Coastar Therapeutics

What Coastar Therapeutics does

Coastar Therapeutics is a privately held, pre-clinical biotechnology company headquartered in San Diego, California, that develops an Erythrocyte Derived Membrane (EDM)-based gene delivery technology platform. The company addresses two central bottlenecks in cell and gene therapy—immune clearance of biological payloads and lack of precision targeting to disease sites—by wrapping genetic medicines (DNA, mRNA, viral vectors, gene-editing components) in engineered red blood cell-derived membranes. Its core technology stack comprises three branded, proprietary platforms: ENHEnS™ (cell membrane coating), eLNP™ (enhanced lipid nanoparticle delivery), and the underlying EDM technology. These platforms are designed to be modality-agnostic and have been demonstrated across mRNA, DNA, AAV, and gene-editing payloads, with stated potential for repeat dosing, systemic delivery, and lower toxicity profiles than viral alternatives.

The company serves pharmaceutical and biotechnology partners rather than end patients, operating a B2B partnership and co-development business model. Revenue is derived from technology access fees, milestone payments, and potential future royalties on co-developed therapies. Active disclosed collaborations include TriArm Therapeutics (blood cancer, DNA modality), EditForce (DM1 gene therapy, AAV/RNA), and SOHM, Inc. (genome editing combining EDM with SOHM's ABBIE platform). The company joined Johnson & Johnson's JLABS accelerator in October 2024. Leadership is co-founded by Eddie Y. Chung (CEO, MS Bioengineering UC San Diego) and Han L. Lim (CSO, PhD Bioengineering UC San Diego), supported by a Scientific Advisory Board that includes 2013 Nobel Laureate Dr. Randy Schekman (joined March 2025), gene therapy pioneer Dr. Joseph Glorioso III, and KPCB China Managing Partner James Huang. Coastar has raised a multi-million-dollar Series Pre-A first close (November 2022) led by Panacea Venture and Proxima Ventures, and was nominated for the 2024 Prix Galien USA Best Startup Award and named to Connect's 2025 Cool Companies list.

Name

Coastar Therapeutics

Legal name

Coastar Therapeutics Inc.

Website

https://coastartherapeutics.com

Company type

Private

Founded year

2017

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

11–50 employees

Short description

Coastar Therapeutics is a pre-clinical San Diego biotech developing Erythrocyte Derived Membrane (EDM) technology to deliver genetic medicines while evading immune clearance, serving pharmaceutical and biotech partners through co-development programs in oncology, gene therapy, and genome editing.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Drug Delivery Technology

NAICS

Biological Product (except Diagnostic) Manufacturing (325414), Research and Development in Biotechnology (except Nanobiotechnology) (541714)

SIC

Biological Products, (No Disgnostic Substances) (2836)

akta.pro primary industry

Non-viral Gene Delivery & Gene Therapy (LNP, polymers, electroporation, physical methods) (HLAAACAC)

akta.pro secondary industry

RNA Delivery Technologies (LNPs, polymers, conjugates incl. GalNAc, peptides, exosomes) (HLAAADAD)

Keywords

• Gene delivery technology
• Cell membrane coating
• Erythrocyte derived membrane
• Cancer immunotherapy delivery
• Genetic medicine platform

Headquarters

HQ city

San Diego

HQ country

United States

HQ region

North America

Offices1 record

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Technology or R&D, Operations, Marketing or Sales, Infrastructure

Revenue model

1. Partnership and Co-development Revenue: Pre-clinical stage biotech company generating revenue through research partnerships, licensing agreements, and co-development deals with pharmaceutical and biotech companies. Revenue derived from technology access fees, milestone payments, and potential future royalties on approved therapies.

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels1 record

Marketing channels6 records

Core offering

Coastar Therapeutics develops a proprietary Erythrocyte Derived Membrane (EDM) gene delivery technology platform that coats biological payloads (DNA, mRNA, viral vectors, gene-editing components) with engineered red blood cell-derived membranes to evade immune system clearance and enable precision targeting to disease sites. The company offers the ENHEnS™ cell membrane coating platform and the eLNP™ enhanced lipid nanoparticle technology, applied to cancer immunotherapy, gene therapy, antibody delivery, and vaccine development through B2B partnerships with pharmaceutical and biotech companies.

Product overview

Coastar Therapeutics offers a unified platform of biological payload delivery technologies for cell and gene therapies. The core offerings include ENHEnS™ (cell membrane coating technology), eLNP™ (enhanced lipid nanoparticle delivery), and EDM (Erythrocyte Derived Membrane) technology. These technologies work together to enable genetic medicines—including DNA, mRNA, and viral vectors—to evade immune clearance and achieve targeted delivery to tumor or disease sites. The platform is designed for applications in cancer immunotherapy and gene therapy, with collaborative development programs in mRNA-based in vivo CAR-T therapy, blood cancer treatment, and DM1 gene therapy.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• ENHEnS™ Platform ENHEnS™ is Coastar's proprietary cell membrane coating technology platform that enables biological payloads (DNA, mRNA, viral vectors) to evade immune system recognition and clearance while achieving precision targeting to disease sites, including difficult-to-reach and metastatic tumors.
• eLNP™ Technology eLNP™ (enhanced Lipid Nanoparticle) is a proprietary delivery technology that coats cell membranes on biological payloads to help them evade recognition and clearance by the immune system and be successfully targeted to tumor or other disease sites.
• EDM (Erythrocyte Derived Membrane) Technology EDM is Coastar's erythrocyte-derived membrane gene delivery technology that uses engineered red blood cell-derived membranes to deliver therapeutic payloads including DNA, RNA, and gene-editing components with improved biocompatibility and potential for repeat dosing for cancer and genetic disease treatments.

Quantifiable outcome

• Platform enables delivery of genetic medicine with improved biocompatibility and potential for repeat dosing
• +1 more outcomes

Named customers3 records

Segments2 records

Ideal customer profiles1 record

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Feature3 records

Partnerships

Four partnerships are on record, tiered major and core.

• Johnson & Johnson Innovation - JLABSmajorStrategic or Co-development Partner · 7 October 2024Coastar joined JLABS, Johnson & Johnson's early stage biotech accelerator program. JLABS provides state-of-the-art lab resources, funding opportunities, mentorship from industry experts, and access to the J&J ecosystem including industry connections and collaborations
• SOHM, Inc.coreStrategic or Co-development Partner · 2 April 2024Strategic collaboration to advance genome editing by combining Coastar's proprietary erythrocyte-derived membrane gene carriers with SOHM's ABBIE genome editing technology. Aims to develop a novel platform for precise and targeted genome editing for gene therapy and regenerative medicine applications
• EditForcecoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerCollaboration for DM1 (Myotonic Dystrophy Type 1) gene therapy using AAV/RNA approach. Coastar's EDM technology enables effective delivery of the gene therapy to disease sites
• TriArm TherapeuticscoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerCollaboration for blood cancer treatment using DNA drug modality with gene therapy approach. Partnership to develop next-generation therapies leveraging Coastar's EDM delivery technology

Scale indicators3 records

Recent moves6 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Direct peers

• Beam Therapeutics: Clinical-stage base-editing company using LNP and electroporation delivery for in vivo and ex vivo applications, comparable in the gene-editing delivery category where Coastar collaborates with SOHM and EditForce.
• Generation Bio: Clinical-stage biotech developing non-viral gene therapies using a lipid nanoparticle delivery platform, directly comparable to Coastar's non-viral EDM/eLNP-based gene delivery approach.
• Arcturus Therapeutics: Clinical-stage mRNA medicines company with proprietary LNP delivery technology and a partnered COVID vaccine, a direct comparability point for Coastar's eLNP and gene delivery capabilities.
• Capstan Therapeutics: In vivo cell therapy company using lipid nanoparticle delivery of mRNA payloads to engineer immune cells, closely paralleling Coastar's membrane-coated LNP platform for cell and gene therapy applications.
• Acuitas Therapeutics: Private LNP delivery technology specialist whose lipid systems underpin Pfizer/BioNTech's COVID-19 vaccine, the most commercially validated LNP delivery platform and a key head-to-head competitor.
• Verve Therapeutics: In vivo base-editing medicines company that uses LNP delivery of gene-editing components to the liver, a direct peer in the in vivo non-viral gene-editing delivery space that Coastar's EDM/eLNP also targets.

Broad incumbents

• Moderna: Commercial-stage mRNA and LNP platform company with a deep pipeline of vaccines and gene therapies using proprietary lipid delivery, the most scaled and well-capitalized reference point for non-viral delivery in the industry.
• Intellia Therapeutics: Clinical-stage CRISPR/Cas9 company using both LNP (in vivo) and ex vivo cell delivery approaches, a broader incumbent whose delivery technology choices directly overlap with Coastar's target use cases.
• BioNTech: Commercial-stage mRNA therapeutics company with a broad pipeline in oncology and infectious disease, often partnered with Acuitas for LNP delivery, a key large-cap reference point for any non-viral delivery platform.
• Editas Medicine: Clinical-stage gene-editing company developing both in vivo and ex vivo CRISPR-based medicines, comparable to Coastar's partnerships in the gene-editing delivery space.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat2 records

Key risks7 records

Key highlights7 records

Customer concentration

• Xx.com/CoastarThera
• Facebookfacebook.com/profile.php
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/coastar-therapeutics

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles8 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds2 records

Investors2 records

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M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Coastar Therapeutics