Swiss ALP Bio closes €161K Venture Kick grant to screen therapeutic antibodies for immune risk before they reach clinical trials

Therapeutic antibodies are among the most promising tools in modern medicine - and one of the most unpredictable. A patient's immune system can recognise a biologic drug as foreign and generate antibodies against it, with outcomes ranging from diminished therapeutic effect to serious adverse reactions and, in some cases, complete programme failure after years of investment. This immune risk is a well-known challenge in biologic drug development. However, pre-clinical screening tools have not been able to reliably identify which antibody candidates will trigger this response. This means that developers only become aware of the problem at the clinical stage, by which time it is the most costly to correct.

ALP Bio, a Swiss biotech start-up co-founded by Dr Christian Vahlensieck, Dr Lucas Schaus, Anatol Ehrlich and Punit Mehra, has developed a platform that identifies this risk before clinical development begins. The platform integrates human tonsil-derived immune tissue - a biologically relevant model of human B and T cell responses - with AI-powered analysis of antibody sequences, enabling immunogenicity to be predicted at an earlier stage than conventional methods allow. The platform operates across three layers: computational screening using protein language models and geometric deep learning; experimental validation through an ex vivo tonsil organoid assay; and generative AI-guided epitope redesign to reduce immune risk while preserving therapeutic function. The goal is to provide drug developers with actionable data at the discovery stage, before investment in a candidate has reached clinical scale.

ALP Bio has just raised €161,000 from Venture Kick at Stage 3 to fund its first pharma partner pilot programmes. The grant follows a CHF 1.75 million pre-seed round led by 42CAP earlier this year, with participation from Ajira Ventures, Venture Kick, and strategic angels.

Sources: ALP Bio | startupticker.ch

Founders: Christian Vahlensieck, Lucas Schaus, Anatol Ehrlich, Punit Mehra