
Tel.: +49 228 8128760
Fax: +49 228 81287620
www.saw-instruments.de

About KI Kapital:
Founded in 2009 by Frank Löhner and Dr. Mirko Scherer, KI Kapital is focused on entrepreneurial investments in the life science sector. KI Kapital understands this to mean financial as well as strategic and operational involvement in growth businesses. KI Kapital is independent of funds and prescribed investment approaches, and has a wide network of people who invest jointly as syndicates.

Contact:
KI Kapital GmbH
Dr. Mirko Scherer
Managing Director
Goethestraße 9
60313 Frankfurt/Main
Tel.: +49 69 9288 7755
Fax: +49 69 9288 7756
info@kikapital.com
www.kikapital.com

About High-Tech Gründerfonds:
High-Tech Gründerfonds invests venture capital in young, high-opportunity technological companies implementing promising research results in an entrepreneurial manner. The start-up companies are planned to lead their R&D projects to the production of a prototype or a “proof of concepts” or market launch by means of the seed financing of up to 500k EUR. The High-Tech Gründerfonds has a fund volume of around 272m EUR. Investors of the public-private partnership are the Federal Ministry for Economics and Technology, the KfW bank group as well as the six industrial groups BASF, Deutsche Telekom, Siemens, Robert Bosch, Daimler and Carl Zeiss.

Contact:
High-Tech Gründerfonds Management GmbH
Dr. Bernd Georgen
Senior Investmentmanager
Ludwig-Erhard-Allee 2
53175 Bonn
Phone: +49 228 96568500
Fax: +49 228 96568550
info@high-tech-gruenderfonds.de
www.high-tech-gruenderfonds.de