Next Phase Newsletter

A private equity advisory firm based in Europe that primarily caters to the investment interest of family offices has a large investment range, and has made allocations in the past from a few hundred thousand dollars into the 10’s of millions. The firm makes equity investments into privately held firms and is looking to invest $20 – $80 million across 4 investments in the next 6-9 months. The firm has no geographical preference.

This particular firm is looking for companies in the Biotech Therapeutics and Diagnostics, Medtech, and R&D Services Sectors and is opportunistic in terms of subsector and indication.

The advisory firm is only interested in companies that are generating revenue and have been approved for reimbursement. As such they will only invest into firms that have a product on the market though they are open to firms across all ranges of EBITDA and Market Cap.

A crowdfunding platform for high-impact life science startups based in the Eastern US also makes  angel investments in life science companies, typically of $60,000-$100,000 in equity provided at the seed stage. The platform supports startups globally, and seeks angel opportunities throughout the USA.

Within the life science space, the platform focuses on therapeutic drugs, but is also interested in medical technology. Therapeutic investments are provided to companies with drugs at the Phase I or Phase II stages of development; they do not invest in products that are still at the preclinical stage.

They prefer to invest in companies that have a CEO, founder or co-owner who is an MD, but otherwise have no specific requirements for managers or researchers.  As investments are made at the seed stage, public companies are not eligible.

A biotech-focused Hedge Fund based in the Western US currently manages nearly $1b in assets under an evergreen fund structure, and is currently looking for investment opportunities across the United States and Europe. They have no set mandate for the number of companies they plan to allocate to over the next 6-9 months, and their investment size varies by case.

The fund is currently only looking for companies developing therapeutics, and is agnostic in terms of therapeutic area and target. They prefer to invest in companies with assets in later stages of clinical trials – typically in Phases II and III.

Fundamentally driven, they have a strong preference for companies that have gone public or are considering going public in the near future. Although the firm does prefer later stage companies, they do not require that the company is currently generating revenue. In terms of management team, the fund is looking for experienced management to be in place. However, they do not require that the current management be the long-term team for the company.

A venture capital firm that has two offices in the Eastern US has approximately $40 million in total assets under management, and is seeking to make equity investments in 2-3 companies in the next 6 to 9 months. The average first investment in a company is between $0.1 million to $ 0.75 million, though it can invest up to $ 1.5 million, depending on the opportunity. They prefer to invest in seed and early-stage companies located in the Southeast and Mid-Atlantic regions of the US with a focus in the states of North Carolina and Florida.

This particular VC is currently looking for new investment opportunities in Medical Technology and Healthcare IT spaces, specifically in companies producing medical devices and software. The firm is very opportunistic in terms of medical devices, and it would consider companies operating within any subsector of medical technology. They generally make investments in pre-clinical and prototype stages within medical technology sector.

This fund will consider pre-revenue companies and make initial investments in companies with no revenues. They prefer to invest in technologies that are disruptive to existing markets or enable entirely new ones. The firm will not consider any biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies, and additionally would not be interested in growth companies.

A venture capital firm based in Canada currently manages four funds that specialize in biotechnology with a total of more than CAD $300m under management. The firm is currently investing from its fourth fund, which raised around CAD $50m. The fund will be making about 9 allocations in the next six months, all in the form of an initial investment of CAD $500,000 for preliminary research with a possible follow-up investment of a further CAD $2.5m if these initial experiments are successful.

The fourth fund in-licenses early-stage assets and funds the preclinical development of these assets. The fund’s investments are focused on asset-holders based in Canada, but allocations can be provided to asset-holders in the USA, provided that development of the asset will take place in Canada. The fund most often exits investments by out-licensing the asset after preclinical development is complete, but sometimes bundles assets to form a start-up company and then seeks syndicated financing for these new companies.

The fund invests only in therapeutic assets at a very early stage of development, before preclinical development has begun, and invests to hold licenses, with the original asset owner retaining ownership of the asset.

Their investments are not indication-specific, but as the fund requires that preclinical research can create strong out-licensing potential, allocations tend not to be made to psychiatric drug assets. They are interested in orphan indications and currently have orphan drug assets in development.

The firm primarily invests in promising assets produced by academic researchers, but also invests in assets shelved by biotech and pharma companies. Within academia, they allocate to a wide variety of researchers who wish to set an asset on the path to market, a process that a conventional academic grant generally cannot cover, requires that preclinical development follow a strict timeline and financial plan, therefore their primary requirement in an asset owner is comfort with this type of stricture and with losing some control over the asset’s development path. The fund most often works with younger researchers (under 7 years in academia) who are adaptable to the process, but they have also worked with veteran academics who are willing to depart from the conventional academic pace in order to bring a drug towards market.