Longitude Capital Expands Investment Team With Senior Hire

MENLO PARK, Calif. and GREENWICH, Conn., Feb. 8, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Longitude Capital, a life sciences venture capital firm, today announced that Gregory Grunberg, M.D., has joined the firm as Managing Director in the Menlo Park, California office, effective immediately.  At Longitude, Dr. Grunberg will focus primarily on medical device company investments.

"We are delighted to welcome Greg to our Longitude team.  He brings broad experience and expertise within life sciences investing and will help us provide high-level strategic counsel to our portfolio companies," commented Juliet Tammenoms Bakker, Founder and Managing Director of Longitude Capital.  She added, "Greg's hire comes at an exciting time for our Firm as we expand our franchise within the life sciences industry and continue to execute successfully within a dynamic macro-environment for both life sciences companies and venture capital funds.  As of December 2011, we have 16 portfolio companies in our inaugural fund, Longitude Venture Partners I, L.P., of which nine are already commercial–stage and generating over $800 million in aggregate annual sales.  We look forward to Greg contributing to our future growth and investments."

Prior to joining Longitude, Dr. Grunberg was a Principal at Rho Ventures, a multi-stage, multi-sector fund where he focused on medical device, biotechnology and other healthcare investments.  Previously, he served as Engagement Manager in the life sciences practice of McKinsey & Company.  While at McKinsey, Dr. Grunberg worked with many large life sciences companies and private equity investors across a range of projects encompassing investment due diligence, business development, R&D and product development.  He also consulted at The Parthenon Group and led his own health care advisory firm during graduate school.  Dr. Grunberg is a board-certified physician in Internal Medicine and completed his residency at Weill-Cornell's New York Presbyterian Hospital.  He has maintained a limited clinical practice in Internal Medicine and affiliations with UCSF, Kaiser, Albert Einstein, U. Miami, Weill-Cornell, and the Weill-Cornell Buganda Medical School in Tanzania. 

Dr. Grunberg formerly served on the Board of AqueSys and was a Board Observer at SARCode Bioscience Inc., PHT Corporation, Crosstrees Medical, Inc. and Nora Therapeutics, Inc.  He holds an M.D. from Duke University Medical School, an M.B.A. from the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University (where he was a Fuqua Scholar) and an A.B. in Economics and English from Amherst College.

About Longitude Capital
Longitude Capital is a life sciences venture capital firm specializing in investments in biotechnology and medical device companies that deliver clinically and cost effective innovations to patients and providers.  The firm typically seeks to invest in clinically de-risked assets that are likely to surpass key value-creating milestones within three to five years.  Besides traditional venture capital investments, Longitude's investment team also proactively searches for "special situations", such as spin-outs, recapitalizations, PIPEs and structured transactions, across both privately-held and publicly-traded companies.  Longitude Capital raised $325 million in its inaugural fund in 2008 and has offices in Menlo Park, CA and Greenwich, CT.  For further information, please visit the Longitude Capital website at http://www.longitudecapital.com.

Contact
Longitude Capital:
Juliet Tammenoms Bakker, Managing Director
(203) 769-5200

Media:
Burns McClellan, New York
on behalf of Longitude Capital
Justin Jackson, 212-213-0006, Ext. 327
[email protected]

SOURCE Longitude Capital