LONDON – Merck KGaA has increased the size of its corporate venture fund M Ventures to €600 million (US$676.4 million), to be invested over the next five years. This is the third increase in the financial commitment to the evergreen fund following its formation as Merck Serono Ventures in 2009, with €40 million. Since then, it has backed more than 80 companies. The larger fund will allow M Ventures to further grow the number and the size of its investments but, said Hakan Goker, managing director of M Ventures, “We will not change the strategy per se.”
Abogen Biosciences Co. Ltd. has raised $300 million in a series C+ round to support the development of its mRNA products, specifically to support the development of its COVID-19 mRNA vaccine and expand to the global market.
Suki AI Inc. recorded $55 million in a series C fundraising round to support further development of its artificial intelligence (AI)-driven voice technology and digital clinical assistant for health care providers. The round was led by March Capital with participation by Philips Ventures. All previous investors in the company also returned, including Gaingels Group, Pankaj Patel (former chief development officer of Cisco), Andrew Deutsch (CEO of RIMA Radiology), and Russell Farscht (former managing director of The Carlyle Group).
Life sciences VC Apple Tree Partners has launched its first U.K.-based portfolio company, providing $53 million in series A funding for immunology specialist Adendra Therapeutics Ltd.
LONDON – Europe’s latest antibody-drug conjugate (ADC) specialist, Emergence Therapeutics AG, will be going head to head with pioneer Seagen Inc.’s approved ADC, Padcev, after raising €87 million (US$97.9 million) in a series A round.
Odyssey Therapeutics Inc. launched with a whopping $218 million series A round, the year’s second-largest, to fuel work by almost 100 employees recruited in the past few months, mostly from big pharma firms.
PARIS – Wishbone SA closed a $3 million funding round, which should allow it to obtain the CE mark prior to launching its range of products in Europe based on bone regeneration technology for reconstructive dental surgery. “Thanks to this round, we are ramping scale and moving from R&D to the commercialization phase in Europe,” Daniel Bee, CEO of Wishbone, told BioWorld.
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