Funding profile · Life science research tools

CellChorus

A single-cell analysis company financed almost entirely by the federal government. Close to $9 million in NIH and NSF awards, $175,000 in disclosed equity, and no Form D on record anywhere.

$8.87MFederal awards on record, NIH and NSF, FY2023 to FY2026
$175KTotal disclosed equity and prize money, 2021
$0Reported on Form D. No Regulation D notice has been filed
$200KBARDA-funded VANGUARD contract, August 2025

Data as of September 22, 2026. Company-reported figures are labeled.

Rounds at a glance

When Round Amount Investors Source
Feb 2021 Pitch competition prize $50,000 Texas Halo Fund, at Venture Houston 2021 Independent
Aug 2021 Y Combinator, Summer 2021 $125,000 Y Combinator Company release
Oct 2021 Seed Not disclosed Breakout Ventures, first seed from its $112.5M Fund II Investor
2023 to 2026 Federal grants $8,868,731 NIH via NIGMS, NCATS and NCI; NSF NIH, NSF
Aug 2025 Non-dilutive contract $200,000 BioTools Innovator VANGUARD, funded by BARDA Company release
To date Regulation D offering None on record None Not found

What the filings show

SEC EDGAR · CellChorus Inc. · no Form D filed

Offerings
None on record
Known equity
Y Combinator $125,000, Aug 2021; Breakout Ventures seed, Oct 2021, amount undisclosed
Implication
Either those rounds were sold under Section 4(a)(2), which requires no notice, or no notice was filed. Absence is not evidence that no money moved

NIGMS · R44GM149106, Chronos instrument · FY2023 to FY2026

Obligated
$324,340 then $1,483,544 then $462,781 plus a $56,415 supplement
Total
$2,327,080
Announced
“Up to $2.2 million” in Jun 2023; InnovationMap reported $2.3 million
Principal investigator
Laurence Cooper, co-founder and board chair

NCATS · R44TR005137 and R42TR005299 · FY2024 to FY2026

R44TR005137
Assay kits. $350,000 then $984,242 then $1,034,752. Total $2,368,994
R42TR005299
Label-free TIMING, an STTR with the University of Houston. $349,171 then $1,128,853 then $1,021,147. Total $2,499,171
Announced
Each headlined at $2.5 million, May 2024 and Oct 2024
Principal investigator
Rebecca Berdeaux, chief scientific officer

NCI and NIGMS · newest awards · FY2025 and FY2026

R43CA298411
$399,625 Phase I with Stanford Medicine, from Sep 1, 2025
SB1GM163323
$998,873 commercialization readiness award for Chronos, Sep 14, 2026 to Aug 31, 2029
Principal investigator
Daniel D. Meyer, chief executive officer

Reading the filings

  1. Ninety-eight percent of the disclosed capital is non-dilutive.Federal awards of $8,868,731 against $175,000 of disclosed equity and prize money is 98.1 percent. Add the $200,000 VANGUARD contract and it rises. On the public record this is a grant-funded business with a venture logo attached.
  2. Announced totals are ceilings, and the record diverges.The NIGMS award was headlined at up to $2.2 million and has obligated $2,327,080, above the ceiling because of a supplement. The two NCATS awards were each headlined at $2.5 million and stand at $2,368,994 and $2,499,171. InnovationMap reported the NIGMS award as $2.3 million; the company release said $2.2 million.
  3. The conversion rate is the real underwriting.SBIR.gov records 5 Phase I and 3 Phase II awards, a 60 percent conversion rate, from a first award year of 2023. Three separate NIH institutes have advanced this company past Phase I. That is a harder gate than a seed round.
  4. The databases are counting grants as funding.CB Insights lists total raised at $5.78 million, within about $34,000 of the $5,813,959 SBIR.gov recorded for the same period. Tracxn counts thirteen rounds, one seed and twelve grants, totalling $125,000. Neither reflects the Breakout Ventures seed, whose size is unknown.
  5. The CEO has taken the principal investigator seat.Every earlier NIH award named a scientist: Cooper, then Berdeaux. The September 2026 commercialization readiness award names Daniel Meyer. That award exists to move a product to market, and it runs to August 2029.

Commercial signals

Signal Detail Source type
Delivery model Service work from the CellChorus Innovation Lab at the UH Technology Bridge. Kits and the Chronos instrument remain grant deliverables, with no launch date or pricing. Company-stated
Customers “top-25 biopharmaceutical companies,” unnamed. Named users visible in public data: Indapta Therapeutics, Indee Labs, FuseBio, Kite Pharma as a co-author, Stanford Medicine as a grant partner. Company and partner
Headcount 4 per Y Combinator, 10 per SBIR.gov, 1 to 10 per the Breakout Ventures job board. Public record
Evidence Nature Cancer 2024, Journal of Clinical Investigation 2022, Cancer Discovery 2024, Frontiers in Bioinformatics 2026. No FDA records and no sponsored clinical trials. Public record
Competitive set CB Insights ranks CellChorus a Challenger among fifteen in cell and tissue analysis, alongside ThinkCyte, PhenomeX and Immunai. PhenomeX, formerly Berkeley Lights, was acquired by Bruker in Oct 2023 at a valuation of $108 million. Independent
Founding date Crunchbase and CB Insights say 2017, TechCrunch says 2020, the company dates its launch to Sep 2019. It traded as an LLC in 2020 and as CellChorus Inc. by Aug 2021. Sources differ

What to watch

  • A first Form D. It would be the earliest public signal of a priced round and would finally size the 2021 seed.
  • Whether the Stanford Phase I converts to a Phase II under R43CA298411.
  • A Chronos launch date or list price, the test of whether the readiness award produced a product.
  • Any customer named on the record rather than by category, and whether the FY2026 NCATS obligations are final-year payments.

The CellChorus story on Healthcare DiscoveryHealthcare Discovery

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Sources

  1. Public recordNIH RePORTER: R44GM149106, R44TR005137, R42TR005299, R43CA298411, SB1GM163323NIH · FY2023 to FY2026
  2. Public recordNSF SBIR Phase I award 2229323NSF · Jun 2023
  3. Public recordSBIR.gov portfolio, CELLCHORUS INCSBA · Sep 2026
  4. Public recordSEC EDGAR full-text and Form D search, CellChorusSEC · Sep 2026
  5. InvestorThe power of single-cell analysisBreakout Ventures · Oct 20, 2021
  6. IndependentBreakout Ventures Announces Close of $112.5M Fund IIBusiness Wire · Dec 9, 2021
  7. IndependentInaugural Houston Venture pitch competition names big winnersInnovationMap · Feb 5, 2021
  8. IndependentHouston health tech co. lands NIH grant for AI cancer prediction toolInnovationMap · May 18, 2026
  9. IndependentCellChorus profile, funding and competitorsCB Insights · Sep 2026
  10. IndependentCellChorus funding rounds and investorsTracxn · Sep 2026
  11. CompanyCellChorus raises funding from Y CombinatorCellChorus · Aug 31, 2021
  12. CompanyCellChorus Awarded $2.2 million SBIR Fast-Track Grant by NIGMSCellChorus · Jun 21, 2023
  13. CompanyBioTools Innovator VANGUARD awards CellChorus contractCellChorus · Aug 25, 2025

Compiled from SEC, NIH, NSF and SBA public records and published reports as of September 22, 2026. Form D notices report offerings under Regulation D; amounts reflect the filing date. Grant figures are obligations recorded by fiscal year and may change with later supplements. Healthcare Venture Capital Fund holds no position in CellChorus. This page is not an offer to sell or a recommendation to buy any security.