BioScience Managers Australia

BioScience Managers is a venture capital life science investment firm headquartered in Melbourne, Australia. The group makes equity investments from $3M-5M and anticipates about 6 new investments this year. BioScience Managers invests globally. 

BioScience Managers will invest in companies across the life science space, including therapeutics, diagnostics and medical technology. The group does not invest in service providers. BioScience Managers considers all subsectors and indications, including orphan indications. The group will consider technology either in or prepared for human clinical trials and is open to all classes of devices. BioScience Managers seeks investments in novel technology and is not looking to gain share of an existing market. 

Investor Type
Biotech Phase of Development
Medtech Phase of Development
Capital Structure Preference
Investment Stage Preference
Jeremy Curnock Cook
Managing Director 
Amanda Gillon
Investment Analyst 
Matt McNamara
CIO 

Biosortia Pharmaceuticals United States

Biosortia has opened the door to a new frontier of fascinating compounds that have the potential to materially impact the direction of various chronic diseases.  We are dedicated to discovering new chemical entities for the management of critical chronic disease states such as cancer, neuroscience, infectious disease, and inflammatory disorders to ultimately improve the lives of others.

Value Proposition

Pharma is looking for 3 key things:

1. Novel, never seen before, chemistry from new environments to fight chronic disease

2. Higher levels of potency (nano to Pico molar) to reduce the impact of side-effects

3. New mechanisms of action to fight chronic disease in new and more effective manner

It is well known that micro-organism consortia (not macro) are one of the most biologically active and chemically diverse plant/fungi that are rich in what we call “Defense Mechanism Chemistry”.  Defense Mechanism Chemistry is key in developing drugs for cancer, infectious disease and inflammation.  The problem is no one has been able to get access to this unique chemistry at scale and have the natural products expertise to identify the unique compounds…until now.  

We will provide Pharma with new compounds, rich in “Defense Mechanism Chemistry” on a routine basis that could shorten the discovery cycle by 2-3 years and reduce the overall cost.  

Best Regards,

Kurt Dieck

President and CEO

kdieck@biosortia.com

(614) 296-7076

Year Founded
2008
Biotech Subsector
Biotech Phase of Development
Technology Overview
Mobile, scalable, technology that maintains the integrity of the cell. Biosortia has proprietary methods & technologies that allow us to harvest unique single cellular micro-organism consortia never before studied and in unprecedented quantities targeting 500-1,000kg dry weight solids (DWS). Our technologies and capabilities open up this rich environment of bioactive and chemically diverse compounds for research in the pharmaceutical space for the first time ever. Biosortia’s relationship with NOAA and our Cooperative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA) with them provides Biosortia with identification and access to distinctly qualified harvest locations.
Alliance & Collaborations
(Eli Lilly, AstraZeneca, Eisai and Cubist Pharmaceuticals) with more in the pipeline.
Supporting Metrics or Evidence
Promising Early Results with big pharma (Eli Lilly, AstraZeneca, Eisai and Cubist Pharmaceuticals) with more in the pipeline. • Eli Lilly’s OIDD To date, nearly 100% of Compounds of Interest submitted into Eli Lilly’s Open Innovation Drug Discovery (OIDD) program have been accepted for evaluation…compared to an average 50-60% rejection rate on all submissions. This unprecedented achievement has recently earned Biosortia the inaugural “Collaborator of the Year” award from Lilly. In addition, due to the success in the OIDD Program, Lilly asked to join our Pharma Direct Model and test our fraction library. Initial results across simple 2 assays have produced 10 leads that they desire to follow-up in December 2014. • Big Pharma Interest As of September 30, 2014 we have 4 Big Pharma companies in our Pharma Direct Model (Eli Lilly, AstraZeneca, Cubist and Eisai) with 3 others in the pipeline in various stages of discussions.
Current Financing Needs
Capital- Biosortia has raised 2 rounds of series A Preferred Shares; November 2012 of $1.1M ($29M pre-money valuation) and September 2013 of $3.9M ($35M pre money valuation). In addition, it secured $1 million loan (2% interest) from the State of Ohio, therefore meeting our original desired capital raise of $4-5 million. The current raise is for $3-$6 million dollar to provide the runway to our first licensing agreement in Q4 2015 and drive the scaling of science capability to support the volume from our fraction libraries to be launched in Q1 of 2015.
Current Timeline
Hit rates well in excess of expectations Through our Pharma Direct Partners and 8 academic collaborators, we have over 50% of our fractions active against various therapy areas. This demonstrates both the richness of our compounds and the diversity across multiple therapy areas. With one of our Big Pharma partners alone, we have 48 active fractions/wells, with 20 showing inhibition of cancer growth from 90-99.8%. • Clear pathway to first license event in 2015 We can share with you a clear pathway to a license event in 2015. AZ, Lilly and Eisai are all on schedule to complete their R&D efforts by Q3 of 2015 that will put them in position to determine which compounds of interest they would like to license.
Recent Milestones
To date, nearly 100% of Compounds of Interest submitted into Eli Lilly’s Open Innovation Drug Discovery (OIDD) program have been accepted for evaluation…compared to an average 50-60% rejection rate on all submissions. This unprecedented achievement has recently earned Biosortia the inaugural “Collaborator of the Year” award from Lilly.
Management Team Highlights
Experienced Leadership Team & Advisors Biosortia’s leadership team has over 135 years of healthcare and life science experience with expertise in both pharmaceutical research and the micro-organism aquatic environments with the capability to provide new chemistry in a research ready format and co-develop with Pharma to pre-clinical. -Kurt D. Dieck, President and CEO - Mr. Dieck has spent 30 years in healthcare, including 18 years at Arthur Andersen where he was a global equity partner. In 2002, Kurt joined Cardinal Health, a Fortune 20 public company as a senior executive; where over his tenure he had responsibilities for Strategy, Business Development and ultimately SVP of Business Execution for the $100B pharmaceutical distribution segment. There he worked with a broad spectrum of partners, including brand pharmaceutical manufacturers, throughout the supply chain. Kurt also sits on two other healthcare related boards that are owned by Private Equity firms. -Guy T. Carter, Ph.D., Chief Scientific Officer – Dr. Carter has over 30 years of experience working in Pharmaceutical R&D, primarily in the discovery and development of microbial products. In the course of his career in the pharmaceutical industry he worked as a natural products discovery scientist and advanced through levels of scientific management to the overall leadership of the Natural Products Discovery function at Wyeth Research (later acquired by Pfizer), as well as directing other elements of the Chemical Technologies Department. Guy received a doctorate in Biochemistry from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and then pursued marine natural products research on an NIH-sponsored post-doctoral fellowship with Kenneth Rinehart at the University of Illinois. -Haiyin He, Ph.D., VP of Research – Dr. He has more than 20 years of experience in pharmaceutical R&D, specializing in discovery of drug leads from natural products and their semi-synthetic analogs in oncology, infectious disease, and other therapeutic areas. Haiyin worked as a principle scientist III and group leader at Wyeth Research and after the merger between Pfizer and Wyeth, he continued on to work at Pfizer World Wide Medicinal Chemistry as an associate research fellow in the area of antibody-drug conjugates for cancer chemotherapy. Haiyin received a doctorate in marine natural products at Scripps Institution of Oceanography with John Faulkner, and then acquired a postdoctoral experience at Chemistry Department, Cornell University with Jon Clardy.
Dr Guy Carter
Dr Guy Carter
LinkedIn logo CSO 
Mr Kurt Dieck
Mr Kurt Dieck
LinkedIn logo President and CEO 

Boehringer Ingelheim

Boehringer Ingelheim was founded in 1885 and is based in Ingelheim am Rhein Germany. The firm invests by means of in-licensing and acquisitions and is primarily focused on respiratory diseases cardiovascular diseases metabolic diseases oncology diseases of the central nervous system and immunology. Boehringer Ingelheim also invests in veterinary medicine.

Imran Nasrullah
Director Innovation Sourcing 

Breakout Labs

Breakout Labs was founded by the Thiel Foundation in 211 and is based in San Francisco CA. Breakout Labs provides seed grants of $35 to 8-1 early stage companies per year. Companies must reach specific milestones in order to receive installments of the grant. Breakout Labs grants are in the form of a convertible note that if the company raises a Series A round will convert based on the Series A valuation, however if the company fails before raising a Series A round no debt will be due. Additionally when a portfolio company becomes revenue-generating or is acquired Breakout Labs receives a 3% royalty payment capped at 3x the value of the grant. Breakout Labs funds companies throughout the USA.
Lindy Fishburne
Executive Director 
Michelle Kim-Danely
Portfolio Manager 

Broadview Ventures

Broadview Ventures is a Philanthropy Venture firm that was established by the Leducq Family Trust in 28 and dedicated to accelerating the translation of new and innovative programs in the CV and stroke areas. The firm is based out of Boston MA but is geographically agnostic in its investing. The firm makes equity and convertible note investments of approximately $1 million into companies that are targeting cardiovascular and neurovascular diseases. The firm invests in privately held companies at both the seed and venture stage and is currently invests in 4-5 companies per year. The firm operates under an evergreen structure and is constantly seeking new investment opportunities. While the firm will consider investments around the globe Broadview is keen to add companies based in Europe to its portfolio. Broadview has previously invested in the US Europe and Israel.
Maria Berkman
Director 
Rick Jones
Director 
Christopher de Souza
Director 

BSI Capital Group

BSI Capital is a Single Family Office based in Mexico City Mexico. The firm is looking to make growth stage investments into healthcare companies generally in series C and D rounds or later. Due to the structure of the firm BSI has a highly variable investment size that will depend of the financial needs of the company. The firm is currently looking for new opportunities throughout the United States Mexico and Canada. The firm has no set number of investment in plans to make over the next 6-9 months.
Alejandra Paradones
CEO & Founder 

California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM)

The California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) was established in 24 with the passage of Proposition 71 and is based in San Francisco California. Proposition 71 provided for $3 billion for CIRM to fund stem cell research in the state of California. CIRM provides strictly non-dilutive funding in the forms of research grants and forgivable loans the largest of which provide for up to $2 million of funding. Being motivated partially by the economic development of California the firm is interested in companies located in California or those that have an interest in relocating or opening space in California.
Neil Littman
Business Development Officer 

CDRD Ventures Canada

CDRD Ventures Inc. (CVI) is the commercialization vehicle of the Centre for Drug Research and Development (CDRD), Canada's national drug development and commercialization center that was founded in 2007 and is based in Vancouver, Canada. CVI seeks to advance promising drug development projects from CDRD using internal funds and through partnerships with international pharmaceutical companies, venture capital firms, biotech companies, and other funding agencies. CVI also seeks to in-license technologies from industry or non-CDRD affiliated research institutions. The firm considers both small molecule and biologic innovative technologies in virtually any therapeutic area.

Ms Natalie Dakers
President & CEO 
Mr Michael Lincoln
Chief Financial and Business Officer 

Celling Biosciences United States

Regeneration Through Innovation

Celling Biosciences is dedicated to researching and developing the future of healing through regenerative medicine and the clinical use of autologous regenerative cells to facilitate the body’s capacity to heal itself. Through our patented Celling therapies and our Institutes of Regenerative Medicine, Celling Biosciences is moving the science of healing forward and redefining the global medical landscape.

Year Founded
2006
Biotech Subsector
Biotech Phase of Development
Medtech Phase of Development
Technology Overview
Regeneration Through Innovation

Celling Biosciences is dedicated to researching and developing the future of healing through regenerative medicine and the clinical use of autologous regenerative cells to facilitate the body’s capacity to heal itself. Through our patented Celling therapies and our Institutes of Regenerative Medicine, Celling Biosciences is moving the science of healing forward and redefining the global medical landscape.

Current Financing Needs

$3-10 million growth capital with opportunity for partial founder buy-out.

Management Team Highlights
Kevin Dunworth

Founder / CEO

Kevin Dunworth, Founder of Celling Biosciences, has spent more than 26 years in the orthopedic industry and brings a wealth of expertise in all aspects of the business. Dunworth has run medical companies in the Middle East, Eastern and Western Europe, and the United States.

He excelled in various executive positions before founding VCD Medical, in Austin, Texas.
For the past eight years, Dunworth has successfully built a world-class distribution business, which provides a variety of orthopedic and biologic products.

Dunworth's leadership roles within the orthopedic industry have included, Director of Emerging Markets and Director of European Sales for Smith & Nephew; Director of International Sales, Vice President of Worldwide Sales and Vice President for FlouroScan International and Vice President of Sales for TransLeasing and Vice President for TransLeasing GE.


Steve Melchiode

President
Steve Melchiode has extensive experience guiding businesses from start-up to profitability. After earning an undergraduate marketing degree followed by a law degree, Melchiode joined a start-up technology firm in Silicon Valley as the West Coast business development director. Melchiode's ability to build and lead successful companies, combined with his experience in medical device sales, provides him with the vision and expertise to lead the Celling Biosciences team. He brings a wide range of experience in sales, business development, marketing, finance, legal and operations management.

Melchiode began his medical device career as a sales representative with VCD Medical, learning the spinal implant industry selling Depuy Spine. After two years spent growing several new territories, Melchiode established himself in a leadership role as sales manager and by running operations for the State of Texas. For the past two years, he has worked with Kevin Dunworth to take the Celling Biosciences model from concept to market, working on business, product and partnership development as well as marketing and operations.

Mr Blair Duncan
Mr Blair Duncan
LinkedIn logo Chief Financial Officer 
BIO

Blair Duncan, Chief Financial Officer, Celling Biosciences

 

Mr. Duncan has over 20 years experience in venture-backed growth companies, as well as Fortune 500 and service firms. Before joining Celling Biosciences, Mr. Duncan was Chief Financial Officer at Emergent Technologies, an early stage life sciences commercialization operator and venture capital firm.  Previously, Mr. Duncan was Chief Financial Officer and Controller at SiteStuff, a leading provider of online procurement services for the commercial real estate industry.  Prior to SiteStuff, Mr. Duncan was Chief Financial Officer for Trillion, a facilities-based provider of wireless broadband telecommunications services to K-12 school districts.  Mr. Duncan also served as Vice President and Controller for ClearSource, a facilities-based provider of broadband telecommunications services.  Mr. Duncan held positions at PricewaterhouseCoopers as Manager of Entrepreneurial Advisory Services, where he launched a new division providing fundraising and business planning consulting services to high-tech companies in Texas, as well as Manager in the Business Assurance practice, where he participated in numerous public offerings and private company audits.  Mr. Duncan started his career with Aetna as a manager of property and casualty underwriting and business development. 

 

Mr. Duncan is a CPA and holds a MBA from the University of Texas at Austin.  He has a BA in Economics and Psychology from Duke University. Mr. Duncan enjoys travel, music, tennis and golf.  He is Career Services Chair of the Financial Executives International – Austin Chapter, as well as Treasurer of the Maya Exploration Center.  He is married with three children and resides in Austin, Texas.

Chempetitive Group

Chempetitive Group is an integrated marketing communications agency focused exclusively on the life sciences. We work with biotech, medical device, pharmaceutical, chemical and tools/instrumentation companies of all sizes that around the globe. We develop winning strategies and campaigns that build brands and generate revenues. We love science. We understand science. And, we know how to effectively reach the scientific, clinical, medical and business communities that matter. 

Long live science. 

Visit us in San Diego, San Francisco, Chicago, Boston or Cambridge UK. 

Find out about us at http://www.chempetitive.com 

Erik Clausen
Erik Clausen
LinkedIn logo Managing Partner 
BIO

Erik Clausen is a managing partner at Chempetitive Group (http://www.chempetitive.com), a marketing communications firm that develops and implements strategies and drives results for life science and healthcare companies. Erik brings two decades of international experience helping life science, medical technology and healthcare organizations to reach and engage the right audiences.