Multiply Labs Raised $75 Million for Therapy Robotics
The San Francisco company secured new funding to scale automated production of gene and mRNA therapies.
Updated on Oct. 6, 2026 in Biotech
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Multiply Labs has closed a $75 million Series B funding round to accelerate the rollout of its industrial robotics systems. The machines are designed to automate the manufacturing of complex gene and mRNA treatments currently produced by hand.
Why it matters
Automating laboratory production addresses significant limitations in scaling life-saving therapies while reducing contamination risks. The capital injection supports the company's transition from limited deployments to a broader commercial manufacturing business.
Multiply Labs currently has a high single-digit number of robotic systems deployed. Each of these specialized machines costs several million dollars to build.
The players
Multiply Labs
A San Francisco-based developer of robotic systems for automating the complex production of gene and mRNA therapies.
NantWorks
A venture capital firm and biotechnology company that led the Series B funding round.
AstraZeneca
A global pharmaceutical company focused on oncology and biopharmaceuticals that participated in the funding round.
The details
The company’s technology utilizes integrated robotic arms that manipulate test tubes to manage the intricate steps of drug manufacturing. By shifting these manual laboratory tasks to automated hardware, drugmakers can operate the machines within their own facilities. This approach seeks to solve production bottlenecks that currently contribute to manufacturing costs reaching as high as $1 million per dose for certain gene therapies.
Timeline
2016: Multiply Labs was founded.
October 6, 2026: The company announced its $75 million Series B funding round.
Summer 2026: An author visited the company warehouse in the Dogpatch neighborhood.
The Tech Race
Multiply Labs is competing to solve the manufacturing constraints inherent in the high manual labor requirements of gene therapy production. The company is currently scaling against traditional, manual batch processing that has long defined the biotech industry.
The technology is currently used by a small group of drugmakers, meaning the immediate impact is concentrated within specialized pharmaceutical R&D workflows. Future scaling will depend on the successful deployment of these multi-million dollar machines to broader production environments.
The takeaway
Multiply Labs aims to standardize the production of complex biologics by replacing manual labor with specialized robotics. Watch for the company's shift from a small group of initial deployments to broader commercial integration across the pharmaceutical supply chain.
Further reading
For more on how automation is reshaping medical manufacturing, see our latest coverage in Biotech.
Source note: This article includes information reported by Business Insider.
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