DeepEn GmbH, a pio­neer in holo­graphic endoscopy tech­nol­ogy, has suc­cess­fully closed a seven-fig­ure seed financ­ing round from the investors bm|t, MBG Thürin­gen, and Sparkasse Jena-Saale-Hol­z­land. This invest­ment will accel­er­ate the devel­op­ment and com­mer­cial­i­sa­tion of the world’s thinnest microscopy tools designed to advance neu­ro­science and bio­med­ical research.

In addi­tion, NEUROGATE, a col­lab­o­ra­tion between the startup and three Euro­pean insti­tutes, has secured €2.5 mil­lion of fund­ing from the Euro­pean Inno­va­tion Coun­cil (EIC) Tran­si­tion Pro­gramme in Jan­u­ary 2025. Together, the con­sor­tium aims to advance the min­i­mally inva­sive tech­nol­ogy to a vari­ety of new applications.

Investing in Neurophotonics Innovation

DeepEn’s endo­scopes use advanced algo­rithms and holo­graphic tech­niques to con­trol laser light as it trav­els through a sin­gle opti­cal glass fibre. When the fibre is inserted into an organ like the brain, it can bun­dle the light beam into a clean focus point, enabling laser scan­ning microscopy in pre­vi­ously inac­ces­si­ble, deep tis­sue regions. This inno­v­a­tive tech­nol­ogy has been endorsed by the 2024 Life Sci­ences Award of the Euro­pean Microscopy Society.

Pro­to­types of the microscopy devices have already been used to image neu­rons and can­cer cells in ani­mal mod­els. With the invest­ment, the DeepEn team, led by CEO Dr Sergey Tur­taev, plans to finalise and launch its first prod­uct, the Neu­roDeep® in-vivo microscopy sys­tem, while accel­er­at­ing the devel­op­ment of next-gen­er­a­tion holo­graphic endo­scope tech­nol­ogy for even more advanced applications.
With bm|t, MBG Thürin­gen, and Sparkasse Jena-Saale-Hol­z­land, DeepEn has gained three sea­soned investors with valu­able expe­ri­ence in the opti­cal ecosys­tem in cen­tral Ger­many. “We warmly wel­come our new invest­ment part­ners on board and want to thank them for their trust in DeepEn’s team and tech­nol­ogy,” says Tur­taev. “Together, we will pur­sue our vision of enabling the devel­op­ment of inno­v­a­tive diag­nos­tic and ther­a­peu­tic approaches for neu­ronal dis­eases through our pow­er­ful imag­ing tools.”

Successful Transfer of Cutting-Edge Research

Start­ing in 2011, Prof. Dr Tomas Čižmár, a later DeepEn co-founder, worked on the holo­graphic endo­scope tech­nol­ogy at the Uni­ver­sity of St. Andrews and the Uni­ver­sity of Dundee in Scot­land. In 2016, Sergey Tur­taev joined the research group dur­ing his doc­toral stud­ies. In 2017, the sci­en­tists relo­cated to the Leib­niz Insti­tute of Pho­tonic Tech­nol­ogy (Leib­niz IPHT) in Jena, Ger­many, where they con­tin­ued their work, funded by the pres­ti­gious ERC con­sol­ida­tor grant LIFEGATE.

In 2020, DeepEn’s com­mer­cial­i­sa­tion jour­ney began thanks to the EXIST Trans­fer of Research pro­gram from the Ger­man Min­istry for Eco­nomic Affairs and Cli­mate Action, lead­ing to a spin-out of DeepEn in early 2024. “This com­pany is a prime exam­ple of how high-qual­ity research,which has led to out­stand­ing pub­li­ca­tions, is rapidly trans­lated into a solid prod­uct,” says Prof. Dr Jür­gen Popp, Sci­en­tific Direc­tor of Leib­niz IPHT. “The team’s speed and ded­i­ca­tion are impressive.”

DeepEn was among the 25 Falling Walls Ven­ture Cup win­ners in autumn 2024 and was awarded the Thuringian Inno­va­tion Prize for young companies.

European Cooperation for Technology Translation

The poten­tial of holo­graphic endoscopy has also been recog­nised in Brus­sels. In Jan­u­ary 2025, the col­lab­o­ra­tive project NEUROGATE was awarded €2.5 mil­lion by the Euro­pean Inno­va­tion Coun­cil (EIC) Tran­si­tion under Hori­zon Europe. “With this project, we are trans­form­ing the most recent sci­en­tific dis­cov­er­ies into valu­able solu­tions for users, allow­ing mon­i­tor­ing of neu­ronal activ­ity under nat­ural con­di­tions with unprece­dented pre­ci­sion,” says Prof. Čižmár.

In addi­tion to Leib­niz IPHT and DeepEn, two inter­na­tional part­ners are involved in NEUROGATE: the Insti­tute of Sci­en­tific Instru­ments of the Czech Acad­emy of Sci­ences (ISI) in Brno and Neuro-Elec­tron­ics Research Flan­ders (NERF) in Bel­gium. NERF, an inter­dis­ci­pli­nary research cen­tre for neu­rotech­nol­ogy, is sup­ported by imec, the life sci­ences insti­tute VIB, and KU Leu­ven. “We’re excited to apply our exper­tise in advanc­ing neu­rotech­nol­ogy appli­ca­tions to bet­ter under­stand the brain and develop new ther­a­peu­tic strate­gies for neu­ro­log­i­cal dis­eases,” says Sebas­t­ian Haesler of NERF.

The Investors

About bm|t: Based in Erfurt, bm|t is the lead­ing address for cor­po­rate invest­ments in Thuringia. bm|t cur­rently man­ages twelve funds with a total vol­ume of around EUR 445 mil­lion, which invest in inno­v­a­tive com­pa­nies in almost all sec­tors and in all phases of cor­po­rate devel­op­ment — both in the start-up and growth phases or in com­pany suc­ces­sion sit­u­a­tions. Fur­ther infor­ma­tion is avail­able at: www.bm‑t.de

About Sparkasse Jena-Saale-Hol­z­land: Since 1828, Sparkasse has been rooted in the region, pro­vid­ing finan­cial ser­vices, advi­sory sup­port, and fund­ing for busi­nesses and com­mu­ni­ties. As the largest regional finan­cial part­ner, it enhances qual­ity of life through dig­i­tal­i­sa­tion, financ­ing, and pub­lic pro­grammes. Sparkasse actively sup­ports the region’s econ­omy, edu­ca­tion, sports, and cul­ture. It fos­ters inno­va­tion by back­ing start-ups like DeepEn GmbH and, together with the Busi­ness Angels Club Jena e.V., has cre­ated a plat­form con­nect­ing start-ups with pri­vate investors to strengthen the regional start-up ecosys­tem. Fur­ther infor­ma­tion is avail­able at: www.s‑jena.de

About MBG Thürin­gen: As a strong and reli­able part­ner, Mit­tel­ständis­che Beteili­gungs­ge­sellschaft Thürin­gen mbH offers small and medium-sized enter­prises mez­za­nine and equity invest­ments to strengthen equity cap­i­tal for start-ups, con­sol­i­da­tion, or suc­ces­sions. Com­pa­nies part­ner­ing with MBG thus have a sound basis for solid devel­op­ment and sus­tain­able growth. Fur­ther infor­ma­tion is avail­able at: www.mbg-thueringen.de