Biotech beauty company Debut raises $20 million

Biotech beauty firm Debut announced on Tuesday it has inked $20 million in investments to expand its AI-based ingredient discovery platform and scale its formulation business in the U.S. and Asia.

The San Diego-based company’s funding round was lead by Fine Structure Ventures, EDBI, Wealthberry, Bold (the venture fund of L’Oréal), GS Futures, Sandbox Industries and Material Impact, among others.

Debut said it will use the funding to discover ingredients that target the 14 hallmarks of aging, in turn helping its global beauty partners to innovate with biotech ingredients and formulations.

It will also enable beauty brands to outsource their formulation innovation, at scale and without the upfront R&D expense associated with biotech.

“Debut is laser-focused on staying at the forefront of skincare innovation and bringing cutting-edge biotech to every beauty brand with the highest-performing and most differentiated ingredients,” said Joshua Britton, PhD, founder and CEO of Debut.

“This funding will enhance our ability to screen upward of 50 billion ingredients to explore the 99.999 percent of unknown molecules that can optimize skin health and make skin longevity a reality.”

​The company is also planning to enter the Asian market, ​beginning with Singapore, where it will partner with leading brands to create custom ingredients and formulations for longevity skincare.

“AI combined with an understanding of skin biology enables the creation of custom formulation solutions for different geographies that has previously not been possible,” said Britton.