Capstan Medical raises $110M in Series C round ahead of structural heart robot’s first-in-human procedure

Capstan Medical has raised $110 million in new funding from an oversubscribed Series C round, the structural heart surgical robot developer said today.

The funding round was led by Eclipse, with participation from Yu Galaxy and Intuitive Ventures, all three of which had previously invested in Capstan. Joining them in the Series C round is first-time investor Gideon Strategic Partners.

The latest round brings Capstan Medical’s total funding to more than $150 million.

“We had such strong internal support for giving us this runway for the next phase of the business that we only added a single investor into the mix for this round, which was fantastic,” Capstan Medical CEO Maggie Nixon said in an interview with MassDevice ahead of the announcement. “The intent is to fuel this next wave of innovation.”

Capstan Medical is developing a surgical robot and catheter-delivered implants for minimally invasive percutaneous replacement of mitral and tricuspid heart valves. The startup hopes to conduct its first-in-human mitral valve procedure by early next year and to follow with the same for its tricuspid valve sometime in 2025.

Medical Design & Outsourcing: Capstan Medical CEO Maggie Nixon offers a tech update

Capstan Medical remains on track to start a pivotal trial of its mitral system in 2026 and submit it for FDA review as soon as 2028, Nixon said.

“We already had fuel in the tank to get us through this first-in-human. This gets us all the way through that pre-pivotal phase and set up to move into pivotal trials for our mitral device,” Nixon said. “This also lets us — as we touched on back in the spring — take our tricuspid concept off the shelf and really move that forward. We’re targeting trying to get that tricuspid implant to first-in-human this next year as well.”

“Our focus is absolutely mitral,” she later continued. “… Getting that tricuspid through the preclinical phase is is going to be fantastic as well [but] our mitral program is our No. 1 priority and if we ever got into any sort of resourcing conflict, our mitral program would take precedence. So we are looking to do [a tricuspid first-in-human] in the next 12 to 15 months and this raise fuels some of that next implant in our portfolio.”

Capstan Medical is targeting the world’s leading cause of death — heart disease — with a less-invasive alternative than open-heart surgery to replace diseased mitral and tricuspid heart valves. Many patients are not eligible for open-heart procedures or even catheter-based procedures.

“We’re at an inflection point where robotics will play a consequential role in delivering life-saving solutions to millions of patients across the world,” Eclipse Partner Justin Butler said in a statement shared with MassDevice. “Capstan is at the forefront of this wave with their robotic solutions for structural heart disease.”

Intuitive Ventures is the venture investment arm of Intuitive Surgical, the leading surgical robotics developer and manufacturer where Nixon first worked with Capstan Medical founder and Chief Technology Officer Dan Wallace.

The Intuitive Ventures funding is not a strategic investment or business development investment by Intuitive Surgical, Nixon said.

“This is purely a financial investment on their front. … It is independent. This is not a structured deal,” she said.

In October, MassDevice was first to report that Intuitive finance executive Brian King left to join the medical device incubator that hatched Capstan Medical, Occam Labs.

“We’re maturing the business right now. We brought Brian King in on the finance side … and we’re in final rounds of interviews on a regulatory head as well,” Nixon said.

“This raise just really shows the level of support and momentum around what we’re doing,” she later continued. “That vote of confidence is incredible. It’s our job to execute.”

Read more from this interview at Medical Design & Outsourcing.