Behind the dazzling advances of modern medicine is a little-known scene: thousands of live horseshoe crabs strapped to racks, needles stuck into their hearts to draw out their "blue blood."
From the vaccines and antibody therapies we get every day to fillers, Botox, and implantable medical devices, the key raw material that tests the safety of nearly every product that goes into the human body, "LAL (Limulus Amebocyte Lysate)," comes from the blood of these horseshoe crabs. It is no exaggeration to say that if horseshoe crabs go extinct, the global pharmaceutical production system could be paralyzed.
At a lab in Seoul's Guro District, Cho Geon-sik, CEO of Cellweavers, told ChosunBiz that this scene shows an "uneasy dependence for human survival." Cho said, "If the semiconductor industry faces rare earth supply chain risks, the bio industry has a raw material supply bottleneck that depends on a specific animal," adding, "Cellweavers aims to redesign the bio raw material supply system through cell culture technology."
In fact, technologies that replace bleeding horseshoe crabs, such as recombinant factor C (rFC), are already commercialized in the market. But adoption by the pharmaceutical and medical device industries remains limited.
Because the composition and mechanism of action differ from the conventional method, applying them requires additional validation across the entire new drug development process. From a manufacturer's perspective, the time and expense burden is inevitably high.
Cellweavers chose a new approach: extracting cells from horseshoe crabs and culturing them. This is the so-called "C-LAL (Cell-based LAL)." Cho said, "Because it preserves the blood components of horseshoe crabs and the detection mechanism for toxins (endotoxins), it can be introduced without changing processes."
For the same reason, it is said to be relatively advantageous for regulatory compliance. Cho said, "We plan to target the European market first, where animal welfare regulations are the strictest."
C-LAL is also evaluated as meaningful in that it can reduce the "quality variability" problem inherent in the conventional method.
Cho said, "Horseshoe crabs differ in sensitivity to toxins by individual, and even the same individual can show different reactivity depending on the time of collection," adding, "Currently, a method of mixing blood from multiple individuals to match an average value is used."
Cellweavers selected only highly responsive cells and established them as a cell line. Because the same cell line is then cultured to produce the raw material, the company says it can supply standardized products that maintain consistent sensitivity throughout the year.
Cho said, "Evaluations by the Korea Institute of Toxicology (KIT) also confirmed sensitivity equal to or greater than commercial test kits," adding, "In the past, a limitation was that the cell lines died quickly, but recent advances in stabilization and culture process technologies have brought us to a level where commercialization is possible."
The global endotoxin testing market is currently estimated at about 4 trillion won. Even though a liter of horseshoe crab blood costs about 20 million won, supply expansion is constrained by capture limits and other restrictions.
Cho said, "If a mass production system based on cell culture is established, the market size could expand two to three times," adding, "We aim to capture about 40% of the total market within 10 years."
Cellweavers is discussing collaboration plans with companies such as the French in vitro diagnostics firm bioMérieux to commercialize C-LAL in 2027. Starting in 2028, the company plans to expand its business beyond raw material supply to the development and sale of endotoxin test kits.
Cellweavers is also accelerating the development of additional pipelines. The company plans to culture cells to produce the raw material for the blood anticoagulant heparin.
Heparin is an essential medicine designated by the World Health Organization (WHO), with about 90% of the global supply dependent on porcine-derived raw materials. However, structural instability has been noted, as raw material prices fluctuate significantly whenever livestock diseases such as African swine fever (ASF) spread.
Cho said, "We have secured two mast cell lines that produce heparin," adding, "We have signed a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) with Netherlands-based drug developer Matis Pharmaceuticals and are preparing a material transfer agreement (MTA)."
The production strategy is also taking shape. Cho said, "We are pushing to build a dedicated production facility in Pohang, North Gyeongsang Province, where our headquarters is located, and recently submitted the related plan to the local government." The site will serve as a key base for producing major pipelines, including C-LAL raw materials and endotoxin test kits.
He said, "We aim to achieve sales of at least 100 billion won in 2030," adding, "Based on that, we plan to pursue an initial public offering (IPO) and global mergers and acquisitions (M&A) through strategic partnerships." Cellweavers is currently raising a pre-Series A round.