# Petri Bio

Next-generation of therapeutics from gut microbes

## Elevator pitch
Petri Bio creates therapies inspired by the compounds found in nature. We mine through the terabytes of underutilized genetic sequence data generated by genome projects and look for sequences that are of potential therapeutic value. We then express these gene sequences as their encoded peptides and screen them for their ability to bind therapeutic targets. From there, leading candidates are further optimized for binding and tweaked for maximum effectiveness as pharmaceuticals.

- Canonical URL: https://wefunder.com/petribioold
- Entity ID: wefunder:company:56486
- Last updated: 2026-06-19T05:00:18Z
- Generated at: 2026-06-20T04:52:20Z

## Quick facts
- We develop therapeutics inspired by the data collected by animal and microbial genome projects.
- Positioned to mine 32+ terabytes of genomic data for future drug precursors.
- Founded by 2 PhD scientists (3 patents and 14 publications). 2nd-time founder (YCS17).
- Patent-pending treatment for COVID-19 under evaluation by a pharma company for sponsorship.
- Early pipeline of candidates help treat IBD, which affects 1.6M people and $15B market
- Drug precursor for the treatment of NAFLD/NASH (“fatty liver disease”), $7B growing market.

## Active fundraises
- wefunder:fundraise:36226: 4(a)(6) successful (USD)

## Story
Petri Bio is searching the gut microbiome for novel therapies for diseases that are tough to treat.Why gut microbes? Because we know they can influence a diverse array of health outcomes, we just don’t know how. But we do know they make millions of unstudied chemical compounds that interact with the body.Petri Bio believes the medicines of the future are among these compounds, waiting to be found.To kickstart the future, we are building out a platform to screen microbial compounds for therapeutic effects.We have early leads on novel treatments for two underserved diseases: Inflammatory bowel disease and fatty liver disease. Fatty liver disease has NO pharmaceutical treatment, and existing IBD treatments have very limited effectiveness. People suffering from these diseases deserve more options than what pharma companies have come up with.We’ve gone beyond treating chronic diseases. As part of Wefunder’s “Fight the Virus” challenge, we’ve used our platform to look for compounds that can bind and neutralize the virus that causes COVID-19.Our approach is unique.We are creating molecules called peptides that neutralize the virus without triggering the immune system — which is what a vaccine does. We hope that our solution will be useful in addition to vaccines so that we have a form of attack for those who experience trouble responding to vaccines (in particular, the immunocompromised and the elderly).In just 3 months, we’ve been able to file a patent on these compounds, and have been selected for evaluation for a sponsorship from a major vaccine manufacturer to proceed with its development!Our pipeline has a total addressable market of over $25 billion per year.We are a team of PhD scientists with decades of domain expertise and Y Combinator alumni network. Our team is ready to hit the ground running.Shu is PhD experienced in genetic engineering and molecular farming, a second-time biotech founder and YC alum.Joe is a PhD biologist and published author on how gut microbes influence health and aging.Our advisor John is a YC alum founder and has 7 years of experience as a biotech CEO, and provides invaluable insight navigating early-stage biotech.What's next for COVID-19We want to end this crisis as soon as possible......by whatever vaccine or therapy gets us there the fastest! Thus, we don't see ourselves competing with other treatments for COVID-19.That said, it’s our hope that our offering can be used with an established pharmaceutical company’s product. We have already received some interest from a vaccine manufacturer and we are currently under evaluation for potential sponsorship.What's next for our pipeline of therapeuticsThe Fight the Virus challenge has given us a real-world crash course in the drug development process, from initial design to patenting and seeking pharmaceutical sponsorships, all in a three-month span.With further funding, we have the experience and network now to do it again with IBD and fatty liver disease. We want to develop them as quickly as possible, and partner with pharmaceutical manufacturers to bring them to market.With enough support, we can even further build out the platform and start screening compounds for other underserved diseases, and branch out into other microbe-inspired products.Join our mission!We’re making drugs from an untapped resource of millions of bioactive compounds: the human microbiome. This gives us millions of “shots-on-goal” that traditional pharma companies aren’t making. Invest as little as $100 to be with us on the journey from the very beginning, and let's build a healthier future for everyone!

## FAQ
1. **Hi Shu, can you confirm if the $4M valuation cap are early bird terms?**
   - Hi Francis! Thanks for reaching out. Yes I can confirm for the first 100k early-bird investments, the cap is 4M. Please feel free to send email to shu@petribio.com if you have more questions!​
2. **And is there a discount rate attached to the standard terms?**
   - Hi Francis, there's no discount rate to the standard terms, but the early bird term has a lower cap value (4M). Also, for investors we know or put in above a certain threshold, we can potentially negotiate or even waive the fee. In addition, investing with IRA is also an option. If you want to know more, feel free to send an email to me!
3. **Hi, What's the goal 6 months from now? Who am I investing in when I invest in Shu Li?**
   - 6 months from now we will get more lab-based proof of concepts to show the effectiveness of peptides. For each peptide proved to be useful for an application (therapeutic function, metabolism regulation, etc), we will file a patent to protect the intellectual properties as well. I truly appreciate everyone that interested in our project and want to know more about us. Please feel free to send me an email at shu@petribio.com, and I'd love to schedule a zoom meeting to let you know more about o...
4. **IS the 32+ terabytes of genomic data proprietary? or is the advantage you have is that you've found a better way to mine it?**
   - Hey Glen, great question. The 32 Tb of data is from the Human Microbiome Project, it was generated with public funding and is publicly available. We get the benefit of mining it without having to reinvent the wheel in terms of massive data collection. Our edge is in how we analyze this data for potentially useful gene sequences, expressing them for the first time in a laboratory setting, testing them, and developing IP around specific use cases for them. Hope this helps! -Joe
5. **You answered other questions, are you avoiding mine?**
   - Hi Leonardo, we are so sorry for missing your question. For some reason we just can't see it on our end. I apologize for the inconvenience. Would you mind re-posting your question here? Happy to answer it!

## Team
- Shu Li (Co-Founder)
- Joseph Schinaman (Co-Founder)
- Sydney Santiago (Marketing)

## Recent posts
- Happy New Year! (2021-01-01T22:12:11Z)
- Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! (2020-12-01T19:05:03Z)
- 3 hours left to join! (2020-12-01T02:12:42Z)
- 2 Days Left! (2020-11-28T22:26:36Z)
- Happy Thanksgiving! (2020-11-23T23:21:38Z)
- Almost $100k! (2020-11-13T22:32:14Z)
- Latest Update! (2020-11-10T19:50:44Z)
- Petri Bio just converted to a Delaware C-corp! (2020-09-15T17:19:02Z)
- Petri Bio is selected for the Fall 2020 Cohort of UC Hastings Startup Legal Garage! (2020-08-25T19:18:17Z)
- We’ve achieved our first fundraising milestone! (2020-08-18T19:34:31Z)
- Thank you for supporting our WeFunder campaign! (2020-08-12T19:04:04Z)

## Q&A
- Q: Do you have social media accounts that we can share?
  - A: Thanks for wanting to help get the word out! We are still busy getting our social media presence up and running, but for the time being you can share our website www.petribio.com, and our wefunder page. We'll send out Wefunder updates as we add more social media.
- Q: Any new updates
- Q: Any new updates
- Q: Validation: Other biotechs are studying gut microbes to further cancer treatments. Possibly, gut microbes could be an emerging field... FYI https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/persephone-biosciences-initiates-the-argonaut-study-of-gut-microbiome-linked-immune-modulation-in-cancer-treatment-response-301178470.html
  - A: Thanks for sharing the article! It's indeed an emerging field and we are very passionate about harnessing the power of gut microbes to develop treatments. Thank you for your continued support! By the way, I noticed that some technical issues might have happened during the transaction. Please let us know if there's anything we can do to help. We want to make sure your investment can be in before we close the campaign!
- Q: Do you intend to pay dividends (post-SAFE conversion)?
  - A: Hello Craig, thanks for reaching out. We are growth oriented startup, and at this time, don't have any plans to pay dividends. Any money we get will be put back into the company for the foreseeable future. Hope this helps!
- Q: How do I purchase stock?
  - A: Hi Wendy, thanks for your interest. We’re still a private company, but we’re excited about angel investment opportunities! Feel free to send me an email at shu@petribio.com, and I’d love to chat more about it.
- Q: Any updates to this campaign? Has it fizzled out?
  - A: Hi Josh, we are making a lot of progress and have been updating our investors through our newsletter. Would you like to provide your email or sign up here? https://buff.ly/3Yf1PvJ
- Q: Happy New Year Shu Li! How are you and how is Petri Bio progressing? Will you be sharing an investor update soon? Looks forward to hearing back from you soon. Sincerely, Baljit
- Q: I am wondering what is the status of this start up. Is it still viable?
  - A: Hi Gilbert! Yes, we are making progress and will send out a major update to our investors soon!
- Q: Any new updates I see on your website down?
- Q: Will you be extending this round of funding?
  - A: Hello Lyle, As it happens, we have already extended our campaign once, so as not to conflict too much with the Thanksgiving holiday. We aren't planning on getting another extension, so anyone thinking of investing further should plan accordingly. Thanks, Joe
- Q: What types of products will you be creating ?
  - A: Hello Lyle! We are developing products with the rigor and efficacy to eventually be granted FDA-approval as therapeutics for certain indications, such as IBD and NASH. That said, we are a discovery company. We are however leaving the door open to possibly release some probiotics direct to consumer, if our future discoveries lead us to something that would make for a safe and effective product in that space. I hope this helps, Joe
- Q: Shu Li, could you share your response to Nicholas Sangtae here. He asked pertinent questions that would be useful to review before making an investment decision.
  - A: Dear Baljit, thank you so much for your question, and sorry for the late reply! How to finance for the long term is always an interesting question in startups, especially for biotech companies. Indeed, clinical trials need relatively much longer time and more work to de-risk. I think one unique advantage we are aware of being a platform company, is that we also have the option to co-develop or even license therapeutic candidates to industrial partners. In that case, our work would focus on early stage development and exploring novel applications, instead of taking each candidates all the way from clinical trials to manufacturing and final distribution. In this way we are hoping to shorten the timeline of generating early revenues from 7-10 years to 3-5 years. However, we know there are many variable factors that can change our plan. Thus we are also working with business school consultants to help us refine the go to market strategy, in order to better prioritize our options. Please feel free to send us an email at info@petribio.com if you want to talk more. We are always happen to jump on a call with future investors!
- Q: Hi Shu and Joseph! I will soon be running a wefunder campaign. Could you help me by answering a couple of questions about your experience? You can email me: larry@lyfmap.com Thanks!
  - A: Of course. Our pleasure to share some tips and lessons learned. Sent you an email and look forward to talking!
- Q: When is the last day to invest?
  - A: Dear Samuel, our campaign is supposed to be open till Nov 21st, but we may be granted a chance to extend it depends on investors' interest.