Chiesi Ventures

Chiesi Ventures is a Venture Capital firm formed by a partnership between the Italian Pharmaceutical company Chiesi and US based VC firm Pappas Ventures. The firm is currently looking to make seed and venture stage investments into companies ranging anywhere from $2K to $5 million initially and up to $8 million over the life of the investment. The firm is actively seeking investment opportunities throughout the United States and Europe and could make as many as 2-4 new investments over the next year.
Art Pappas
Partner 

CitareTx Investment Partners

CitareTx founded in 2008 is a venture development and investment firm based in Houston Texas. The firm provides investment and incubation services to start-up and early-stage medical device companies. The firm provides seed capital (equity) ranging from $5K to $2M with follow-on capital of up to $5M. The firm also considers investment opportunities with smaller than typically accepted venture capital market size thresholds. The firm is geographically agnostic but prefers companies to be based in Texas. The firm is actively seeking new opportunities.

Jeffery Sheldon
General Partner & Managing Director 

Correlation Ventures United States

Correlation Ventures is a venture capital firm that founded in 2010 and is based in San Diego, California with an additional office in Palo Alto, California. The firm currently has approximately $165 million in total assets under management. The firm typically makes investments ranging from $0.25 million to $5 million over the life of the company, and the first investment will be not larger than $2.5 million. The firm’s preferred capital structure is convertible preferred equity or convertible loan. Correlation Ventures will consider invest in any industry segment at any stage, but there must be at least one other venture capital firm making their first investment in the company in this round. The firm only invests in US-based companies. 

Correlation is extremely opportunistic when it comes to investments in the life sciences space; with that being said the firm's specified sectors and sub sectors of interest may or may not be an area in which Correlation Ventures is currently looking to allocate capital to. The firm has made a number of investments in companies in the life sciences space, and has mainly invested in companies in the biotech therapeutics and diagnostics space. The firm's current portfolio includes biotech therapeutics and diagnostics firms developing products targeting endocrine, metabolic, and nutritional diseases, musculoskeletal system and connective tissue, neoplasms, cancer, and oncology, genitourinary system, and infectious and parasitic diseases.

Year Founded
2010
Investor Type
Medtech Phase of Development
Capital Structure Preference
Investment Stage Preference
David Coats
Managing Director 

Corvida Medical United States

Headquartered in the greater Iowa City area, Corvida Medical innovates intelligent technologies that are designed to represent the next generation of safe handling of hazardous drugs and excellence in design.  We address the problems inherent in current methods and develop smarter, simpler solutions to improve safety, productivity and quality for providers and patients. Our first technology, a novel new Closed System Transfer Device – the Halo™ — will be available in 2015.

Indication
Biotech Phase of Development
Medtech Phase of Development
Technology Overview

Corvida Medical is an emerging device company optimizing the safe handling of hazardous drugs, such as chemotherapeutics used to treat cancer patients. Millions of healthcare providers are at risk of exposure to hazardous drugs each year, resulting in adverse events such as cancers, reproductive toxicity, genetic mutations, etc. The company has developed anInnovative Device to Improve Safety of Preparing and Administering Chemotherapy supported by the National Cancer Institute as well as private investors. 

Alliance & Collaborations
NCI grants and awards
Supporting Metrics or Evidence

Launched a multi-center research study funded by the National Cancer Institute (NCI) as part of a series of Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grants, the aim of this study is to demonstrate the improvements that Corvida’s technology could bring to the safe handling of hazardous drugs. 

Current Financing Needs

Raising $5M series B round

Current Timeline

First quarter 2015 510 applicartion. Approval Q 2 2015

Current Investors

Disclosed under NDA

IP Status

7 patents isued

15 PCT utility patents pending

Recent Milestones

Closed 2 rounds of financing and current 

Management Team Highlights

Corvida Medical is led by CEO, Kent Smith, MBA, who brings over 20 years of successful commercialization and leadership experience in the medical device start-up arena, to include Suros Surgical, which had a very successful exit, and in large corporations, such as American Hospital Supply and Baxter Healthcare.

 

John Slump
Co-Founder & CEO 
Kent Smith
CEO 

CureDuchenne United States

Debra Miller co-founded CureDuchenne in 2003 with her husband, Paul, after their only son was diagnosed with Duchenne. Miller relies on her extensive background in sales and marketing to lead CureDuchenne. 

Her role includes overseeing all operations, research and financial resources as well as serving as the primary liaison to the Board of Directors. She is the decision maker, leader and manager in carrying out the mission of the organization. She also works closely with the Scientific Board of Advisors in designing and implementing the medical research strategic plan.

Miller is a member of the Department of Defense Duchenne Research review board and also a member of the TREAT-NMD international review board, TACT.  Miller has led CureDuchenne’s successful venture philanthropy programs and is the architect of CureDuchenne Ventures LLC, a new, for profit entity created to attract significant research funding to Duchenne research.

Prior to CureDuchenne, Miller had a career in publishing with positions at IDG Communications, Cahners Publishing, Ziff-Davis Publishing and Scholastic Publishing. She also worked in management at PC Magazine and was an independent stock trader.

Miller earned a Bachelor of Arts in Communication Studies from the University of California – Los Angeles. 

Mrs Debra Miller
Mrs Debra Miller
Founder and CEO 

Cydan

Cydan is an orphan drug accelerator that was founded in 213 and is based in Cambridge MA. The firm has raised $26 million dollar to derisk therapeutic assets targeting orphan indications (excluding oncology). The firm looks to option/in-license assets and form subsidiary companies around them. Cydan then derisks the assets conducting all the necessary IND enabling activities. Cydan?s investment syndicate including NEA Pfizer Ventures Lundbeck Venturefonds Bay City Alexandria then has the option to fund the NEWCo Series A round to human proof of principle Cydan is also performing due diligence on companies that are interested in receiving investment from the company's syndicate. Cydan is currently considering pre-clinical and clinical assets worldwide.
Chris Adams
CEO 

Diamond BioFund Taiwan

Diamond BioFund is an evergreen fund that was established in 2013 and is based in Taipei City, Taiwan. The fund is operating from a committed capital of USD 300 million. The fund makes equity investments in early- to late-stage private businesses. Typical allocations range from USD 1.5 million to north of USD 10 million. The fund likes to lead investments in Taiwan-based businesses and co-invest in businesses overseas. The fund is currently seeking new opportunities in Taiwan, Greater China, Southeast Asia, US, Canada, and EU.

Diamond BioFund takes a generalist approach when considering life science opportunities, including therapeutics (small molecule and biologics), medical devices, diagnostics, healthcare services, and nutraceuticals. The fund is seeking cutting edge, innovative, and platform technology. In therapeutics, the fund considers all stages from preclinical through pre-IPO. In medical devices, the fund prefers later stage projects with proof of concept. The fund is open to all disease indications.

Investor Type
Biotech Phase of Development
Medtech Phase of Development
Capital Structure Preference
Investment Stage Preference
Winston Town
Vice President 
Haolin Sung
LinkedIn logo Director 

Easton Capital United States

Easton Capital Investment Group is a venture capital firm based in New York. Easton Capital invests broadly in the life science sector, and considers investment opportunities globally. The firm is likely to make 4-6 allocations in the next 6 months. Allocations typically vary from $250,000 to $5 million, in the form of equity or convertible debt. Allocations are typically made at the venture stage of development, but may be made in seed rounds if a company already has proof of their product's efficacy.

Investor Type
Biotech Phase of Development
Medtech Phase of Development
Capital Structure Preference
Investment Stage Preference
Lisa Rhoads
Managing Director 

Enso Ventures United States

Enso Ventures is a Venture Capital firm that was founded in 2010 and based in London with an additional office in New York. The firm is looking to provide equity capital to high growth companies in the life science space. The firm is currently interested in companies located in Europe, Russia and the US and is looking to make approximately 2-3 investments over the next 6-9 months.

Sergei Petukhov
Partner 

Excel Venture Management United States

Excel Venture Management is a venture capital firm that was founded in 2008 and is based in Boston, Massachusetts. The firm has managed one fund with committed capital of $125 million, and the firm is currently raising the second fund. Excel Venture Management seeks to make equity investments into life science companies from early to late stages. The typical investment size ranges from $3 million to $ 5million. The firm plans to invest in 4-5 companies over the next 6-9 months and prefers to invest in companies based in US.

Year Founded
2008
Investor Type
Medtech Phase of Development
Capital Structure Preference
Investment Stage Preference
Eric Zimmerman
Kevin Liang