1. Executive Summary

AlphaBrick is a novel software tool for the easy design, exchange and creation of synthetic gene constructs.

Recent advances in the synthetic biology field, such as with the Crisper/Cas9 system, have dramatically increased the potential of synthetic biology technologies to transform our world. We can now use our biological understanding to create products that solve some of the biggest challenges the world faces. These advances, however, require a new set of accessible computational tools that enable the synthetic biologist to quickly and collaboratively design and test DNA circuitry.

Employing a lean methodology, we have identified the three key problems faced by the synthetic biology community. Currently, (1) the design of gene circuits is complex because collaboration between and within teams is difficult and thought processes are lost, (2) exchange of gene circuit parts is messy, as you have to individually track and hunt down the person who created it and (3) individuals have to have an advanced understanding of programming languages to use automated labs.

Our software platform solution, Alpha Brick, originated at the UK’s first 72-hour bio-hackathon at which it won first place. AlphaBrick allows synthetic biologists to easily design, exchange and create DNA circuitry. The platform enables users to experience a quicker, traceable design process that ensures that decisions are recorded and that subsequent progress is accelerated. It provides a marketplace for lab designs by facilitating the buying and selling of gene circuit parts, making collaboration easier. The integration of the AlphaBrick platform with Transcriptic’s automated laboratories saves precious time and reduces the knowledge-barrier to using robotic labs. Our platform’s patent notification and parts combination recommendation, furthermore, address an unmet need of biotech industry that we identified through industry interviews. We envisage that AlphaBrick will have a big impact on accelerating synthetic biology research and commercialisation.

The synthetic biology community of biohackers, academics, startups and established biotech companies who have these problems is growing quickly and the current tools available don’t address these concerns in an integrated way. There is space in this is $1.2 billion market for an easy to use tool that allows high share ability of gene circuitry. The platform will be commercialised such that users will be required to pay a monthly subscription fee at the average market rate for the platform’s premium features.

Our multidisciplinary team consists of developers, biologists and entrepreneurs and can be broadly stratified into product development and business development. The current team was formed at the Cambridge University Technology and Enterprise Club’s 2016 Bio hackathon. Our 4 co-founding members are working to establish AlphaBrick as an incorporated software company.

Working through the prestigious Accelerate Cambridge programme, we envisage that our alpha-version will be ready for distribution in January 2017 and that our final product will be ready for launch in June 2017. In order to ensure the progression of our venture, Alphabrick are looking to raise £20,000 in pre-seed from angel investors funding or non-dilutive funding by the start of February 2017.

2. Product Concept

The Problem

Recent advances in the $6.4 billion synthetic biology field have dramatically increased the potential of synthetic biology technologies to transform our world. We can now use our biological understanding to create products that solve some of the biggest challenges the world faces. We have adopted a strong lean methodology to identify that these advances have also lead to a currently poorly met need for a new set of accessible computational tools that enable the synthetic biologist to quickly and collaboratively design and test DNA circuitry.

Through extensive interviews with the synthetic biology community, we have sought to verify every one of our business hypothesis to generate evidence-based identification of the pains of each our customer segments and the value propositions that they care most about. By talking to 69 iGEM teams, 7 synthetic biology startups, the UK’s world leading synthetic biology labs and a major world pharmaceutical R&D lab, we have been able to identify the key pain points in the work flow of synthetic biology users. This has informed and shaped our continuously changing business model canvas, the staple tool of all startups in search of a viable and scalable business model.

The three key pains of most of our customer segments within the synthetic biology community are that (1) the design of gene parts is complex because collaboration between and within teams is difficult and thought processes are lost; (2) exchange of gene circuit parts is messy, as you have to individually track and hunt down the person who created it and (3) individuals have to have an advanced understanding of programming languages to use automated labs. Our customer interviews, moreover, elucidated nuances in the pains felt by our customer segments: while most of our customers would benefit from easier access to automated cloud labs to reduced labour costs and the time taken to run manual experiments, some of customers, and arguably our most important customers in terms of purchasing power, would not benefit from this due to worries over intellectual property and trade secrets. From talks with a major pharmaceutical and biotech company, we also identified a fourth pain point, (4) the need for notifications about patented sequences and readily available information about part combinations.

Our Solution

We have therefore founded Alphabrick, a software tool interfacing automated cloud labs, for the design, exchange, and creation of synthetic gene constructs. Our software platform solution, www.alphabrick.bio, originated at the UK’s first 72 hour biohackathon at which it won first place.

AlphaBrick allows synthetic biologists to easily design, exchange and create DNA circuitry. The platform enables users to experience a quicker, traceable design process that ensures that decisions are recorded and that subsequent progress is accelerated. It provides a marketplace for lab designs; by facilitating the buying and selling of gene circuit parts, making collaboration easier. The integration of the AlphaBrick platform with Transcriptic’s automated laboratories saves precious time and reduces the knowledge-barrier to using robotic labs. Given our customer interviews, we envisage that this platform will have a big impact on accelerating SynBio research and commercialisation.

>h4> We demoed a successful run of our first prototype and MVP with a use-case at the Cambridge Biohackathon using Transcriptic’s automated cloud lab work cell in July of this year.

3. Commercial Potential

4. Business Environment

4. Team