Diagnostic test company Oxford Immunotec has raised $26 million (£17 million) in a Series D round led by US investor New Leaf Venture Partners.

Diagnostic test company Oxford Immunotec has raised $26 million (£17 million) in a Series D round led by US investor New Leaf Venture Partners.

Existing backers including SPARK Ventures, Wellington Partners and Oxford University also participated in the fundraising, together with the ventures arm of US healthcare organisation Kaiser Permanente, which like New Leaf is investing in the company for the first time.

Dr Jonathan Gee, a director at SPARK Ventures, has joined the board of Oxford Immunotec, which develops and sells a product that helps to diagnose tuberculosis (TB) by measuring blood cells.

Gee says that the company, whose TB test has been approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), ‘is well placed to grow a very significant business in the US and beyond’.

It will use the funding for sales and marketing of its flagship product to ‘accelerate the company’s rapid revenue growth’, according to Oxford Immunotec’s CEO Peter Wrighton-Smith, as well as to support the development of new diagnostic tests.

New Leaf Venture Partners manages $1.3 billion of assets and invests in clinical-stage biopharmaceutical products as well as early-stage diagnostic technologies.