Salt Lake City, UT, October 28, 2026. NanoKar Therapeutics, Inc. (“NanoKar”), a biotechnology company re-engineering the intracellular signaling engine of CAR-T cell therapies, announced today that it has joined Altitude Lab as a resident company. Located in the Gateway’s BioHive life science innovation hub on Recursion’s campus in Salt Lake City, Altitude Lab provides NanoKar with specialized laboratory resources and direct connectivity to global biopharma executives, strategic acquirers, and investors.
Joining Altitude Lab marks a key operational milestone for NanoKar as the company scales its preclinical translational studies and expands its business development efforts. Designed as a platform-first accelerator, Altitude Lab has established itself as a powerhouse for high-growth biotech startups in the Mountain West, with portfolio companies surpassing $205 million in financing and securing global biopharma deals. Through its laboratory facilities, executive coaching, and commercialization initiatives, including its Horizon program, Altitude Lab bridges academic spinouts directly with global pharma decision-makers.
“Every approved CAR-T therapy, and every allogeneic and in vivo program in clinical trials today, still runs on the exact same CD3ζ signaling engine first patented in 1994. While the industry has invested billions into faster delivery and off-the-shelf manufacturing, using a 30-year-old signaling domain means inheriting the same unsolved problems of severe toxicity, T-cell exhaustion, and poor efficacy in solid tumors. Becoming a resident company at Altitude Lab gives us the laboratory infrastructure and direct biopharma network needed to accelerate our tunable ITAM platform and put translational data in front of pharmaceutical leaders looking to upgrade their CAR engines or incorporate this technology in efforts to attack solid tumors.”
Craig Mosman, J.D. · Chief Executive Officer
NanoKar will leverage Altitude Lab’s wet-lab facilities and industry network to generate partner-ready solutions designed for seamless integration into big pharma pipelines. Originating from the laboratory of NanoKar founder Matthew Bettini, Ph.D., at the University of Utah, NanoKar’s proprietary platform has generated 26 patent-pending immunoreceptor tyrosine-based activation motif (ITAM) configurations within the CD3ζ domain that calibrate T-cell activation, persistence, and long-term memory formation. The technology functions as a “plug-and-play” signaling upgrade, requiring no changes to antigen targeting, co-stimulation, or manufacturing workflows. Altitude Lab’s resources will allow NanoKar to rapidly validate these constructs across autologous, allogeneic, and in vivo architectures, positioning the company for strategic collaborations, licensing, and acquisition opportunities.
About NanoKar Therapeutics
NanoKar Therapeutics, Inc. is a preclinical biotechnology company developing an ITAM optimization platform for CAR-T cell therapy. Built on research from the University of Utah and licensed exclusively worldwide, the platform is designed to tune activation signals inside engineered T cells. NanoKar aims to improve cell persistence and antitumor activity while addressing excessive activation, including in approaches targeting solid tumors. The company is pursuing research collaborations and licensing partnerships with cell therapy developers to evaluate its technology in existing and next-generation CAR designs.
For more information, visit nanokartherapeutics.com.
About Altitude Lab
Altitude Lab is a Salt Lake City life science accelerator founded by Recursion. Through state-of-the-art laboratory facilities, executive mentorship, and curated connections to global investors and biopharma industry leaders, Altitude Lab supports early-stage visionary founders as they commercialize breakthrough technologies and build scalable biotechnology companies.
Learn more at altitudelab.org.
Media Contact
Craig Mosman, Chief Executive Officer NanoKar Therapeutics, Inc. craig@nanokartherapeutics.com