Sortera Bio eyes triple Business Weekly Awards triumph

The company is tilting at Life Science Innovation, Startup of the Year and Disruptive Technology categories. Its proposition enables the development of novel medicines against challenging biological targets.

Deep Screening facilitates the precise identification of potential therapeutic candidates with desirable drug-like properties by experimentally collecting sequence and functional data in massive parallelism for hundreds of millions of biologics in a single experiment.

These datasets enable the rapid production of internally consistent training datasets and large-scale experimental validation of its generative AI models.

The breakthrough technology powering Sortera Bio was originally developed and validated at the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology with support from AstraZeneca through the LMB-AstraZeneca Blue Sky Collaboration.

Sortera Bio was founded by Ben Porebski and Philipp Holliger – both recognised leaders in protein engineering and synthetic biology. Porebski, formerly an Investigator Scientist at MRC LMB, is Sortera Bio’s CEO and CTO. Holliger, a Programme Leader at MRC LMB, brings invaluable expertise and strategic guidance to the venture, and serves on its Board.

Sortera’s Deep Screening technology, invented by Porebski, has the potential to revolutionise the discovery of antibody therapeutics. Having only raised its first investment in May 2024, Sortera Bio has incredible traction across multiple sectors and is building on its early success to develop and commercialise a truly game-changing technology.

Last summer, the company attracted big hitting backers for a £7.5 million pre-seed round to power AI models for drug discovery. The round was led by Cambridge Innovation Capital (CIC) with participation from Cambridge-headquartered Big Pharma player AstraZeneca and global immunotherapy powerhouse BioNTech, anchored in Germany.

Sponsor line-up

Four new global leaders in their fields have joined the Business Weekly Awards sponsor line-up this year - Innovate Cambridge, which is a pathfinder to Cambridge innovation growth on the world stage; international quantum computing giant Quantinuum, £34 billion pensions scheme Railpen and the hugely growing Wellcome Genome Campus.

Lead sponsor of the 2025-2026 event, law firm Mills & Reeve, will again conduct the initial phase of the judging before deciding upon the final shortlist.

Also sponsoring the event are Arm, AstraZeneca, Barclays, Cambridge Innovation Capital, Cambridge Network, Cambridge Science Park, Cambridge Spark, Chesterford Research Park, Howard Group, MAG: London Stansted Airport, Marshall of Cambridge, PwC, Savills, St John’s Innovation Centre and The University of Cambridge Judge Business School.

Enter the awards

The Awards are designed to cover companies of all sizes and at different stages of evolution from raw startups to established world leaders. Closing date for entries is June 30, 2026. The categories are:

Startup of the Year: For a start-up in any sector deemed to have the most potential to become globally successful. (Reigning champion – Wave Photonics)

Cambridge Judge Graduate Business of the Year: For a venture that in the last 12 months has benefited from engagement with the wider Cambridge ecosystem – in terms of support and giving back –and is retaining graduate talent. (Reigning champion – Eyesea Green)

Sir Michael Marshall Engineering Excellence Award: For a company or individual who in the last 12 months has added game-changing engineering to any product in any business & industry. (Reigning champion – Cambrionix)

Disruptive Technology: For a company in any sector whose science or technology is deemed to be genuinely game-changing on a broad scale. (Reigning champion – Cambridge Intelligence)

The Pathfinder Award: For a company whose science or technology is influencing next generation Life Science innovation. (Reigning champion – Neobe Therapeutics)

Technology Scale-up: For a hi-tech company that in the previous 12 months has broadened its market reach, scaled headcount, secured increased investment or added noticeable impact to its technology proposition. (Reigning champion – Quantinuum)

Life Science Scale-up: For the Life Science business that has shown most progress in the preceding 12 months in terms of scaling headcount, broadening vertical markets or increasing the potency of its pipeline. (Reigning champion – Constructive Bio)

Life Science Innovation: For the organisation or individual who has done the most to further the cause of life science discovery for the benefit of human healthcare internationally. (Reigning champion – Nuclera)

International Trade Champion: For a business in any industry that has significantly broadened its export sales or access to global markets. (Reigning champion – Raspberry Pi)

Collaboration of the Year: This Award is designed to recognise a meeting of minds and marriage of expertise in any field of activity in the last 12 months without which the driver of the initiative would not have been able to make such signifiant progress. (Reigning champion – Alchemab)

Quoted Company of the Year: For a company in the region based on any public exchange which in the last 12 months has fleshed out its proposition and maintained or enhanced value for its shareholders. (Reigning champion – Raspberry Pi)

Female Founder in AI: For an inspirational female founder or co-founder of a growing company deemed successful in the sphere of Artificial Intelligence. (Reigning champion – Susan Hill, CEO of Mestag Therapeutics)

Sustainability Champion: For a company whose science or technology is deemed to hold most potential to dramatically reduce or eliminate the carbon footprint of industry and achieve demonstrable sustainability. (Reigning champion – Nyobolt)

AI Innovation: For a business in any sector of business that in the last 12 months has made demonstrable progress in developing or monetising artificial intelligence. (Reigning champion – SKC Games Studio)

Young Company of the Year: For an early-stage company in any sector that is gaining traction in its field with revenue streams secured. (Reigning champion – AnthroTek)

Deal of the Year: For a deal that has raised significant growth funding, enhancing the recipient’s ability to deploy the investment in a game-changing manner. Or a significant Merger or Acquisition that has strengthened the local party’s ability to expand. (Reigning champion – Rnwl)

Cambridge Torchbearer Award: For a company or individual who has fanned the flames of entrepreneurship for Cambridge. (Reigning champion – Cambridge Consultants)

From all of the entrants, judges will choose a Business of the Year to join a Hall of Fame that includes Abcam, Acambis, Arm, Autonomy, AVEVA, Bicycle Therapeutics, British Sugar, Cambridge Antibody Technology, Cambridge Quantum Computing (Quantinuum), CSR, CuspAI, Darktrace, Domino, Frontier Developments, Horizon Discovery, Ieso Digital Health, IQGeo, Paragraf, Perkins Engines, Pi Group, Ryanair, Sepura, TTP, Treatt plc, Virata and Xaar plc, among others.

You can enter online or by emailing Tony Quested – tquested@businessweekly.co.uk

2025 competition: Arm and CuspAI grab glory at Business Weekly Awards as Raspberry Pi wins double