Month: September 2019

Colorcon Launches $50 Million Venture Capital Fund

Colorcon Launches $50 Million Venture Capital Fund  

Pharmaceutical leader partners with Touchdown Ventures to fund promising startups

Colorcon Ventures Inc (PRNewsfoto/Colorcon Ventures Inc)

NEWS PROVIDED BYColorcon Ventures Inc 

Sep 18, 2019, 03:25 ET

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HARLEYSVILLE, Pennsylvania, Sept. 18, 2019 /PRNewswire/ — Colorcon, a world leader in the development, supply and technical support of specialty products for the pharmaceutical industry, today announced the establishment of Colorcon Ventures to invest in promising companies in the pharmaceutical industry. Colorcon’s business focus is on advanced coating systems, modified release technologies and functional excipients for use in pharmaceutical immediate and modified release dosage forms.

Colorcon Ventures is a $50 million venture fund focused on startups that are strategically relevant to the core Colorcon business. The fund will target investments in transformational solutions across manufacturing, supply chain, and delivery of pharmaceutical products and services. The fund is not investing in companies developing active ingredients or molecules. 

The fund will be stage-agnostic, with an emphasis on early and mid-stage companies that demonstrate product market fit and revenue growth. Colorcon Ventures will invest in startups where Colorcon can add value in the form of subject matter expertise or commercial relationships, and leverage Colorcon’s global reach, relationships within the pharmaceutical industry, and agile R&D approach.

“We are excited to launch this venture fund to support the growth of startup companies in the pharmaceutical and healthcare industries,” said Martti Hedman, CEO of Colorcon.  “Colorcon has a rich history of innovation and we believe this fund will allow us to continue to serve our customers by partnering with startups.”

Touchdown Ventures, a firm specializing in corporate venture capital, will help manage the Colorcon Ventures fund. Touchdown will work closely with senior executives of Colorcon in all aspects of operating the fund.

“The promise of corporate venture capital is to bring more than just money to the table. A successful corporate investor can generate meaningful value by facilitating commercial relationships with its portfolio companies. We believe that Colorcon Ventures, through close association to the senior executive and business units of Colorcon, is well poised to accomplish this goal,” said David Horowitz, CEO of Touchdown.  

For more information about Colorcon Ventures, please visit www.colorconventures.com

About Colorcon

Colorcon is a world leader in the development, supply and technical support of specialty ingredients; formulated film coating systems, modified release technologies, and functional excipients for the pharmaceutical industry. Our best-in-class products and technologies are complemented by our extensive application data and value-added services to support all phases of solid oral dose design, development and manufacture.

With focus on market issues and technology development has earned Colorcon an international reputation as a pharmaceutical supplier of choice. That reputation is based on superior product quality, unparalleled technical support, extensive regulatory assistance and reliable supply from multiple locations.

Colorcon has 11 manufacturing facilities, 21 technical service laboratories globally and more than 1200 employees exclusively dedicated to its customer base. For more information, visit www.colorcon.com

About Touchdown Ventures

Touchdown Ventures partners with corporations to manage their venture capital programs. Touchdown works closely with each corporation to achieve the financial and strategic benefits from venture capital investments. The firm maintains offices in Los Angeles, Philadelphia, and San Francisco. More information on Touchdown can be found at www.touchdownvc.com

Corporate Communications Contact:

Deborah J. Taylor
Senior Associate
Phone: +44-1322-627234
deborah@colorconventures.com

Media Contact:

Richard Hayhurst
Richard Hayhurst Associates, Ltd.
Phone: +44-7711-821527
Richard@richardhayhurstassociates.com

SOURCE Colorcon Ventures Inc

Copyright © 2019 PR Newswire Association LLC. All Rights Reserved. A Cision company.   

Oncora Medical receives investment from, establishes strategic partnership with Varian to fight cancer

Tom Paine

CEO David Lindsay

Philly startup Oncora Medical received an investment of an undisclosed amount from Varian. and has joined in a strategic partnership between the two, it was announced Friday. The partnership’s goal is to accelerate the development of software tools to enable precision medicine in radiation oncology.

Varian Medical Systems (NYSE: VAR), based in Palo Alto, combines radiation technology with intelligent software tools to attack, reduce and cure cancer. Varian had revenue of $826 million and net income of $29.4 million in its latest quarter ending in June. It has a market cap of nearly $11 billion.

Oncora Medical, Inc. has developed a predictive analytics platform for oncology, capable of analyzing diverse healthcare data and applying advanced machine learning techniques to produce valuable clinical insights.

An important benchmark in Oncora’s development was its joint study, begun in 2017, with University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston to help radiation oncologists develop personalized treatment plans with the goal of improving outcomes.

CEO David Lindsay (Penn) and CTO Chris Berlind, PhD co-founded Oncora Medical in 2014. Gary Kurtzman, MD of Safeguard Scientifics is Board Chairman.

Its raised $2.6 million prior to Varian’s investment, according to SEC filings. iSeed Ventures, DreamIT Ventures and Dorm Room are among the investors.

Why New Enterprise Associates said it left Baltimore

Former NEA HQ on St. Paul St.

Tom Paine

New Enterprise Associates (commonly referred to as NEA) was once the largest venture capital firm in the world, and is still right near the top with $20 billion in assets under management. NEA launched its newest (and eventually largest) fund this spring, with a target of $3.6 billion. Curalate is a Philly company in its portfolio; larger examples are Uber, and Workday. NEA is equally as powerful on the life sciences side.

NEA profiles today as a large Silicon Valley VC with a strong east coast presence. But if you haven’t been around for awhile, you may not realize it was Baltimore born & bred, a product of an innovative investment management ecosystem including T Rowe Price and Alex Brown.

But in early June 2009, Louis Citron, the gen­eral coun­sel of New En­ter­prise As­so­ci­ates on St. Paul Street, sent an email to Baltimore Mayor Sheila Dixon announcing NEA was leaving Baltimore. This was not like the Irsays leaving town in the middle of the night for a new stadium in Indy.

In the email,  Citron told the mayor the firm is mov­ing to the sub­urbs be­cause their em­ploy­ees no longer feel safe in the city. “We had peo­ple held up at gun­point,” Citron said. “A num­ber of us have had our cars bro­ken into, and it’s very ex­pen­sive to get them re­paired.” In the e-mail, he noted the “re­cent lo­cal beat­ings by rov­ing teenagers dur­ing the day in this neigh­bor­hood, the rau­cous club in the base­ment of the Belvedere and other gang vi­o­lence through­out the city.” NEA worried about the safety of clients visiting the office.

NEA might have eventually left anyway, though its east coast headquarters is now in DC. But its hard to lose economic gems like that and remain viable as a business center.

Veeva R&D Summit draws life sciences leaders to Philly

Tom Paine

California-based Veeva Systems was showing some of its Philadelphia ties this week, hosting a major conference in the city. The 2019 Veeva R&D Summit took place Sept. 8-10, 2019 in Philadelphia, and was expected to draw 1,700 life sciences professionals and industry experts. Former Novartis CEO Joe Jimenez and Lilly’s Drug Development leader were featured keynote speakers.

While Silicon Valley is Veeva’s base for managing one of the most sophisticated cloud operations around, it needs to stay close to its major customers on the east coast, as it does through its Radnor office. The R&D summit focused on Veeva’ clinical data side, as Veeva Vault now makes up a majority of its revenues.

Veeva has achieved an important financial milestone in the 2nd calendar quarter of 2019, reporting revenue of $267 million (up 27.3 year over year), assuring a billion dollar run rate for its 2020 fiscal year ending this coming January. Veeva is forecasting total revenues between $1,062 and $1,065 million and non-GAAP operating income between $401 and $404 million for FY 2020.

Veeva says that the number of Vault CTMS customers has doubled in less than a year to 50 (see my earlier article, Veeva Vault has traction in CTMS). Veeeva, among others, is trying to redefine the CTMS category, which is a critical bottleneck in the industry’s need to get products to market in a safe and timely manner.

Veeva also announced today that it will host a 2020 Medical Device & Diagnostics Summit June 1-2, 2020 in Minneapolis, reflecting an increased focus on that segment.

Veeva (NYSE: VEEV) has continued a remarkable stretch of market and financial performance. It currently has a Price/Sales (not P/E) ratio of 21, and its shares have risen almost 80% during 2019.

“The life sciences industry is transforming to precision medicine and software is transforming along with it to the cloud,” CEO Peter Gassner, who was an executive at Salesforce.com Inc. and Peoplesoft Inc. before co-founding Veeva in 2007, recently told Bloomberg. “The stars are aligning.”

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A Message from WeWork

A message from WeWork

We took on way too much leverage on a very speculative biz plan

Now we are paying for our mistake!

Clearance Sale

Up to Î33% 50% or More off brand new WeWork shares

Our former Sales Manager made a mistake, and authorized far too many shares of our WeWork common.

Now we have to move inventory off the lot, and we’re pricing to sell

Financing problems? Bad Credit history? We’ll work with you to get a deal done

Make us an offer

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Edison Leads $10 Million Investment In Hoboken-based Health Recovery Systems

 September 5, 2019  Esther Surden Emerging technologies, Health Tech, investors, NJ Tech Companies, tech entrepreneurship,

In a move that illustrates Princeton-based Edison Partners’ continued commitment to the state of New Jersey and to New Jersey startups, the venture capital firm announced that it would be the lead stakeholder in a $10 million investment in Health Recovery Solutions (HRS), based in Hoboken.

HRS was established in 2012 by Jarrett Bauer, Rohan Udeshi and Daniel Priece, and has since grown into a market leader in remote patient monitoring. According to a release, the funds will be used to “accelerate the company’s go-to-market capabilities and augment its best-in-class technology platform within the $12 billion telemedicine market.” HRS is Edison’s 49th investment in New Jersey.

In an explanation of what the company does, an Edison statement pointed out that “chronic disease continues to drive up healthcare costs and is the leading cause of hospital readmissions. Remote patient monitoring (RPM) is becoming a fundamental tool for decreasing readmissions, improving outcomes and reducing the overall cost of care.  … HRS provides an RPM platform that allows health systems and home care agencies to reduce hospital readmission rates by up to 80% while improving patient and caregiver satisfaction.”

This year, HRS landed on the Inc. list of the 5,000 fastest growing private companies, and it came in at number 10 on our list of the fastest growing private tech companies in New Jersey, with a reported 2018 revenue of $6.3 million. Bauer, the CEO, presented the startup’s origin story at a New Jersey Tech Council meeting in 2017.

Explaining Edison’s choice of HRS, Gregg Michaelson, the partner at Edison Partners who led the investment, told NJTechWeekly.com, “We have mapped the telehealth market and believe that the HRS product and business model will make it the clear market leader in the remote patient monitoring space.  The founders are passionate and persistent about improving the health of millions of Americans.  We believe those qualities, along with their proven strategic and tactical chops, will create another huge outcome for a New Jersey company.” 

He continued, “We believe this company is unique in many ways—best product in the competitive set, very profitable unit economics, exceptional revenue growth and a founding team that desires more than just funding from a financial partner.”

In a release, Michaelson stated, “As the U.S. healthcare industry shifts to a value-based care model, providers are more incentivized than ever to decrease readmissions and improve patient outcomes.”  Michaelson will join the HRS board of directors.

“We’re delivering a comprehensive solution to costly chronic disease management,” Bauer stated. “Our partnership with Edison Partners will allow us to further accelerate toward our ultimate goal of positively impacting millions of patients who are unnecessarily readmitted to the hospital every year. We’re thrilled to partner with the Edison team as they bring healthcare and technology expertise, along with operational capabilities, to help us drive toward a premium outcome.”

The HRS software platform connects post-acute patients with clinicians and family caregivers, allowing for daily performance tracking, video visits, dietary guidance and a host of other engagement and communication tools. Clinicians utilize the platform to track vital statistics, manage patient recovery and to intervene directly or through a family caregiver when necessary.  The software is customizable, with more than 40 treatment plans for conditions such as diabetes, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), congestive heart failure and chronic kidney disease.

The company has more than 140 customers across the healthcare provider network, including recognized names such as Banner Health (Phoenix), Penn Medicine at Home (Philadelphia), WellCare Health Plans (Tampa), Northwell Health (Lake Success, N.Y.) and MedStar Health (Columbia, Md.).

This post previously appeared in NJTechWeekly, and is reposted here with the permission of its author, Esther Surden, NJTechWeekly Editor & Publisher

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Philly EnterpriseTech PeopleNews 9/8: New SunGard AS Team; Another SAP exec to Google Cloud

After bankruptcy

At least 2nd SAP vet to Google Cloud
CPE biz is based mostly in Horsham. Will it be sold?
Ex-Comcast PR exec
Former Comcast tech exec
Past Salesforce MVP was with Valley Forge-based CRM Science
Left SAP as CTO earlier in 2019

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Philly Go Fund Makes First Investments

Tom Paine

 

Ben Franklin Technology Partners’ Global Opportunity Philadelphia Fund , or Philly Go Fund for short, announced its first two investment in late August, in two Philly area expansion-stage ventures.

The Fund, announced in February by Ben Franklin along with Newtown-based EPAM Systems, has raised $20 million – a significant portion of it from EPAM and Ben Franklin-towards a $50 million goal. Ben Franklin’s chief investment officer and managing partner of GO Philly,  Scott Nissenbaum, told me he sees the fund not primarily as a vehicle for expanding seed funding to more early-stage startups, but as a way for Ben Franklin to participate in some followup fundings in ventures its already helped seed, which it can’t do today.

Its first two Philly Go Fund investments, Ambler-based customer loyalty platform Clutch, and Philly-based ecommerce performance marketing technology company Sidecar, fit the criteria. Sidecar ($1 million as part of a $7.5 million C-1 participating preferred round) has raised $38 million in total to date per CrunchBase, Clutch ($750,000 as part of the company’s $2.5 million senior preferred note in preparation for its forthcoming larger Series C) has raised $24.8 million.

With the Go Philly Fund’s potential level of investment, Ben Franklin can double down in later rounds in some of the promising ventures it seeded. That’s when a VC knows more about a venture’s chances for success, which can result in higher returns. Possibly, Ben Franklin can use such returns to further grow its investment pool.

When fully funded, Go Philly will be a considerable pool of capital. But investments of the size it just made are not, by themselves, going to have a significant impact upon the shortage in expansion stage capital that some feel holds the Philly venture scene back. Its not going to replace the millions that Safeguard Scientifics could sometimes invest in companies such as Clutch. Or going back aways, Portico Systems (where Clutch’s founder was CEO) or ThingWorx. But it will help.

The blockchain feature of the fund, in which one can invest using cryptocurrency, has already been utilized and is an innovative tool for the future.

But a further problem for Ben Franklin is the ongoing cut in its state funding. Since 2008, Pennsylvania lawmakers have cut its budget by nearly 50%, from $28 million to $14.5 million.

My own instincts are to be cautious about state-funded venture investing. I can imagine some states -none near Pennsylvania of course – where such funding might be diverted to political chronies, or even relatives. And everything I’ve ever been taught about investing tells me that the state doesn’t do it very well.

But I’ve been following Ben Franklin closely for a long time now, and I know it works closely with the area’s top VCs to vet deals, and I’ve never heard a squeak about impropriety. Its a model many states try to emulate. Its a winner for Pennsylvania.

In the past, supplemental state funding has eased the burden of the cuts, but Ben Franklin was told those sources would no longer be available in the new fiscal year.

I had an idea that some of the windfall the sate received from the new internet sales tax could be allocated to Ben Franklin.

It is difficult for such a small fund to produce optimal performance because there’s little scale to cover any overhead.

The logjam that exists in Harrisburg on this, considering the relatively small amounts of money involved, is hard to understand.

By the way, EPAM is a great company whose participation can only be a plus for the Philly Tech community..

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Sungard Availability Services Announces New Board (Press Release)

Sungard Availability Services Announces New Board

New Leadership, Owners, and Independent Industry Experts to Drive Business Transformation and Propel Company into the Future

Sungard Availability Services

NEWS PROVIDED BYSungard Availability Services 

Sep 04, 2019, 11:41 ET

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WAYNE, Pa., Sept. 4, 2019 /PRNewswire/ — Sungard® Availability Services (Sungard AS) announced its new board of managers following the company’s successful financial restructuring in May 2019. The company’s new board will consist of a combination of independent industry veterans, representatives from its largest equity holders, and the company’s chief executive officer and president, Michael (Mike) K. Robinson. 

The company welcomes three independent members that bring a vast amount of business transformation and operating experience in the technology and infrastructure services sectors, including:

  • Robert E. Guth, who will serve as chairman of the board, has a demonstrated background of driving growth and building shareholder value serving in operating roles, as well as independent director roles at businesses such as TelCove, Electric Lightwave, and Lumos Networks;
  • Jarrett B. Appleby brings more than 25 years of senior management experience successfully developing and executing growth strategies for technology platform and IT solutions companies in competitive global markets, such as Digital Realty Trust, Coresite Realty, Inc., and Equinix, Inc.; and
  • Michael Tobin OBE (Order of the British Empire) a highly successful and well-recognized technology entrepreneur and pioneer with over 30 years’ experience in the telecommunications and technology sectors, with companies such as Telecity Group, plc., Fujitsu, and ICL. Mr. Tobin will be a director of Sungard AS’ European holding company, as well as an advisor to Sungard AS’ parent board.

“As a team, we recognize the strength of Sungard AS’ global geographic footprint, range of facilities-based and cloud-based managed services capabilities, long-standing marquis customer relationships, talented team, and the market opportunity,” said Robert E. Guth, chairman of the board. “We are confident Sungard AS will continue to evolve to deliver solutions that enterprises need in an ever-changing market. And, as a board we will work together leveraging our differentiated experiences to support the company’s initiatives and are committed to invest in Sungard AS’ continued success.”

In addition, the company’s four largest equity holders—Angelo Gordon, The Carlyle Group, FS Investments, and GSO Capital Partners LP, each of which invested new capital into the business during its balance sheet restructuring—will serve on Sungard AS’ Board. Each member brings extensive financial experience working across a variety of industry sectors, including information technology services. The equity holders are represented on the board by:

  • Bryan Rush, managing director, Angelo Gordon;
  • Glori Holzman Graziano, managing director, The Carlyle Group;
  • Kenichiro Jin, managing director, FS Investments; and,
  • Jacob Gladstone, principal, GSO Capital Partners LP.

Mike Robinson is also on the company’s board. Mr. Robinson joined the business as CEO in May 2019, leading the business and re-energizing focus in both the company’s more traditional facilities-based offerings, such as colocation and workplace, as well as its more recent offerings in the managed services market, such as Managed Cloud – AWS and cloud-based Disaster Recovery as a Service (DRaaS), for which the company is recognized as a leader.

“I am very pleased with the differentiated expertise that we have assembled on our board,” stated Robinson. “This is a highly engaged group of respected business and financial experts, with deep knowledge of driving successful business transformations. They, as am I, are committed to our success and clearly recognize the value that we deliver for our customers, as we continue to work hard together to earn the opportunity to do so for many years to come.”

About Sungard Availability Services

Sungard Availability Services (“Sungard AS”) is a leading provider of critical production and recovery services to global enterprise companies. Sungard AS partners with customers across the globe to understand their business needs and provide production and recovery services tailored to help them achieve their desired business outcomes. Leveraging more than 40 years of experience, Sungard AS designs, builds and runs critical IT services that help customers manage complex IT, adapt quickly and build resiliency and availability. To learn more, visit www.sungardas.com or call 1-800-468-7483. Connect with us on Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook.

Media Contacts
Karen Wentworth
Vice President, Global Corporate Communications
Sungard Availability Services
Tel: 410.279.0563
karen.wentworth@sungardas.com

Alison Brooker
Corporate Communications Director
Sungard Availability Services
Tel: 610-745-2697
alison.brooker@sungardas.com

Sungard Availability Services is a trademark or registered trademark of SunGard Data Systems or its affiliate, used under license. The Sungard Availability Services logo by itself and Recover2Cloud are trademarks or registered trademarks of Sungard AS New Holdings III, LLC. or its affiliates. All other trade names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders. ©2019 Sungard Availability Services. All rights reserved. 

The abbreviation for Sungard Availability Services is ‘Sungard AS’ as cited above. Please use ‘Sungard AS’ when abbreviating the name rather than ‘Sungard’ or ‘SunGard,’ which may confuse the reader with another separate company with a similar name.

SOURCE Sungard Availability Services

Related Links

https://www.sungardas.com

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