AESCAP Venture leads € 6m Series A in Antibody Engineering Company f-Star
Amsterdam, Netherlands (September 13, 2007) – Aescap announced that it has led a € 6.0 million in a Series A financing round in Vienna based antibody company f-Star with a € 3 million investment. Seed Investor Atlas Venture provided the other € 3 million of this funding round.
f-Star is an antibody engineering company based in Vienna, Austria. The company develops improved therapeutic antibodies and antibody fragments based on its Modular Antibody Technology, which allows the introduction of additional binding sites into antibodies and antibody fragment. This will lead to improved existing antibody therapies in a range of disease areas e.g. auto immune diseases or oncology.
Kreske Nickelsen, partner at Aescap Venture and responsible for Aescap’s investment in f-Star, was highly impressed by the technology’s potential: “It’s very hard nowadays to find an antibody technology that is both broadly applicable and has strong IP protection. f-Star’s Modular Antibody Technology is one of these rare case’s.
Contacts:
Aescap Management BV
Kreske Nickelsen
World Trade Center
Strawinskylaan 1525
1077 XX Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Tel: +31 (0)20 570 29 44
Fax: + 31 (0)20 673 78 46
Email:
f-Star Biotechnologische Forschungs- und Entwicklungs GmbH:
Dr. Eugen Stermetz
Chief Financial Officer
Muthgasse 18
1190 Wenen, Oostenrijk
Tel: +43 664 549 56 88
Fax: +43 1 230 60 30 46
Email:
About Aescap Venture
Aescap Venture is a venture capital firm focusing on the creation and growth of European biomedical companies. Through early and active involvement in the companies, Aescap Venture will achieve an accelerated development of its portfolio companies and their products.
Aescap Venture Fund I has € 103 million under management. The founders of Aescap are Michiel de Haan, the founder and CEO of Atlas Venture until 2000 and Dinko Valerio PhD, the founder and former CEO of Crucell, a Euronext / NASDAQ-listed biotechnology company. Additional Partners are Patrick Krol MBA, a successful entrepreneur and expert in Life Science marketing and business development and Kreske Nickelsen MSc/MBA, previous Director at 3i, with 10 years of experience in European Life Science venture capital.
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About f-Star
f-Star is an antibody engineering company based in Vienna, Austria. The company develops improved therapeutic antibodies and antibody fragments based on its Modular Antibody Technology, which allows the introduction of additional binding sites into antibodies and antibody fragments by engineering the non-CDR loops of constant or variable domains. Using Modular Antibody Technology, antibody fragments with antibody functionality and long half life but much smaller size (Fcab™) or full antibodies with additional functionality (mAb2)can be created.
The company was founded by a team of experienced antibody engineering and biotech executives. Seed-financed by Austrian government agencies and Atlas Venture in 2006, the company recently closed a Series A financing round co-led by Aescap Venture and Atlas Venture and has raised € 10million so far. f-Star has 15 employees at its research site in Vienna, Austria.