Lightstone Ventures raises $250m second fund

Lightstone Ventures this week said it raised $250 million for its second fund, $50 million more than it was aiming for.

Menlo Park, Calif.- and Boston-based Lightstone said it plans to use the cash to back “companies developing therapies which have the potential to change the practice of medicine” and to found companies via its alliance with the Foundry medtech incubator and other strategic partners.

The second fund has already made an investment, joining the $30 million Series A round for pharma startup Disarm Therapeutics.

“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,” general partner Mike Carusi said in prepared remarks. “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.”

Lightstone’s first, $172 million fund led to a trio of initial public offerings: Catabasis, Flex Pharma and Ra Pharma plus the acquisition of Nimbus Apollo. Another fund started last year with Temasek and the Singapore Economic Development Board, Lightstone Singapore, raised $50 million last year for life science investments in that Pacific nation.

Lightstone said it also named Jason Lettmann as a general partner and Mark Deem and Hanson Gifford as partners.

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