UK’s Scripta Therapeutics Raises €10 Million to Transform Drug Discovery

The funding round is led by Oxford Science Enterprises (OSE) and Apollo Health Ventures, with additional investment from AlbionVC, YZR Capital, Parkwalk Advisors, and support from Oxford University Innovation.

Peter Hamley, founder and CEO of Scripta, said “We’re flipping the script on conventional target-based drug discovery to find therapies that genuinely move the needle for patients. By focusing on understanding and manipulating the master controllers of biology, we’re searching for drugs with the potential not just to delay disease progression but to stop it in its tracks.”

The new Seed round for Scripta Therapeutics is part of a wider trend in European biotech investment in 2025, with continued support for AI-driven and biology-led drug discovery.

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In the UK, TRIMTECH Therapeutics raised €28.6 million to develop small-molecule degrader therapies for neurodegenerative diseases, showing strong investor interest in CNS-focused innovation. In Europe, Graph Therapeutics in Austria and Aerska in Ireland highlight the growing focus on AI-enabled discovery and brain-targeted RNA therapeutics.

Similarly, BIMINI Biotech in the Netherlands reflects oncology efforts using comparable computational approaches.

Altogether these 2025 funding rounds total around €51 million, demonstrating steady investor commitment to platform-based and neuro-focused therapies with Scripta’s raise reinforcing the UK’s position as a hub for next generation drug discovery.

BioTech business builder Ray Barlow, CEO of SynOx Therapeutics, has also been brought on to strengthen Scripta’s board as a Non-Executive Director: “Scripta brings fresh thinking and a novel biology-led, data-rich approach to a traditionally challenging area of drug discovery. I am looking forward to working with this outstanding team to deliver effective new medicines that are long overdue for so many patients.”

Scripta Therapeutics is focusing on transcription factors the master controllers of biology to find drugs that could not only slow disease progression but potentially halt or even reverse it. By combining expertise in pharma, biotech, and disease biology with advanced computational tools, Scripta aims to develop therapies that can truly change patient outcomes.

Their approach treats transcription factors as core drivers of disease, acting as detailed maps of the underlying biological mechanisms.

Using a data-driven, lab-in-the-loop approach that blends experimental biology with cutting-edge AI and informatics, Scripta works to efficiently identify therapeutics that can adjust these maps and restore healthy cell function.

Claire Brown, Partner at OSE and board member of Scripta, said, “We’re proud to be backing Scripta – a brilliant team that exemplifies the next generation of technology-enabled drug discovery and capitalises on the strength of the University of Oxford and the wider Oxford ecosystem.”

The platform can be used for any disease, but the team is starting with Alzheimer’s and other neurodegenerative conditions, in collaboration with scientific co-founder Noel Buckley, Professor of Neurobiology at the University of Oxford.

Marianne Mertens, Partner at Apollo Health Ventures, added, “Manipulating transcription factors in disease has long been seen as an intractable challenge, yet it holds tremendous promise for treating neurodegeneration and other life-limiting conditions.

“Scripta’s innovative approach could deliver transformational therapies and exemplifies one of Apollo’s key investment strategies: reprogramming diseased cells into healthy ones to tackle the root causes of age-related diseases and enable disease-modifying treatments.”

About Scripta Therapeutics

Scripta Therapeutics, based in Oxford, is a techbio company developing disease-modifying drugs for neurodegenerative disorders. Using a biology-first approach, they target transcription factors the master controllers of gene expression combining experimental biology with AI-driven informatics to identify therapeutics that restore healthy cell states and reprogram disease biology.