Gilde raises 85m for healthcare

Gilde Healthcare Partners, the Dutch venture firm, has held a first closing of Gilde Healthcare II (GHC II) on €85m, with a final closing on at least €125m anticipated later in the year.

Banks invested 47% of the capital raised so far, with fund-of-funds investing 24%, pension funds 11%, 6% from biotech cross-over funds and 12% from family offices and management. The fund will target European start-ups in the healthcare sector including therapeutics, diagnostics, medical devices and enabling technologies. Investment size will range between €1m to €12m per company.

Pieter van der Meer, a managing director at Gilde, said: “The strength of the investor’s response was prompted by the strong track record of our first healthcare fund which includes investments in premier life science companies such as Ablynx (Belgium), Agendia (Netherlands), Chroma Therapeutics (UK), Glycart (Switzerland) and Innate Pharma (France). We believe that the timing for investing in healthcare is right.”