BioCentury
ARTICLE | Finance

Investing in maturity

Why Medicxi thinks Europe is ready for a late-stage crossover fund

June 16, 2017 6:17 PM UTC

Medicxi’s decision to expand into late-stage investing reflects a belief that the European biotech industry has everything it needs to mature, except growth capital. The VC also hopes that providing smart money for biotechs in Phase IIb and beyond will attract additional specialist money to the region to support the creation of bellwethers.

With advice as well as money from new LPs Novartis AG and Verily Life Sciences LLC, the life sciences subsidiary of Google parent company Alphabet Inc., the $300 million Medicxi Growth 1 fund announced June 15 will invest in private and public companies that have ambitions to take drug candidates to market...