Sift Biosciences is a preclinical immunotherapy company creating “T-cell booster” peptides that activate infection-trained memory T cells, aiming to overcome the low immunogenicity that limits many current cancer treatments. Its proprietary platform combines artificial intelligence, metagenomics, and high-throughput immune profiling to identify microbial analogs of tumor-associated epitopes capable of rapidly amplifying immune responses. The initial pipeline targets solid tumors such as microsatellite-stable colorectal and ovarian cancers, while parallel research explores selectively expanding regulatory T cells for autoimmune disease. Founded in 2024 as a UC Berkeley spin-out and headquartered in San Carlos, California, the team is led by CEO and co-founder Clare Lou, Ph.D. The company has raised $3.7 million in pre-seed capital to fund in-vivo proof-of-concept studies, expand its AI-powered discovery engine, and select lead oncology candidates. Early preclinical data suggest the potential for faster, more potent, and durable immune responses compared with existing approaches. Financially, the company is still pre-revenue and focused on advancing its research programs toward clinical validation.

Total raised

$4M

Funding rounds

1

Latest round

Seed

Latest activity

Feb 2026