$525M Venture Fund to Back Tech, Science Companies

The venture capital company Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers in Menlo Park, California has closed a $525 million venture capital fund for equity investments in early-stage green technology and life sciences, as well as digital enterprise companies. The fund, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers XV LLC (KPCB 15) will be led by 10 of the company’s managing members.

KPCB’s green technology investments support solutions in the fields of clean water, renewable energy, next-generation transportation, and sustainable agriculture. Recent green tech investments include Aquion Energy Inc. in Pittsburgh, a developer of sodium ion batteries and energy storage systems. Aquion Energy, a spin-off of Carnegie Mellon University announced in February plans to build a manufacturing plant in southwest Pennsylvania that expects to create 400 high-tech jobs.

KPCB says it has funded over 100 life sciences companies developing new health care technologies covering therapeutic and medical devices, drugs, vaccines, personalized medicine, diagnostics, and health care IT and services. Foundation Medicine in Cambridge, Massachusetts is a recent early stage KPCB investment. Foundation Medicine was founded in 2010 to devise comprehensive diagnostic tests that analyze relevant tumor genomes and other molecular information in individual patients’ cancers and connect the results to a knowledge base of clinical data to help oncologists personalize treatment. Foundation Medicine’s founders include scientists from the Broad Institute, Harvard Medical School, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, and MIT.

The company’s other funds provide financing for later-stage companies in digital and green technologies, mobile applications, and social media. KPCB says it provides support to its portfolio companies through recruitment and talent management, building strategic relationships, as well as expertise in operations, marketing, and communications.

Read more:

• Breakout Labs Makes First Early-Stage Science Company Grants
• University Research Spinoff To Build Manufacturing Plant
• Diagnostics Start-Up Closes $33.5M Early-Stage Financing

Photo: Andrew Magill/Flickr

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