We welcome you to the first quarterly newsletter of SYNthesis BioVentures (“SYNBV”, or “Fund”). This newsletter is in a format we will reproduce quarterly, giving you updates on our progress, while also providing insights into the science SYNBV finds exciting. Your feedback is most welcomed.
Fund Update:
- SYNBV was granted its provisional ESVCLP license in July 2022, and proceeded with its fund raising efforts in tandem with the restructuring of the SYNthesis Group’s holdings. As of May 1st, the Fund has obtained commitments of $18 million.
- We are now embarking on an effort to bring our committed capital up to A$30M with an ultimate goal of reaching our maximum size of $75M, and have started working with multiple parties to organise road shows in Perth, Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne.
- We welcomed two senior SYNthesis Group employees into key roles at SYNBV: Dr Martine Keenan as the Fund Chief Scientific Officer and Dr Simon Preston as the Fund Investment Analyst.
- The Fund has recently completed its first investment of A$3.8M into Catalyst Therapeutics Pty Ltd, a cutting-edge joint venture between the SYNthesis Group and the WEHI, Melbourne’s oldest and most prestigious Medical Research Institute. Anaxis Pharma Pty Ltd, a wholly owned subsidiary of Catalyst and the main operating subsidiary, is developing first in class drugs for the treatment of acute and chronic inflammatory diseases.
- Other investors in Catalyst’s total A$11.7M seed round included WEHI and the Pharm Bio Pty Ltd as trustee for the Pharm Bio Trust, the unit trust of the SYNthesis Group shareholders. The company is planning to raise an additional A$10-12M in or before the 4th quarter of 2023, in order to facilitate IND-enabling studies on its lead asset.
- The Fund is already gearing up to make its second investment into Aculeus Therapeutics Pty Ltd, a SYNthesis Group portfolio company with a pipeline focussed on developing small molecule activators of innate immunity for oncology. The company is currently in the process of acquiring a clinical asset that will help facilitate an ASX listing in late 2023 or early 2024.
