There’s a lot of money around for young biotechs at the moment. After Flagship said this week it was seeking a $500 million fund, fellow VC Lightstone has $250 million in the bank for life science research.
The $250 million total, a chunky $50 million over target, goes into its second fund known as LSV II, from which the VC said it will “continue to focus on early-stage therapeutic opportunities across the life sciences sector. The firm’s overarching goal is to fund companies developing therapies which have the potential to change the practice of medicine.”
Specifics on disease areas or potential targets were not given.
The firm also wants to push on with its company creation efforts, which sees it work with The Foundry, a medical device incubator, as well as other “corporate, academic and strategic partners,” it said in an update.
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“The successful implementation of our strategy requires the ability to identify, access and build upon key scientific discoveries. In less than five years, we’ve established a global footprint with unique initiatives underway in the U.S., Europe and Asia,” said Mike Carusi, general partner at Lightstone Ventures.
“The strong interest we received in this fund from both new and existing limited partners represents a vote of confidence in our strategy, our team and our continued success. We would like to thank them for their support,” he added.
The VC will hope to build on the successes from its first, $172 million round, that has seen three successful public offerings:
- Catabasis’ $60 million IPO (although it has seen some big trial flops in the past year).
- Flex Pharma’s $86 million IPO (but it, too, has not had the rub of the green for its trial work of late).
- Ra Pharma’s $92 million IPO, as well as the acquisition of Nimbus Apollo.