New Life Sciences Venture Fund to Invest in Europe, U.S.

Sofinnova Partners, a venture capital company in Paris, closed its seventh fund focusing on investments in life sciences start-up companies, valued at €240 million ($312 million). Sofinnova Partners is affiliated with Sofinnova Ventures, a life sciences venture capital company in Menlo Park, California.

The company says contributors to the Sofinnova Capital VII fund are major institutional investors, predominantly pension funds, venture fund aggregators, and insurance companies. The new fund’s investors include the financial services and investment companies European Investment Fund, Skandia Life Insurance Company, CNP Assurances, and CDC Entreprises.

Sofinnova Partners says the new venture fund will support entrepreneurs developing technologies in the biopharmaceutical and medical device fields with offerings that can take their markets in new directions. Sofinnova Capital VII is expected to make seed investments in biopharmaceutical and medical device companies, while a separate Sofinnova Green Seed Fund will support industrial biotechnology start-ups.

The company anticipates Sofinnova Capital VII will make two-thirds of its investments in Europe, with most of the remainder in the U.S. Sofinnova says it typically invests as a founding and lead investor in start-ups, corporate spinoffs, and turnaround candidates.

Sofinnova Partners says in the last three years several of its portfolio companies have been acquired, including Corevalve, Novexel, Movetis, Fovea, and Preglem. In addition, two of its supported companies have gone public: Stentys and DBV. The total value of these transactions, says the company, is $3.6 billion.

Hat tip: Fortune/Term Sheet

Image: MD4 Group/Flickr

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