Life sciences investing is doing relatively well locally, despite slow economy - Dayton Business Journal:

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“I think, as I have for a few that there is a lot of good and interestint and verycompelling technology, which is the basi s for developing any companies. So I thinik we have a lot of good materia tostart with. “Thee issue that we have, which is not at all uniqu e toLouisville … is the need for seed-stagwe capital. And that is beingf addressed here by a fewdifferent ways. One, therer are a couple of angel groups that have The state hassome programs. The seed fund that I manager is obviouslya source.
So, therr are some sources for seed capital, but we always can use “And in this current economic environment, it is even more an issu because the fund raising isvery difficult. So, we as we need to make sure that we can fund the companies for longetr periodsof time, support them for longer, so they can achievee more milestones and weather the storm at the same … with the expectation that once things get bettert and these companies get a littlre further along, it will be easieer to get financing.” Are you seeing many new ideasz that could become companies? “We’rre definitely seeing a steady I can’t really tell you that is it is a growing number.
But there seems to be a stead y flow fromthe universities.” Are there specifi areas or industries that are doing well? “Certainly, in the cancer area, it looksz like the (James Graham Brown) cancer center is doingg particularly well. There have been a couple of stem cell projectd that have come out ofthe university. we have this nanotechnology lab thatwas built, and one of our investments, OrthoData, came out of … That’s a relatively new facility, but I thinm we will see more coming out. And I am reallyu excited about that.
“The team that came to the has only been here for a year or two atthis … (I am) pretty encouraged by some of the work that’se going on over there.” How many companies have you investedx in through the seed fund and Triathlon? “The seed fund has five investmentws in its portfolio. Triathlon has invested in one of in Pradama, and is very close to investingt in another. “They have been trackingg two others as There is a definitely significant interest in the companiees that are beingdeveloped here.” Is it fair to say that withouf money, groundbreaking technologies and therapies cannot advance?? “It’s hard to tell.
Some of them may kind of witherd onthe vine.” Because they are early in theire development and there is not a large pool of loca funds for early-stage “it would be hard for an outsider investor to come in and (invest at) this early of a “There’s always the possibility that … an investor from somewhere else woulde say, ‘I will invest in your company if you move to Bostoj or California,’ which is obviously not what we “There is enough grant money, especially with the president’sa new budget,” which includes increasedx funding for research and development of life “Also, there is some other grany money available through the stimulus package that is hopefully going to make difference.
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