[Posted on October 10, 2007 - 2:43 PM]
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Life sciences investment lands a clean bill of health again from New Leaf Venture Partners, which has increased the size of its second fund since spinning off of Sprout Group by nearly 50%, closing New Leaf Ventures II LP at $450 million.
New Leaf first split off from the Credit Suisse Group-affiliated Sprout Group in July 2005, but it continues to manage the legacy Sprout portfolio and took on investments from Sprout's final Sprout Group IX fund in the first fund. Sprout had been investing in venture capital deals since 1969.
The New York- and Menlo Park-based firm drew heavily on previous LPs in raising the latest fund, but it also added new investors to continue to focus on late-stage biopharmaceutical, early-stage medical device and molecular diagnostics companies. Since closing its $310 million New Leaf Ventures I LP fund in August 2005, the firm has backed 19 companies including drug developers Cerexa Inc., Ilypsa Inc. and Sirna Therapeutics Inc.; diagnostics developer Adeza BioMedical; drug industry software maker Phase Forward; and device developer Radiant Medical Inc.
Management of the new fund carries over from New Leaf's previous vehicle, with managing directors Philippe Chambon, Ron Hunt, James Niedel and CFO Craig Slutzkin operating out of New York office, and managing directors Jeani Delagardelle, Kathy LaPorte, Vijay Lathi and venture partner Milt McColl investing from Menlo Park. - Clifford Carlsen
See Oct. 10 press release from New Leaf Partners
See June 5 story from TheDeal.com
See August 2005 story from The Deal.com
See October 2006 story from TheDeal.com
