Funding profile · Antibody therapeutics

Abalone Bio

Eight years old, fourteen people, three pharma partnerships and no priced venture round on the public record. Almost everything documented about this company’s capital came from federal grant agencies.

$7.45MFederal grants on record, NIH and NSF, 2018 to 2024
$165,375Sold by the only Form D on EDGAR, an outside investor vehicle (Dec 2022)
$27,563Average per investor in that vehicle, 6 investors
$3MPartnership revenue to date, company-reported

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

Rounds at a glance

When Round Amount Investors Source
Jan 2018 NSF SBIR Phase I, award 1747391 $225,000 National Science Foundation · PI Carlos Gustavo Pesce NSF
2019 to 2023 NSF SBIR Phase II and IIB, award 1853147 $1,599,997 obligated National Science Foundation · PI Monica Schwartz NSF
FY2019 to FY2024 NIH SBIR, nine award actions, five project lines $5,620,424 NCI, NIDDK, NICHD, NIDA NIH
Winter 2020 Y Combinator batch Not disclosed Y Combinator, after what the CEO calls a little seed money and the NSF money Founder interview
Nov to Dec 2022 SPV: Abalone Bio a series of Sharding Holdings Management LLC $165,375 6 investors · Allocations as administrative manager Form D
Mar 2025 University of Pennsylvania collaboration Not disclosed Includes an exclusive option on key IP from the work Company release
Oct 2025 Sihuan Pharmaceutical (0460.HK) co-discovery deal Multi-million upfront, sales payments the company says could pass $1B Sihuan Pharmaceutical Company release
Jan 2026 Pfizer research collaboration Confidential Pfizer Company release

What the filings show

Abalone Bio a series of Sharding Holdings Management LLC · Form D · filed Dec 23, 2022

First sale
Nov 14, 2022
Type
Pooled investment fund, single company vehicle, Delaware LLC formed 2022
Offered
$165,375
Sold
$165,375 · nothing remaining
Investors
6 · average about $27,563 · minimum accepted $10,000
Exemptions
Rule 506(b); Investment Company Act 3(c)(1)
Related persons
Joseph Turner (manager); Allocations Fund Administration LLC (administrative manager); Hoang Phan (officer of the administrative manager)
Filing
SEC EDGAR, CIK 0001957900

Reading the filings

  1. The company has never filed a Form D.An EDGAR full text search for Abalone Bio on September 22, 2026 returns exactly one document, and it belongs to an outside syndicate vehicle, not to the operating company. Firms that raise under Section 4(a)(2) rather than Regulation D file nothing, so this is not proof that no equity moved. It does mean no public filing records a priced round in eight years.
  2. The one vehicle on file is angel sized.$165,375 divided by six investors is about $27,563 each, against a $10,000 minimum. That is a small syndicate buying into a deal, not a fund leading one. Trackers that report Abalone Bio as having raised $150K appear to be reading this filing, the only equity figure on the public record.
  3. Grant money is the balance sheet.$7,445,421 of federal awards against $165,375 of filed equity is a ratio of about 45 to 1. NIH supplied 75 percent of the federal total. The single largest project line, liver fibrosis under R44DK125191, drew $2,349,011 across three awards and expired in July 2025.
  4. The revenue claim is the load-bearing one.The company reports $3M of partnership revenue and $125M of downstream value across three deals, yet the Sihuan release alone describes sales-based payments that “have the potential to surpass $1 billion.” Those two numbers are measuring different things and neither is verifiable. No partner has disclosed terms.
  5. The founder says the venture door stayed shut.“I just hit my four hundredth rejection or whatever the number is, you know, from the VCs, it’s, like, whatever,” Yu told the Biotech Startups Podcast in 2026. Of the 2020 YC cycle he said: “No, like, rich Texans coming in and, like, offering you a $4,000,000 SAFE note on the spot. Like, that was not my experience.” The filing record is consistent with both statements.

Commercial signals

Signal Detail Source type
Stage Preclinical. No registered trials, no FDA device or biologics approvals on record. Public record
Evidence AB120 and AB150 characterized in Molecular Pharmacology, March 2026, with Mount Sinai. In vitro and human liver slices only. Public record
Partners Pfizer (Jan 2026), Sihuan Pharmaceutical (Oct 2025), University of Pennsylvania (Mar 2025). Company-stated
Revenue $3M booked from partnerships, $125M in downstream value. No third party confirmation. Company-stated
IP One granted US patent on yeast periplasmic antibody display, issued Oct 24, 2023. Public record
Size and site 14 people. Emeryville, California, in a converted Pixar sound studio suite; earlier NSF work was performed in Richmond. Company-stated

What to watch

  • A Form D filed under Abalone Bio, Inc.’s own CIK. It would be the first, and it is due within 15 days of a first sale.
  • Disclosed economics on the Sihuan deal, which is the only partnership described with an upfront payment.
  • NIH renewals or new awards after FY2024, given how much of the funding base is federal.
  • A named development candidate for the metabolic program, the point at which the capital need changes shape.

The Abalone Bio story on Healthcare DiscoveryHealthcare Discovery

Related companies

  • Macromoltek: Shared investor: Company-Stated Partners. An Austin software company that has designed antibodies inside a computer since 2011, paid for by federal grants and customer fees rather than venture rounds
  • Pirouette Pharma: Shared investor: Company-Stated Partners. A disk-shaped, push-button auto-injector built by three engineers who met running a student rocket lab, now paired with old drugs on abbreviated FDA pathways
  • CB Therapeutics: Shared investor: Company-Stated Partners. A Carlsbad company that brews cannabinoids, psilocybin and other plant and fungal molecules in engineered yeast
  • Perception Biosystems: Shared investor: Company-Stated Partners. A Y Combinator company that set out to build a robotic lab so a rare disease gene therapy could be made faster and far more cheaply

Sources

  1. Public recordForm D, Abalone Bio a series of Sharding Holdings Management LLC, CIK 0001957900SEC EDGAR · Dec 23, 2022
  2. Public recordEDGAR full text search for Abalone Bio, one resultSEC · accessed Sep 22, 2026
  3. Public recordNSF awards 1747391 and 1853147NSF Award Search · 2018 to 2023
  4. Public recordNIH RePORTER awards to Abalone Bio, Inc., nine actionsNIH · FY2019 to FY2024
  5. InterviewRichard Yu, parts 2 and 3The Biotech Startups Podcast · Mar 2026
  6. IndependentAI-designed antibodies crack a long-elusive target for fibrosisDrug Discovery News · Mar 2, 2026
  7. IndependentAbalone Bio raises $150KSignalbase · 2026
  8. CompanySihuan Pharmaceutical collaboration releaseEIN Presswire · Oct 30, 2025
  9. CompanyPfizer collaboration releaseEIN Presswire · Jan 6, 2026
  10. CompanyUniversity of Pennsylvania collaboration releaseEIN Presswire · Mar 11, 2025
  11. CompanyAbalone Bio company profile, team size and traction claimsY Combinator directory · accessed Sep 22, 2026

Compiled from SEC, NSF, NIH and other public records and published reports as of September 22, 2026. Form D notices report offerings under Regulation D; amounts reflect the filing date and may not capture later sales. Healthcare Venture Capital Fund holds no position in Abalone Bio. This page is not an offer to sell or a recommendation to buy any security.