Dive Brief:
- Dimension, a young biotech venture firm run by former Lux Capital and Obvious Ventures investors, has raised its second fund in two years.
- Called Dimension II, the $500 million fund announced Monday surpasses the $350 million the firm debuted with in January 2023. Like the earlier fund, Dimension II will support companies working at the “interfaces of life science and technology,” its three co-founders and managing partners wrote in a blog post. It’s investing in tech-powered therapeutics companies as well as developers of tools and manufacturing techniques that aid in drugmaking and discovery.
- In an interview, the co-founders — Adam Goulburn, Zavain Dar and Nan Li — said Dimension aims to make about two dozen investments with its latest fund. Investments will range from the single digit millions to upwards of $40 million, and support new startups, growing companies and publicly traded biotechs, they said.
Dive Insight:
Dimension views itself as a “contrarian” compared to its investment peers, according to Goulburn.
The firm is staffed by experts in both life sciences and computing to reflect “how biotechs are built these days,” Li said. Its portfolio includes drug discovery specialists like Chai Discovery and Kimia Therapeutics, but also companies like Automata and Kaleidoscope Bio that specialize in software and other tools that can help drugmakers “upgrade their own processes,” he said.
Having that “all within one firm is pretty unique,” Li added. “It’s starting to resonate with founders [and] industry folks.”
Dimension also aims to be selective, concentrating on a smaller number of larger investments, rather than spreading itself thin, Li said. Though the firm surpassed its original $400 million fundraising target, it hit its hard cap and turned away opportunities to raise more. The goal is to give entrepreneurs more attention and support at any time — not just around board meetings — and, with greater financial firepower, write bigger checks and accumulate larger ownership stakes.
“Many of our brethren end up on 20, 30 or 40 boards each. It’s impossible to actually know or pay attention to the top concerns and the top priorities of many of your management teams and entrepreneurs,” Dar said, adding that the firm aims to have about 20 positions per fund.
Atlas Venture, a prominent startup creator, cited a similar desire for “discipline” in raising what partner Bruce Booth described in a blog post last week as a “modest” $450 million fund.
While Dimension is run by experienced investors, it’s still something of an unproven commodity compared to its more established counterparts. It hasn’t yet recorded any investment “exits,” such as an initial public offering or acquisition, that generate returns. Many of Dimension’s startups are early, maturing companies. At least so far, the firm has held onto all of its stakes.
Dimension is also bucking a rising trend in biotech, as investors are flocking to invest in more proven companies. That’s led to fewer, but larger funding rounds overall in 2024 and a spike in investments to biotechs that already have drugs in clinical testing.
Dimension’s partners say they are able to maintain a longer view, even despite what Dar acknowledged is a “bear market” for biotech. The firm has a ten-year window for each fund, enabling Dimension to make bolder investments and stick with companies that might take awhile to flourish.
“Big, highly transformative ideas are what we’re seeking,” Goulburn said. “That, in itself, is ‘risk-on,’ not ‘risk-off.’”
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- Source: https://www.biopharmadive.com/news/dimension-biotech-tech-startups-venture-firm-second-fund/734593/