Investing in politics

While most biotechnology companies are more concerned with equity funding than campaign funding, a few biotech players have bought into Washington.Sanford Robertson and Mark Simon of Robertson, Stephens & Co. helped raise large sums for the Clinton-Gore campaign.

A perusal of Federal Election Commission records reveals names of other important biotech executives and investors who chose to open their wallets at either the local or national levels in support of one - or both - of the parties during the fall campaign, including venture capitalists Brook Byers and Sam Colella, investor David Blech and top executives such as James Vincent at Biogen, Gabriel Schmergel of Genetics Institute, and George Rathmann of Icos. ...