While the VC fund launched on Monday by Regeneron Pharmaceuticals has an investment mandate that includes healthcare broadly, Regeneron Ventures will lean towards biotechnology, devices, tools and enabling technologies.
New York-based pharma Regeneron announced Monday that it is launching a $500 million venture capital fund that will invest in promising biotechnology innovation amid a renewed wave of investment activity in the biotech market.
Regeneron Pharmaceuticals will serve as the exclusive limited partner to the VC fund—called Regeneron Ventures—and commit $100 million annually over the next five years, according to Monday’s announcement. While the fund has an investment mandate that includes healthcare broadly, it will lean towards biotechnology, devices, tools and enabling technologies.
Regeneron Ventures will be independently managed by former Regeneron executives Jay Markowitz and Michael Aberman, who will also direct the fund’s investment strategy. Before joining Regeneron Ventures, Aberman held CEO positions at XenImmune Therapeutics and Quentis Therapeutics. Prior to that, Aberman spent seven years at Regeneron, with his most recent position at the pharma being vice president of investor relations and strategy. Markowitz most recently served as senior partner at VC firm ARCH Venture Partners. He also worked at Regeneron from 2017 to 2020 as senior vice president.
Markowitz said that the fund will support “long-term” investments and will be “agnostic to therapeutic area, technology and stage of development.”
“Our goal is to cultivate an ecosystem where the next generation of biotech companies can thrive, drawing on the lessons learned and successes achieved at Regeneron and throughout our careers,” Aberman said in a statement. “Together, we will strive to identify and support groundbreaking advancements that push the boundaries of what’s possible in science and medicine.”
Coming off a downturn in biopharma VC activity in 2023, there has been a recent surge of activity in the investment space. In February 2024, ORI Capital announced its second fund had raised $260 million, with the intention of investing in early stage biotechs that are working on unmet medical needs in cancer, metabolic disorders and neurodegenerative diseases, among other targets. Also, New York City-based Scion Life Sciences launched an oversubscribed $310 million fund that same month with the goal of forming companies that are developing curative treatments for life-threatening diseases.
The European-based VC firm Earlybird Health also in February closed a €173 million ($184.4 million) fund to finance biopharma and other healthcare companies in Europe.
Tyler Patchen is a staff writer at BioSpace. You can reach him at tyler.patchen@biospace.com. Follow him on LinkedIn.
