Archive for the ‘VC’ Category
May
10
Posted under
Atlas Venture,
Blog,
Bob Radie,
CLS Capital,
Companies,
Diagnostics,
Egalet,
Funding,
Medical Devices,
Medical Supply,
morphine,
pain drugs,
Pharmaceuticals,
R&D,
startup,
Startups,
Universities,
VC,
Videos by rmcbride
Pain med developer Egalet has found a new investor for a second-round financing and hired former Eli Lilly ($LLY) employee Bob Radie as president and CEO. CLS Capital has joined the company's previous investors--Altas Venture, Omega Funds, Sunstone Capital and Index Ventures--and the company raised $14.3 million in a Series B round of financing.
With the influx of capital, the company plans to move ahead with late-stage studies of its lead anti-pain treaments, which include an extended-release formulation of morphine, according to the startup's website. The company has drug-delivery tech that enables opioids and other meds to be delivered gradually and stymie abuse of the drugs.
Radie, the new CEO, previously served as chief executive of Topaz Pharmaceuticals, which a unit of Sanofi ($SNY) scooped up late last year to acquire its anti-lice treatment. His nearly 30-year career in the biopharma industry includes stints at TransMolecular, where he was CEO, Morphoteck, Vicuron Pharmaceuticals and Eli Lilly.
"With the funds raised and Bob's appointment, Egalet is well positioned to move through the final stage of development with its lead abuse-resistant pain programs," Atlas partner Jean-Francois Formela, Egalet's chairman, said in a statement. "With the increase in abuse of pain medications and the increasingly restrictive regulation and oversight of pain medications, there is a growing need for the Egalet's abuse-resistant opioids in development."
- here's the release
May
09
Posted under
Atlas Venture,
Biotech Venture Capital,
Blog,
Companies,
Diagnostics,
Funding,
Medical Devices,
Medical Supply,
Pharmaceuticals,
Pipeline,
PricewaterhouseCoopers,
Startups,
Universities,
VC,
Videos by rmcbride
Life sciences venture investors gambled far less on life sciences startups in the first three months of the year, underscoring a shift toward later-stage deals and concerns about the amount of dollars going into newly hatched drug and device developers.
After reporting last month that first-quarter venture investing in U.S. biotech dropped by 43%, PricewaterhouseCoopers has drilled deeper into the numbers and noted that young life sciences outfits might have fared even worse than more mature startups. Based on data from Thomson Reuters, the firm found that the number of companies to get their first influx of VC money fell by 53%, and dollars invested into deals shrank by 38% in the first quarter compared with the same period last year.
The game of taking the pulse of innovative activity in biotech based on venture numbers can be tricky, as young drug developers have learned to make do with smaller budgets and some outfits choose to stay under the radar and advance programs without a big-bang VC round. There's also plenty of talk about the dearth of big-idea operations getting off the ground nowadays because of the huge expense and risk of supporting such companies.
"I don't get concerned about quarterly variation in dollars and deals," Atlas Venture partner Bruce Booth, who invests in biotech, said in an email. "Overall Life Sciences investments were within 10% of 1Q 2011, and 2011 was one of the strongest four years for [life sciences] venture investing in the past 15 years."
The VC industry as a whole has contracted, yet Booth's analysis shows that the relative interest in backing biotech and device companies hasn't changed. "[Life sciences] remains reasonably steady as a percentage of total venture capital spend: it has been around 25% for most of the last decade and I expect that to continue."
- here's PricewaterhouseCoopers' release
Related Articles:
Biotech venture rounds dwindle in Europe, tracking U.S. trend
Biotech VC deals, dollars shrivel in Q1 as devices see an upturn
The best of times, the worst of times?
May
08
Posted under
Amgen,
antibodies,
Blog,
Companies,
Diagnostics,
Eli Lilly,
Funding,
Medical Devices,
Medical Supply,
Pharmaceuticals,
Startups,
Sutro Biopharma,
Universities,
VC,
Videos by rmcbride
Sutro Biopharma has reeled in more capital to back work on next-generation protein drugs. Skyline Ventures led the second $16.5 million closing of the San Francisco-based startup's Series C round, which included backing from Amgen Ventures, Lilly Ventures, Alta Partners and SV Life Sciences.
The VC units of Amgen ($AMGN) and Lilly ($LLY) joined Alta and SV in the first $20 million closing of the $36.5 million third-round financing in November 2010. Sutro, founded in 2003, says it has landed almost $60 million from investors, and the company is among of bevy of biotech startups benefitting from pharma companies' growing role the venture game.
Sutro is working on antibody-drug conjugates and bi-specific antibodies with the company's protein drug platform. Last year the company landed a research pact with Pfizer ($PFE), agreeing to work on peptide-based drugs for the drug giant. Sutro aims to land more collaboration deals with biopharma partners as well as pursue its own drug programs, according to the company's release.
"Although we generally remain cautious, especially when investing in earlier stage companies, we see the tremendous potential for antibody drug conjugates and bispecific antibodies for drug development, particularly in cancer therapy," Skyline partner Leon Chen said in a statement. "We believe that Sutro's biochemical protein synthesis platform provides a unique opportunity to rapidly identify and develop next generation therapeutics that can be manufactured utilizing the same platform in accordance with current good manufacturing practices."
- here's the release
Related Articles:
Pfizer inks peptide deal with Sutro
Sutro raises $36.5M Series C for protein drug work
May
07
Posted under
Blog,
Companies,
Diagnostics,
Eli Lilly,
Esanex,
Funding,
Lilly Ventures,
Medical Devices,
Medical Supply,
Pharmaceuticals,
R&D,
startup,
Startups,
Universities,
VC,
Videos by rmcbride
A secretive startup at Lilly Ventures in Indianapolis has grabbed $4.6 million of a documented $15 million round of equity financing, MedCity News reported, citing SEC documents. The recently founded Esanex doesn't appear to have a website or a publicly known research focus, but the startup does appear to have resources from drug giant Eli Lilly's ($LLY) $200 million venture unit. According to MedCity News, Lilly Ventures partner Steven Hall is identified as the young company's chief executive. Report