Adjuvant Capital, a NYC-based global global life sciences venture capital firm, closed its first fund, at $300m.

Backers included the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Anthos Fund & Asset Management, Beacon Pointe Advisors, CDC Group, the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation, Dalio Philanthropies, the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, ELMA Investments Ltd., the Ford Foundation, the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, Global Health Investment Corporation (with funding from the Government of Germany through KfW), Laerdal Million Lives Fund, Merck, Novartis, RockCreek, Sonanz, and The Sorenson Impact Foundation, among others.

Headquartered in New York, with offices in San Francisco and Zurich, Adjuvant is a global life sciences investment company built to accelerate the development of new technologies for the world’s most pressing public health challenges.

The firm invests in companies developing promising new vaccines, therapeutics, diagnostics and medical devices targeting high-burden infectious diseases, maternal and child health, antimicrobial resistance, and malnutrition, with a commitment to make these interventions accessible to those who need them most in low- and middle-income countries.

Led by Glenn Rockman and Jenny Yip, Adjuvant has already backed 14 companies developing technologies for high-impact indications ranging from rare conditions, such as melioidosis, to widespread global emergencies, such as COVID-19. Each Adjuvant investment includes binding commitments to make any successfully commercialized products broadly accessible to underserved populations in low- and middle-income countries.

Although based in the U.S., the firm pursues the most promising technologies and talent globally, with investments in Nigeria, Bangladesh, and China, in addition to collaborations in India and Western Europe. Recent financings include:

• New York-based Codagenix, which is using computational biology to “rationally design” vaccines for intractable public health challenges;
• California-based ChromaCode, which is leveraging machine-learning and artificial intelligence to significantly increase the throughput of existing molecular diagnostic equipment;
• Lagos-based 54gene, which is using pan-African genetic data to drive discoveries in drug and vaccine development; and,
• Beijing-based Yisheng Biopharma, which is addressing chronic supply issues in the rabies vaccine market.