NanoGhost Ltd., an Israeli biotechnology company, announced on Monday that it has been awarded its sixth grant from the Israel Innovation Authority to fund a new immuno-oncology research program with Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. The award, disclosed in a June 22 press release from NanoGhost, will support preclinical work on next-generation immune checkpoint inhibitors delivered via the company’s nano-vesicle platform, with glioblastoma and other hard-to-treat solid tumors at the center of the work.
The grant brings NanoGhost’s total IIA funding tally to six awards since the company was founded in 2019, per the authority’s own company page. The Netanya-based company has raised approximately $17 million to date, of which roughly $4.5 million has come in non-dilutive grants from leading innovation and research funding programs. Yonatan Malca, NanoGhost’s co-founder and CEO, framed the new program as a platform validation step. The grant amount itself was not disclosed.
A Sixth IIA Grant in Seven Years
Six in seven years. The Israel Innovation Authority’s company profile for NanoGhost lists two specific prior awards by name: an R&D program request in 2023 under the “Entitled Growth Corporate” track, and a 2024 win through “The Expedited Program.”
IIA grants for collaborative programs typically require an academic partner and a defined work plan, and they tend to fund the industry side of the joint work. The press release does not name a BGU principal investigator, list the grant’s dollar value, or describe the experimental design, though it does say the program targets cancers with significant unmet medical needs, with brain cancers explicitly named. The framing is the company’s own, and the program is built on the bet that a better delivery vehicle can do what a free drug has not.
A short stats snapshot from NanoGhost’s public filings and the IIA:
- 6 Israel Innovation Authority grants since 2019
- ~$17 million raised to date
- ~$4.5 million in non-dilutive grants
- 12 employees, R&D stage
- 2019 founding year, Netanya, Israel
The IIA’s own materials describe the authority as the support and investment arm of the Israeli government, tasked with fostering innovation across the economy through competitive grant programs. Each of NanoGhost’s prior IIA grants was, by design, a competitive award, and the cumulative six reflects a sustained funding relationship.
How the NanoGhost Particle Reaches the Tumor
The particles are hollow. The company’s nano-vesicles, branded NanoGhosts, are derived from the cell membranes of mesenchymal stem cells, a class of adult stem cells with known tropism to tumors and to sites of inflammation. The IIA’s company page describes NGs as nanovesicles derived from the cell membranes of allogeneic mesenchymal stem cells, with the cell membrane isolated and downsized to nanoparticles while retaining original architecture and characteristics. That retained architecture is the platform’s central claim, and it is what the company says lets the vesicles home in on tumors after injection.
The platform is positioned, in the press release and on the company website, as a way to deliver a broad range of therapeutic payloads, from small molecule drugs to proteins and mRNA. A single delivery vehicle that can be loaded with different therapeutics gives the company optionality across oncology programs without rebuilding the underlying carrier each time, and the platform’s tags on the IIA page, biotechnology, drug delivery, stem cells, and bio-convergence, point to the same broad applicability. The company’s framing of its own technology leans on the same idea: the platform is the vehicle, and the drug is a swappable cargo.
So far the most public data point on platform performance comes from 2019 coverage of the company’s launch, when the company said lab experiments in animals had shown that NanoGhosts loaded with anti-cancer payloads reduced tumor size in small lung carcinoma, prostate, and pancreatic cancer models by as much as 85%, according to the 2019 funding round coverage with the 85% preclinical tumor data. The company has not announced a clinical-stage program, and the press release describes its current status as promising preclinical results in several cancer indications, including brain tumors.
From Machluf’s Lab to a Commercial Spin-Out
It began in a Technion lab. NanoGhost’s scientific origin sits in the lab of Prof. Marcelle Machluf, a full professor and dean of the Faculty of Biotechnology and Food Engineering at the Technion, who developed the NanoGhost concept over a decade of funded academic research before spinning it out. Her Technion faculty profile records that in November 2019 she founded a startup company, NanoGhost, for the therapy of cancer and raised $5 million to support the scale-up of the platform until reaching Phase 1 clinical studies. A 2019 report on the launch added operational detail: Israel’s aMoon health-tech fund led a $5 million investment through its Velocity fund, the technology had been patented in the US and Europe, and in 2016 Israel’s Ministry of Science and Technology had selected the NanoGhost technology as one of the 60 most important historical developments in Israel. The launch story was a classic academic spin-out with a clear named CEO in Malca, then a former public-company executive.
A short timeline of NanoGhost’s public milestones:
- 2016: Israel’s Ministry of Science and Technology lists NanoGhost technology among the country’s 60 most important historical developments.
- November 2019: Prof. Marcelle Machluf and Yonatan Malca co-found NanoGhost and raise $5 million led by aMoon’s Velocity fund.
- 2023: NanoGhost receives an IIA R&D grant under the “Entitled Growth Corporate” track.
- 2024: NanoGhost wins an IIA grant through “The Expedited Program.”
- June 2026: NanoGhost receives its sixth IIA grant, focused on immune checkpoint inhibitors for glioblastoma via BGN and BGU.
Why Glioblastoma, Why Checkpoint Inhibitors
The cancer NanoGhost’s new program names first is glioblastoma, the aggressive adult brain tumor that has resisted nearly every systemic therapy tried against it. The press release is direct on the gap: immune checkpoint inhibitors have transformed cancer treatment over the past decade, yet many patients continue to experience limited responses, disease progression, or lack of effective treatment options, particularly in aggressive cancers such as glioblastoma and other difficult-to-treat solid tumors.
NanoGhost’s reason for picking glioblastoma is structural. The company has spent the last several years saying its MSC-membrane vesicles can home in on tumors and penetrate hard-to-reach sites, including the brain. The IIA’s company page makes the same point more plainly: nanoGhosts selectively target and treat tumors, including hard to penetrate brain tumors.
A grant that puts the company’s delivery vehicle in front of immune checkpoint inhibitors is a bet that the bottleneck in glioblastoma sits in delivery, with the checkpoint biology as the cargo. The market framing is generous. The press release puts the global market for immune checkpoint inhibitors at tens of billions of dollars annually, with continued growth as immunotherapy becomes a standard of care across more cancer types. That figure is the company’s own estimate and a broad one, so it is worth treating as a directional reference alone.
We are honored to receive this continued support from the Israel Innovation Authority and to collaborate with Ben-Gurion University on this exciting program. This project has the potential to advance new immunotherapy approaches for patients with significant unmet medical needs while further validating NanoGhost’s platform for the targeted delivery of biologics.
The BGN Bridge and the Missing Details
BGN is the bridge. The technology-transfer partner on the new program is BGN, the company that commercializes research out of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, and BGN’s portfolio, per the press release, spans cybersecurity, robotics, biotechnology, energy, agtech, and quantum research. The press release does not say which BGU lab or researcher will lead the BGU side of the immune checkpoint work, or what the joint milestones look like.
Some are missing on purpose. A few other details are missing on purpose, or by default. The grant amount is not disclosed, the work remains preclinical, and the company has not said when a first human study would start. The IIA’s company page lists NanoGhost’s stage as R&D, the company’s employee count at 12, and its registered tags to include bio-convergence, biologicals, cancer, drug delivery, life sciences, medtech, and stem cells. Six IIA grants across a single company signal sustained patience, and the BGU collaboration is the next sandbox.
The path is slow. The company has framed the new grant as further validation of the delivery platform, without tying it to a clinical timeline. Machluf’s T3 profile lists 8 national-phase patents and 4 international approved patents in the field of drug delivery and tissue engineering, with more pending. The grant itself does not move any of those patents into a clinical-stage program, only extends the runway for further preclinical work.
The IIA’s program structure has given NanoGhost room to work over the years, with each grant typically funding a multi-year work plan and the cumulative six since 2019 pointing to a sustained funding relationship. The next public test of the platform is whether the BGU collaboration can produce a checkpoint-inhibitor-loaded vesicle ready for a clinical-trial design.
