Dialybrid’s team
- Silkothane® Arteriovenous Graft is a novel hybrid arteriovenous graft engineered to integrate into patients’ vessels and provide a safe, easy-to-cannulate, durable, vascular access for hemodialysis in patients with end-stage kidney disease
- €15 million Series A led by new investor XGEN Venture, with participation from CDP Venture Capital
- Successful first-in-human implant of the Silkothane® Arteriovenous Graft in a pilot clinical trial enrolling in Italy
- Dialybrid to present at LSI Europe ’26 Emerging Medtech Summit on September 29, 2026
Cantù, Italy, September 22nd, 2026, Dialybrid S.r.l. (Dialybrid), a privately held medical device company developing a novel vascular access solution for hemodialysis based on Silkothane®, a patented hybrid material made up of silk fibroin and polyurethane, announced today the closing of a €15 million series A round led by new investor XGEN Venture, with participation of CDP Venture Capital (Rilancio Fund).
The financing will fund clinical development of Dialybrid’s Silkothane® Arteriovenous Graft as a hemodialysis vascular access, and preclinical development of the Silkothane® material in other vascular applications. The first-in-human (FIH) clinical trial is enrolling and the first patient has been successfully implanted by coordinating principal investigator Prof. Matteo Tozzi, MD, Director of the Vascular Surgery Department at ASST Sette Laghi and Professor of Vascular Surgery at Insubria University, in Varese, Italy.
Francesco Giovanni Greco, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Dialybrid, commented: “We are delighted to announce the closing of our series A round and the start of the first-in-human trial, a transformative milestone for our company. According to the KDOQI Clinical Practice Guideline for Vascular Access1, the ideal hemodialysis access should provide adequate flow rates to sustain prescribed dialysis and be easy to access/cannulate, cost effective, acceptable to patients, and associated with excellent long-term patency and minimal complications. We are developing Silkothane® Arteriovenous Graft to offer physicians and patients a novel vascular access solution for hemodialysis that delivers all these characteristics, ultimately addressing a strong unmet clinical need.”
“We are excited about our investment in Dialybrid, which reflects our focus on Italian, innovative life science companies developing novel best-in-class solutions for high unmet medical needs, such as vascular access in hemodialysis. We look forward to supporting the company as it advances Silkothane® Arteriovenous Graft through the clinical stage towards regulatory approval,” said Daniele Scarinci, Co-Founder and Managing Partner at XGEN Venture.
“I am proud to lead the first-in-human trial investigating the use of Silkothane® Arteriovenous Graft in vascular access for hemodialysis and extremely satisfied by the ease-of-implant in the first patient ever. If it works as intended, this new graft may provide vascular surgeons a new tool with shorter cannulation time than native fistulas and longer durability than commercially available grafts,” said Prof. Matteo Tozzi, MD, coordinating principal investigator of the FIH study.
“We are proud to support Dialybrid at this important stage in its development. Silkothane® is a technologically innovative and clinically relevant product in the strategic vascular access for hemodialysis market, with the potential to improve patient outcomes and redefine standards of care,” said Caterina Siclari, Head of Rilancio Fund of CDP Venture Capital.
Over half a million vascular access procedures for hemodialysis are performed each year in the European Union and United States by either implanting a synthetic arteriovenous graft (AVG) or surgically creating a native arteriovenous fistula (AVF). AVGs provide faster access to hemodialysis but have low long-term durability and increased risk of infection. AVFs are more durable, but require a longer maturation time before they can be used in hemodialysis. About 60% of AVGs and 40% of AVFs fail in the first year, leaving a substantial unmet need for safe and durable vascular access2,3.
Silkothane® Arteriovenous Graft is a novel, partially resorbable vascular access solution based on a patented hybrid material that delivers the advantages of both native and synthetic materials. Silkothane® consists of silk fibroin, a biocompatible and bioresorbable material that supports endogenous tissue remodeling, combined with polyurethane, an elastic synthetic biocompatible material that does not resorb and endows the graft with increased durability and long-term stability. The proprietary Silkothane® manufacturing process, based on electrospinning, enables precise tuning of mechanical properties optimized for rapid graft use, long-term patency, and low rates of infection, overcoming the limitations of commercially available vascular access options.
The first-in-human study is planned to enroll 18 adult patients across four Italian centers. The open-label single-arm study will measure safety and performance of Silkothane® Arteriovenous Graft for hemodialysis access. The trial will follow patients for up to 60 months with interim analyses at 6, 12 and 24 months.
Dialybrid Chief Technology Officer Stefania A. Riboldi will be attending the LSI Europe ’26 Emerging Medtech Summit at the Grand Hyatt Barcelona, Spain, and will present the company on September 29th at 11:25 a.m. CEST (UTC+2) in Library B. In addition, she will be speaking during a panel discussion together with XGEN Venture MedTech Specialist & Dialybrid Board Member Luca Porro on September 30th at 10:30 a.m. CEST (UTC+2) in Track 5 – Loft Ballroom.
Dialybrid S.r.l. (www.dialybrid.com) is a clinical-stage medical device company developing novel arteriovenous vascular grafts for hemodialysis and other vascular applications based on Silkothane®, a patented innovative hybrid material consisting of silk fibroin and polyurethane. The lead clinical-stage product, Silkothane® Arteriovenous Graft, is an arteriovenous graft engineered to enable fast access to hemodialysis and high durability, overcoming the limitations of commercially available vascular access options.
XGEN Venture (www.xgenventure.com) is an Italian alternative investment fund manager (Società di Gestione del Risparmio, or SGR) established in 2021 by the former Genextra team, with over 15 years of activity and significant experience in the startup process, the discovery and the development of novel solutions for high unmet medical needs. The XGEN team is currently investing out of its first fund, XGEN Venture Life Science Fund, launched at the end of 2022.
CDP Venture Capital (www.cdpventurecapital.it) is the largest venture capital management company in Italy and one of the largest in Europe. It operates in strategic fields for the future, investing directly or indirectly in startups, innovative SMEs and in venture capital funds to create an infrastructure that could support the entire life cycle of the new enterprises.
1 National Kidney Foundation (2020), KDOQI (Kidney Disease Outcome Qualitative Initiatives) Clinical Practice Guideline for Vascular Access: 2019 Update. American Journal of Kidney Diseases, 75(4), S1-S164. https://doi.org/10.1053/j.ajkd.2019.12.001
2 Niklason et al., Kidney360. 2020 Oct 15;1(12):1437-1446. https://doi.org/10.34067/kid.0003502020
3 Bylsma et al., Eur J Vasc Endovasc Surg. 2017 Oct;54(4):513-522. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejvs.2017.06.024
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