Investments
We are intense, as our patients and their families
Rare diseases are uncommon, but we do not think that is a good excuse to forget about the patients and their family. On the contrary, a number of regulatory incentives facilitate and incentivize the development of therapies for these disorders.
We work to create a portfolio of companies that will serve the space of rare diseases in every aspect of its very relevant needs, from diagnosis to disease management, to disease awareness and to therapy, whether that means cure or care.
We operate at early stage and interact with universities, biopharmaceutical and bioinformatics companies and other VC funds to create hopes for better diagnosis, services and treatment for patients affected by rare diseases and their families.
Follow us in our intense journey to bring new, clinically meaningful therapies to the patients and their families.
FOCUS
We create value by solving the mosaic of the many rare diseases and unlocking its huge market potential.
To this end, we believe that there is a great potential in partnering on embryonic ideas from academic institutions and industrializing and scaling up a pharmaceutical product
EARLY STAGE
We invest in early stages: in the case of early stage products or new technological platforms, we back companies in mid-preclinical stage that already have some proof of concept.
We cover the spectrum of financing from Seed rounds to Series A with equity tickets up to the $4-5M range and reserve a portion of our fund for future rounds. For larger investments, we may act as a lead investor and syndicate investment in a certain round, even more so for one of our portfolio companies.
We typically focus on small, private entities.
SUPPORT
We use our experience and network to scout and evaluate opportunities, put companies together, and help them design and optimize preclinical, clinical and CMC development for pharmacological treatments or design devices and implement IT systems in the space of disease discovery, diagnosis and management.
We like to have a hands-on approach and are willing to contribute to value creation with the companies we invest in by working closely with entrepreneurs to speed up development, guarantee flawless execution and eliminate roadblocks.
Investment Criteria
Our investment criteria reflect our judgment and commitment for rare diseases. We do expect the same level of passion from the entrepreneurs, clinicians, study managers, and more generally individuals who are interested in collaborating with us.
RIGOROUS AND SCIENTIFIC
Our evaluation of opportunities is inherently scientific, both in the treatments area as well as in the diagnostics and disease management systems area. While we are not scared by risk, we do not take investment decisions lightly. We specifically look for opportunities with a very solid scientific rationale waiting to be translated into clinical evidence or an incredible user experience.
MEANINGFUL
We look for opportunities that create true clinically relevant value for the patients and their families, filling unmet medical needs such as extending life expectancy and improving quality of life via paradigm-shifting advanced therapies, new pharmacological approaches or dramatically improved delivery systems. We will typically not consider incremental improvements that bring only marginal relief to the patients and their families.
ORPHAN
We focus specifically on the rare disease space. This means creating and investing in companies which have the capabilities of taking orphan drugs to the market as well as disease-specific diagnostics. We focus on opportunities that can be immediately translated into rare diseases or that can be re-focused or optimized for this purpose.
CAPITAL EFFICIENT
While pharmaceutical research and development is by itself an expensive process, we believe that the development of orphan drugs can be capital efficient. This is achieved by smartly designing the development process as well as leveraging our network or many service providers that can optimize development costs. We are very attentive to management capability of “cutting corners”.
ETHICAL
Ethics is at the core of our evaluation. To be able to bring new hope to the patients and their families, we are cognizant that ethical compromises are not acceptable. Despite advanced therapies and new approaches tend to be experimental in nature, we believe that ethical research is always GMP and regulatory-compliant.
COMMITTED
Ethics is at the core of our evaluation. To be able to bring new hope to the patients and their families, we are cognizant that ethical compromises are not acceptable. Despite advanced therapies and new approaches tend to be experimental in nature, we believe that ethical research is always GMP and regulatory-compliant.