With the new entity investments can be made outside of the normal company realm to create additional R and D resources...in other words not limited to their own in house products...and the ability to help finance start up organizations....they join the ranks of several other pharma companies in this effort...and they will consider start ups after a proof of concept has reached acceptable clinical levels...BD
The eponymously named GSK Venture Fund, which hasn’t formally been announced, will have a two-fold agenda: First, the group will make strategic investments outside the company that will bolster the pharma’s internal R&D strategy; second, the venture group will commit capital to build start-ups around assets that GSK has deprioritized.
GSK is just the latest pharma to take a more active interest in corporate VC. As we reported back in November, big pharma is reaching far and wide for new business development strategies that might help them fill their pipelines without having to overpay for the best licensing and M&A deals. They're are eager to function more like traditional stand-alone venture capital firms, with an eye toward locking early into the best deals and identifying new industries that might help them broaden their product portfolio. Pfizer Inc.'s venture group, for example, is investing heavily in diagnostics while Novartis' venture group is investing in medical device companies. In addition, Novartis company also has a $100 million option fund for investing in companies with early stage platform technologies. The idea: at the time of investment, the fund takes a no-cost option on a given start-up's program--usually after its reached clinical proof-of-concept--giving the pharma (theoretically) cheap access to new compounds.
0 comments :
Post a Comment