Good day. Biotechnology startup BigHat Biosciences has raised $75 million in new venture capital, less than a year and a half after closing its Series A round in a different funding climate.

San Mateo, Calif.-based BigHat disclosed a $19 million Series A round in February 2021, when biotech stock prices were peaking and drug startups were racing to go public. Last year, U.S. and European biotech startups corralled a record $36.83 billion in venture capital, according to Silicon Valley Bank.

This year, stocks have tumbled and venture investment has slowed. After securing $11.1 billion in the first quarter, U.S. and European biotech startups raised $6 billion in the second quarter, down from the $9.3 billion they collected in the year-earlier three months, according to SVB.

BigHat, which uses machine learning and synthetic biology to search for more-effective antibody drugs, started raising this Series B round toward the end of the first quarter, co-founder and Chief Executive Mark DePristo said. It raised more than originally planned, he said, and the financing included new investors such as Section 32, which led the round, and returning backers such as Andreessen Horowitz.

BigHat thrived because it concentrated on building its platform and succeeding with its partnerships, he said. In the initial phase of a collaboration with drugmaker Amgen Inc., for example, BigHat improved an Amgen molecule by making it better stick to its target, he said.

Now BigHat aims to accelerate collaborations, hire more staff and move its own drugs toward clinical trials. Its ability to apply its platform to partnerships and internal drug discovery resonated with investors.

This time “it was a stormier environment,” Dr. DePristo said. “We managed to pass through that relatively unscathed.”

And now on to the news...

Cancer testing. Venture capitalists have supplied $225 million in new financing to Delfi Diagnostics Inc., betting it will be the next big startup success in the cancer blood-testing sector.

• Delfi is developing a blood test initially for early lung-cancer detection, but aims to introduce tests for other tumors. This financing brings its total venture backing to about $330 million.
   
• Advances in areas such as genomics have made it possible to spot molecular signatures of cancer in the blood. Initially, cancer blood-testing startups focused on people known to have cancer, developing tests to spot recurrence of the disease or identify suitable drugs for a patient.
   
• Recently, molecular-testing technologies have matured enough to enable startups to tackle the much-larger opportunity of screening the general population for the disease, said Justin Kao, a partner with DFJ Growth, which led Delfi’s new financing.

The slowdown in venture-capital funding has spread to early-stage startups, with that part of the market suffering one of the biggest investment drops in more than a decade, The Wall Street Journal's Berber Jin reports.  In the second quarter, venture capitalists invested around $16 billion in U.S. early-stage deals—known as Series A and B rounds—a 22% decrease from the year-earlier period, according to PitchBook Data Inc. That marked the biggest quarterly year-over-year decline in early-stage funding since at least 2010, with the exception of a drop in the second quarter of 2020, when investors pulled back briefly amid the onset of the global pandemic.

Frontera Therapeutics Inc., a developer of gene therapy medicines, completed a $160 million Series B investment from Boyu Capital, Sequoia Capital China, OrbiMed, Creacion Ventures and others. The company has offices in Bedford, Mass. and China.

CAMP4 Therapeutics, a Cambridge, Mass.-based genetic medicines company, scored $100 million in Series B funding. Lead investor Enavate Sciences was joined by 5AM Ventures, Polaris Partners, Northpond Ventures, Andreessen Horowitz, Kraft Group, Gaingels and others in the round. Jim Boylan, chief executive of Enavate, was added to the company’s board.

Cartography Biosciences Inc., a Foster City, Calif.-based cancer therapeutics startup, launched with $57 million in initial funding. The company’s Series A round was led by 8VC, and included participation from Andreessen Horowitz, Wing VC, Catalio Capital Management, Artis Ventures, Alexandria Venture Investments, AME Cloud Ventures, Cancer Research Institute and Gaingels.

Wysa, a digital mental health platform, picked up a $20 million investment. Led by HealthQuad, the round included additional support from British International Investment, W Health Ventures, Kae Capital, Google Assistant Investments and pi Ventures. The company has offices in London, Boston and India.

GT Metabolic Solutions, which has developed minimally invasive incisionless bypass technology for bariatric, metabolic and digestive surgery, has raised about $15 million in a Series A round. The company will use the capital to complete initial clinical trials for its incisionless duodenal ileal bypass anastomosis for bariatric and metabolic surgery. Ceros Capital Markets, the investment-banking division of Ceros Financial Services, completed the financing for GT Metabolic Solutions. 

Retia Medical LLC, a Valhalla, N.Y.-based hemodynamic monitoring provider, raised $15 million in Series B funding. Fresenius Medical Care Ventures led the round, which included participation from Red Cedar Ventures.

• As BA.5 spreads, how long will a prior Covid-19 infection protect you?
   
• Abbott Labs raises earnings outlook as revenue climbs
   
• Covid-19 complication among children fades in latest wave of virus
   
• Investors see far out profits in psychedelic medicine
   
• What is monkeypox? What to know about symptoms, vaccines and how it spreads

• Powerful Senate Democrat outlines more drug pricing overhauls to follow Medicare negotiation. (STAT)
   
• Vertex, Verve team up to develop a gene-editing drug for liver disease. (Biopharma Dive)
   
• Embryonic research could be the next target after Roe. (Wired)

This newsletter was compiled by Matthew Strozier and Brian Gormley. 

WSJ Pro Venture Capital is a premium service of The Wall Street Journal. We cover venture capital and the global startup ecosystem. Share your tips, comments and questions: vcnews@wsj.com

The Team: Matthew Strozier, Yuliya Chernova, Brian Gormley and Marc Vartabedian.

Follow us on Twitter: @wsjvc, @ychernova, @BrianPGormley, @marcvarta.