Forbion Capital Partners launches $208m life sciences fund

European venture capital shop Forbion Capital Partners said today that it raised a $208 million fund it plans to use for investments in medical device, drug and diagnostic companies.

The €183 million fund’s limited partners included strategic investors Charles River Laboratories and Knight Therapeutics, plus the European Investment Fund, the Dutch Venture Initiative, Germany’s KfW development bank, other regional investment agencies, pension funds, insurance companies and “leading European family offices,” the VC shop said. Forbion, which is based in Naarden, Holland, and Munich, said it plans to use about 70% of the Forbion Capital Fund III on the Continent, with the rest invested in U.S. and Canadian companies.

Investments have already been made in 7 companies, the company said: Autonomic Technologies, based in Redwood City, Calif., and Munich, which is developing the Pulsante microstimulator to treat cluster headache; Montreal-based gastrointestinal gene therapy company enGene; Rigontec, a Bonn-based company that’s developing RNA therapeutics to target the RIG-I immune receptor; Oxford, England’s oncolytic immunotherapy firm Replimune; Illes Balears, Spain-based biopharma Sanifit; stealthy Staten Biotech; and drug developer Akarna Therapeutics, based in Cambridge, England.

“Raising such a substantial amount is a tribute to Forbion’s reputation as a quality player in life sciences venture capital investment. In Europe especially, it is still a buyer’s market; as a result, we see many highly attractive assets from an increasingly rich deal flow,” managing partner Sander Slootweg said in prepared remarks. “Our new portfolio is already showing great promise. Canadian molecular therapeutics company enGene, inventors of the so-called ‘gene pill’, has closed 2 major pharma collaborations since we led the Series B financing round in 2015. In the U.K., oncolytic immunotherapy company, Replimune secured a substantial and attractively priced $30 million Series A round after we provided the seed capital. As several more companies are currently enjoying strategic interest, this bodes well for the success of FCF III.”

Forbion also said it hired analyst Matthias Falcenberg from the Max-Planck Institute of Biochemistry to help deploy the new fund.

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