Funding profile · Industrial enzyme AI
Ligo Biosciences
A pre-seed AI enzyme design company with a Y Combinator accelerator investment, a named angel and VC investor list, and no Form D found on file. What the founders have said about the round in interviews does not fully line up with what data providers report.
Data as of September 25, 2026. Company-reported and third-party-reported figures are labeled.
Rounds at a glance
| When | Round | Amount | Investors | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jan 2024 | Accelerator/Incubator (Y Combinator) | Not disclosed | Y Combinator | Data provider |
| Sep 2024 | Early Stage VC, described elsewhere as Seed | $500K total raised, per data providers | 468 Capital, A.Capital Ventures, Hawktail, Liquid 2 Ventures, Multimodal Ventures, and 9 more unnamed, per PitchBook | Data provider |
| By early 2025 (as described) | Seed, per founder interview | Not disclosed; described as closed in six hours at a valuation “multiple times higher” than UK offers | Not named in the interview | Differs from data providers |
What the filings show
No Form D was found for Ligo Biosciences. A search of SEC EDGAR’s company database for companies whose name starts with “Ligo” returns two unrelated entities, LigoCyte Pharmaceuticals and Ligon Discovery, and no Ligo Biosciences. That does not prove no money moved: a company that raises entirely under Section 4(a)(2) rather than Regulation D, or that has not yet reached a reporting trigger, would show the same absence. It does mean there is no primary federal filing to check the company’s or the data providers’ numbers against.
No Form D on file · checked Sep 25, 2026
- Search performed
- SEC EDGAR company search, company name starting “Ligo,” form type D
- Result
- 2 matches, both unrelated (LigoCyte Pharmaceuticals Inc, CIK 0001400794; Ligon Discovery, Inc., CIK 0001464245)
- Conclusion
- No filing under the name Ligo Biosciences was found
Reading the filings
- There is no primary filing to check against.Every dollar figure on this page below the fold comes from a commercial data provider (PitchBook or Tracxn), not from a document the company or an investor signed and filed with a regulator. That is a meaningfully weaker source than a Form D.
- The founders’ own account is bigger than the data providers’ number.In a May 2025 interview, CEO Edward Harris said the company closed its initial round in six hours at a valuation “multiple times higher” than what UK investors had offered, and said the size of the raise was “set to be released soon.” PitchBook and Tracxn both report total funding of $500,000 as of their most recent updates. Either the disclosed figure never arrived, the trackers have not caught up to a later or larger close, or the $500,000 reflects only part of what closed that day. The page cannot resolve which, and treats this as an open conflict rather than picking a side.
- The investor list points to seed-stage, Valley-standard backers.PitchBook names 5 of 14 investors: 468 Capital, A.Capital Ventures, Hawktail, Liquid 2 Ventures and Multimodal Ventures. Liquid 2 Ventures is Y Combinator alumni-founded; the pairing with a YC accelerator investment in the same year is consistent with a standard YC-track seed.
- Employee count has grown modestly.Tracxn reports 11 employees as of July 2026; PitchBook reports 10 as of August 2026. For a company with $500,000 in disclosed funding, a team of that size implies either founder-heavy staffing, additional undisclosed capital, or both.
- The open source AlphaFold3 release is the strongest non-financial signal of capability.It is not a funding record, but the company’s most concrete public output, a working reimplementation with training code and named technical partners, predates or coincides with the reported fundraising and is likely part of why investors moved quickly, per the founders’ own account.
Commercial signals
| Signal | Detail | Source type |
|---|---|---|
| Open source release | Ligo-Biosciences/AlphaFold3, a full single-chain AlphaFold3 reimplementation with training code, published under Apache 2.0, with named technical partners Adaptyv Bio and Basecamp Research. | Public record |
| Accelerator | Y Combinator, joined 2024, per company and third-party data. | Public record |
| Named investors | 468 Capital, A.Capital Ventures, Hawktail, Liquid 2 Ventures, Multimodal Ventures, per PitchBook; 9 additional investors not named. | Data provider |
| Revenue and customers | No named paying customer or disclosed revenue found. The company’s own materials ask for introductions to chemical and pharmaceutical companies, suggesting it is still in business development rather than at scale commercially. | Not found |
| Team size | 10 to 11 employees, per PitchBook and Tracxn respectively, both mid-2026. | Data provider |
What to watch
- A Form D or other primary filing that would confirm the round size the founders described in interviews.
- Whether the $500,000 figure reported by data providers is updated to reflect a larger, later close.
- The remaining 9 of 14 investors PitchBook lists but does not name.
- Any named commercial customer or enzyme performance data that would move the company’s evidence beyond the open source AlphaFold3 release.
The Ligo Biosciences story on Healthcare DiscoveryHealthcare Discovery
Related companies
Sources
- Public recordEDGAR company search, companies matching “Ligo,” form type D
- Data providerLigo Biosciences company profile, funding and investors
- Data providerLigo Biosciences company profile and funding rounds
- IndependentThe Startup That Took on DeepMind and Won the Attention of Silicon Valley
- Public recordLigo-Biosciences/AlphaFold3 repository and README
- CompanyLigo Biosciences profile
- CompanyLigo Biosciences homepage
Compiled from SEC and other public records and published reports as of September 25, 2026. Form D notices report offerings under Regulation D; amounts reflect the filing date. Healthcare Venture Capital Fund holds no position in Ligo Biosciences. This page is not an offer to sell or a recommendation to buy any security.