Finance Watch: Lots Of Money, Big And Small, Flowing Into Drug Development
Executive Summary
Big venture capital bets continue in biopharma, including Foresite's new $668m fund and Merck's $125m investment in Moderna, but small VC rounds could be making a comeback. In public company financings, Aslan and Evelo launched in the US, while Ascletis is testing Hong Kong’s IPO market.
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Private Company Edition: Scion’s first fund exceeded its initial $250m fundraising goal. Also, The Column Group’s incubator raised a $400m-plus fund and Seroba’s fourth fund reaches $134m, while Neurona raised a $120m financing and Cour closed a $105m series A round.
Finance Watch: Neuron23 Adds $100m To Take First Drug Into The Clinic
Private Company Edition: Westlake Village BioPartners-founded Neuron23 will take the LRRK2 inhibitor NEU-723 for Parkinson’s disease into human testing before the end of 2022. Also, Celsius raised $83m in fresh VC cash and ITM added another €33m to its recent €25m equity financing.
Finance Watch: Cell And Gene Therapy Firms Raised Nearly $20bn In 2020
Private Company Edition: Venture capital mega-rounds continue a brisk pace with machine learning-based drug discovery firm insitro and gene therapy developer Graphite Bio among recent $100m-plus deals. Also, Argobio raised €50m to fund five start-ups in Europe.