Startups

New fund: SV Life Sciences raising $400M for biotech, health IT startups

The venture capital firm's last fund, in 2010, raised $523M. Historically, SV Life Sciences has invested about 40 percent of its funds in later-stage deals.

Boston-based venture capital firm SV Life Sciences is working on its sixth fund, with a fundraising target of $400 million, according to a Form D filing on the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s website. The firm invests in biotech, medical devices, health IT and healthcare services.

In a phone interview, CFO Denise Marks told MedCity News the firm’s previous fund closed out in 2010 with $523 million. The initial target then was also $400 million. Although it’s done making initial deals with the fifth fund, it has a reserve for any follow-on deals for companies that haven’t yet exited, Marks said.

SV Life Sciences has nearly $2 billion under management, and also has offices in San Francisco and London. Launched in 1993 as part of Schroder Ventures Group, it became independent in 2001 and shortened its name to SV Life Sciences in 2005. It has more than 160 life sciences companies in its portfolio.

Historically, SV Life Sciences has invested about 40 percent of its funds in growth or later-stage deals, primarily in healthcare services and health IT, with some later-stage deals in medtech as well, said Marks.

“There’s some real opportunity in companies that have advanced, but maybe the syndicates are tapped out,” Marks said. “They haven’t quite gone public, but are looking to do a later stage round of financing. We’ve come in there.”

It divides its investments fairly evenly between biotech and medtech. The firm runs the gamut in life sciences investment, however — it’ll get in at the ground level and build pharma spinouts or in-license assets to create new companies, Marks said.

SV Life Sciences tends to invest $10 million to $15 million in medtech deals, $15 million to $25 million in biotech deals and $20 million to $30 million in health services deals, she said.

Beyond that, Marks didn’t comment on any specific areas of interest for the investment firm, or what sort of timeline the sixth fund will follow in raising cash and investing in a new crop of startups.

[PHOTO: Flickr user Tax Credits]

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