Fund performance: OrbiMed, Canaan, DCM lead early-decade San Francisco portfolio

Funds from OrbiMed Advisors, Canaan Partners and DCM Ventures lead a portfolio of early-decade venture investments at the San Francisco Employees’ Retirement System.

All were able to post returns multiples of 2x or better after just several years of deploying capital, according to a performance report updated through December 2015.

The funds are among 15 venture investments the pension manager made with vintages of 2011 to 2013. The portfolio favors mid-sized and large funds with a multi-stage approach to deal making.

Included are big name firms New Enterprise Associates, Battery Ventures, IVP and Mayfield Fund.

The top fund in the portfolio is OrbiMed Private Investments V, which made substantial progress over the past year. The 2013 fund ended December with a 2.2x multiple, more than double where it began the year, according to the portfolio report.

The $735 million fund backed a number of biotech companies that went public, including Corvus Pharmaceuticals, Dimension Therapeutics, Loxo Oncology and ProNAi Therapeutics, among others, according to data from Thomson Reuters.

Canaan IX from 2012 also made a significant gain and ended 2015 with a 2.0x multiple, the latest SFERS report shows. That’s up from 1.5x in December 2014.

DCM Ventures China Fund chalked up even better advance, rising to a 2.0x multiple from 1.3x at the start of last year.

A table accompanying this story lists the 15 funds with their distributions, capital commitments and multiples.