Foresite Capital CEO Jim Tananbaum, M.D., says we’re in “one of the best biotech investment environments” of his multidecade career—and has rounded up $900 million to put that belief to the test with a fresh set of big bets.
The cash makes up Foresite’s new fund, the sixth raised since Tananbaum founded the VC shop in 2011. Foresite will use the money to continue backing drug developers, companies at the border of technology and biotechnology, and other businesses at all stages that fall into its healthcare and life sciences wheelhouse.
Specifically, the VC shop will focus the sixth fund on precision therapeutics, life science infrastructure and healthcare delivery. That focus is reflected in Foresite’s investments in biotechs such as Alumis, Latigo Biotherapeutics and Xaira Therapeutics, which have raised rounds of $135 million to $1 billion this year.
As that list of investments suggests, Foresite is often in the room when biotechs raise big private rounds. And, with Alumis and CG Oncology following up Foresite-backed rounds with IPO filings, the pipeline that runs from private investment to public markets is flowing in the VC shop’s corner of the industry.
The picture of biotechs progressing from megarounds to IPOs is somewhat at odds with the state of the broader sector, where tightening access to private and public funding has forced companies to scale back their ambitions. But Tananbaum is convinced the fundamentals are in place to support the development of breakthrough science and generate returns for investors.
“Advances in biology, genomics and artificial intelligence continue to converge,” the Foresite CEO said in a statement. “Biotech innovation is predicting, preventing and treating disease more effectively than ever before. We believe these advances will lead to increasingly efficient investing at all stages.”
That vision, coupled with a track record that includes 47 IPOs, 28 buyouts and 58 FDA drug approvals, has helped Foresite persuade university endowments, charitable foundations, medical institutions, pension funds and other groups to back its sixth fund.