By Max Braht, VP of Business Development, LSN
Experienced life science executives who have successfully raised capital understand something that first-time fundraisers often underestimate: a successful fundraising campaign is not built around a handful of investor introductions or a series of meetings at industry conferences. It is built around a large, qualified, continuously evolving list of investor and licensing-partner targets, supported by the disciplined execution required to keep that list working throughout the campaign.
Last week, I discussed why fundraising requires both a focused strategy and consistent execution. But there is another critical component that deserves more attention: the target list itself. It is the foundation of the entire campaign, and building, maintaining, and continually replenishing that list is one of the most demanding aspects of raising capital.
At Life Science Nation, we have found that experienced fundraising executives are often the first to recognize the value of our BD Assist program. They have been through the process before. They understand that a serious life science fundraising campaign can take 9–18 months, and that a campaign of that duration needs to begin with approximately 800–1,000 qualified investor and licensing-partner targets.
Just as importantly, they know that the original list will not remain intact. Investors respond, decline, change their investment mandates, move into diligence, or prove to be inappropriate targets. Some relationships advance while others are eliminated from consideration. Throughout this process, new qualified targets must continually enter the pipeline to replace those that have fallen away. The campaign is constantly moving, with prospects entering, advancing, and exiting at different stages.
The target list is not a static spreadsheet. It is the engine that drives the fundraising campaign.
Keeping that engine running requires much more than sending emails. It means identifying investors whose investment theses align with the company’s technology, development stage, financing requirements, and geography. It means researching investment activity, finding the appropriate contacts, developing compelling messaging, canvassing prospects, tracking responses, managing follow-up, and maintaining a steady flow of new opportunities.
Experienced executives know how difficult this is because they have done it themselves. They understand that maintaining a professional fundraising campaign often requires a dedicated full-time resource whose responsibility is to keep the target list accurate, active, and continuously replenished. They also know how tedious and time-consuming that work can become, particularly while managing the scientific, clinical, regulatory, financial, and operational responsibilities of an emerging life science company.
This is the fundamental value proposition of LSN’s BD Assist program. LSN has spent years building and maintaining a global database of investors and licensing partners, developing the market intelligence and processes required to identify appropriate targets and execute sustained fundraising campaigns. BD Assist combines that infrastructure with the daily canvassing, outreach, scheduling, tracking, and follow-up needed to keep a campaign moving forward. Rather than building this capability internally, executives can leverage LSN’s existing database, investor intelligence, and business development team to maintain the campaign engine while they concentrate on running their companies and advancing relationships with interested investors.
The value is not simply that BD Assist takes work off an executive’s desk. It provides access to an established fundraising infrastructure that would otherwise take considerable time, money, and effort to replicate.
Timing: Preparing for RESI JPM
The life sciences industry is now preparing for JPM Healthcare Week, when biotech, medtech, diagnostics, digital health, and investment professionals from around the world will gather to establish new relationships and advance existing ones. RESI JPM provides an important opportunity for early-stage companies to meet investors and licensing partners whose interests align with their development and financing objectives. But experienced fundraisers know that conferences are not standalone fundraising strategies. They are opportunities within a much larger campaign.
The companies that benefit most from RESI are those that arrive with a well-developed target list, know which investors they need to meet, have already begun their outreach, and are prepared to continue those conversations long after the conference concludes.
A meeting at RESI may initiate a relationship, advance an existing discussion, or reveal that an investor is not an appropriate fit. Each outcome provides information that helps refine the target list and determine the next step. Meanwhile, the broader fundraising campaign must continue generating new prospects, new conversations, and new opportunities.
RESI creates access. The continuously replenished target list and the execution behind it turn that access into a sustained fundraising campaign.
For executives who have raised capital before, none of this is new. They know what it takes to build a successful campaign, and they know how difficult it is to keep the engine running for 9–18 months. What LSN offers through BD Assist is the infrastructure, investor intelligence, and dedicated execution capability to help them do exactly that.
Ready to Put Your Fundraising Campaign into Motion?
If you are preparing for RESI JPM or planning a sustained fundraising campaign, LSN’s BD Assist team can help you build, maintain, and continuously canvass the global investor and licensing-partner target list that drives the process.
Because a successful fundraising campaign does not run on meetings alone. It runs on a continuously replenished pipeline of qualified targets.
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