VC Firm’s New $260M Fund Taps AI to Identify Biotechs Poised for Success

2024-02-22

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Pictured: Businessmen shake hands amid visualization of big data driven by artificial intelligence /iStock, metamorworks After wildly successful investments with her first fund, Simone Song is at it again. Song’s life sciences venture capital firm ORI Capital announced Thursday its second fund has raised $260 million. ORI Fund II is poised to invest in early-stage biotech companies across the globe, focused on areas with high unmet need and even higher mortality rates. The VC’s announcement listed areas of cancer, metabolic disorder and neurodegenerative disease, among the targets. Capital will be deployed to companies working in areas ORI sees as driving significant growth: next generation molecules, programmable nuclear acid therapies, immuno-oncology cell therapy and synthetic biology. “We are in a golden era of innovation across the intersection of AI and biology, where technological breakthroughs are creating new approaches to diagnosing and treating disease,” Song said in a statement. Song’s track record speaks for itself. ORI’s first fund of $200 million invested in CG Oncology, a bladder cancer-focused biotech, in 2017. In January 2024, CG went public with a $380 million upsized IPO. The company’s market cap is already around $3 billion. Another investment for the firm was acquired by Sanofi in January 2021 for $1.1 billion. Kymab’s immunology platform added a human monoclonal antibody targeting key immune system regulator OX40L to Sanofi’s pipeline. At the time, the company’s head of R&D said he believed it to be a key to rebalancing the immune system without suppression. Vertex Pharmaceuticals picked up Semma Therapeutics, an ORI invested company, in 2019 for access to its stem cell-derived human islets as a potential cure for type 1 diabetes. Two more of its companies—Orchard Therapeutics and TriSalus Life Sciences—have also gone public. ORI utilizes its proprietary AI-enabled data platform to sift through companies, fund managers and industry professionals to find biotechs that fit their disease focus areas. It also utilizes the data to pinpoint which companies appear to have the highest chance of success based on leadership experience and technology. “We can’t afford to make a mistake that will cost us $10 million or $20 million or $30 million,” Song said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal. Kate Goodwin is a freelance life science writer based in Des Moines, Iowa. She can be reached at kate.goodwin@biospace.com and on LinkedIn.

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