It’s set to be a whirlwind year for Circuit Clinical, the startup company founded by cardiologist Irfan Khan.
• The company closed this month on $2.2 million round of funding, which includes new contributions from several local investment groups. Launch NY, the Buffalo Angels fund and an investment group led by businessman Charles Lannon, participated in the latest round, along with original investors KMG Capital Partners out of Denver.
Lannon’s participation is notable. As an early-stage investor, he supported both Athenex and PostProcess Technologies. Athenex went on to raise hundreds of millions from Asian investors before going public, while PostProcess recently closed on a $20 million cash injection from billionaire B. Thomas Golisano.
• Circuit Clinical is also moving out of its downtown headquarters for three years at 599 Delaware Ave., a building redeveloped by Jake Schneider and also occupied by marketing firm FIFTEEN.
Circuit Clinical, which won a $500,000 award in the latest 43North competition, will be moving into Seneca One Tower. 43North is preparing to open its new headquarters and incubator operation in the Buffalo skyscraper this month.
These moves will serve to support the company as it seeks this year to begin significantly scaling the scope of its business. Circuit Clinical essentially sells two things. It runs a network of clinical trials with participating doctors – offering the creation of research sites to pharmaceutical companies developing novel therapies. And it also developed its TrialScout software platform, dubbed by Khan as “Yelp for clinical trials,” which is a tool used to engage patients engaged in experimental drug therapies.
“Circuit needs to be successful in Western New York and grow outside of the region in its clinical trials business,” Khan said. “It needs to prove that its enterprise software solution has market traction with pharmaceutical companies. If we can accomplish those two things – and I’m very confident we can – that’s a very successful company on its way to scaling up.”
Circuit Clinical has 20 full-time employees now and expects to add more over the next few months.