Serán Bioscience Announces Investment by Vivo Capital
A majority investment by Vivo Capital, a healthcare investment firm headquartered in Silicon Valley, will fund the expansion of Serán's service offering, the doubling of clean room capacity by year-end, and the development and construction a new commercial scale cGMP manufacturing facility by the end of 2022.
BEND, Ore., Jan. 6, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Serán Bioscience today announced that healthcare investment firm Vivo Capital has made a majority investment in Serán alongside Serán's founders who will continue to lead the Company.
Founded in 2016, Serán is a leading contract development and manufacturing organization providing a comprehensive suite of development, analytical and clinical manufacturing services to pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies. Serán's deep experience and expertise in materials science, formulation development, engineering, and pharmaceutical manufacturing enables optimum solutions for their customers most difficult drug development challenges. Serán currently has over 50 employees—of which more than half are scientists—at its facilities in Bend, Oregon.
Mahendra Shah, a Managing Director at Vivo, said, "We are excited to embark upon this partnership with the Serán management team. Serán has built an exceptional organization that is predicated on technical excellence, science-driven decision-making, and an unwavering commitment to quality and customer service. Serán's specialized expertise in enhanced solubility and engineered particle formulations enables solutions to some of the most difficult challenges in drug development. We look forward to supporting founders Dan and John in the journey ahead."
"We are excited to partner with Vivo as we initiate our next phase of growth," said Dan Smithey, Co-Founder and CEO of Serán. "We chose to partner with Vivo because of its successful track record of investing in science-driven healthcare businesses, its deep expertise in the pharma and pharma services, and its reputation for partnering with founder-owned businesses. We are extremely pleased to team up with Vivo as they share our vision for expanding Serán's capabilities to better serve our customers while maintaining our focus on science and employee empowerment."
John Melvin, Co-Founder and President of Serán, added, "Vivo's strategic and financial support enhances Serán's ability to pursue key growth objectives. These objectives include growth of our employee base, service line expansion, doubling of our clean room capacity by the end of 2021, and the development and construction of a new 50,000 ft2 commercial-scale cGMP manufacturing facility by the end of 2022. These initiatives will allow Serán to serve our customers from pre-clinical development through full-scale commercialization."
William Blair acted as exclusive financial advisor to Vivo on the transaction and Latham & Watkins acted as legal advisor. Schwabe, Williamson & Wyatt served as legal counsel to Serán.
About Serán Bioscience
Serán is a leading contract development and manufacturing organization providing a comprehensive suite of development, analytical and clinical manufacturing services to pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies. Serán utilizes a foundation of physical and chemical science and engineering to design robust formulations and engineered solutions. The Company's personnel have decades of experience in process engineering and scaleup activities, including product launches and commercial manufacturing. Serán's experience and expertise covers a wide range of pharmaceutical manufacturing concepts, including spray drying, fluid bed processing, granulation, solid dosage forms, and many other enabling approaches. For more information, visit www.seranbio.com.
About Vivo Capital
Founded in 1996, Vivo Capital is a global healthcare investment firm. Vivo has approximately $4.3 billion in assets under management, invested in over 260 public and private companies worldwide. The firm is headquartered in Palo Alto, California, with additional offices in Asia. The Vivo team consists of more than 50 multi-disciplinary professionals, including scientists, entrepreneurs, physicians, operating executives, and industry experts. Vivo is currently actively investing from its $1.4B Vivo Capital Fund IX, which focuses on private companies, its $635M Vivo Opportunity Fund, which focuses on public equities, and its $100M Vivo Innovation (PANDA) Fund, which focuses on early-stage investments. Across all fund strategies, Vivo invests broadly in the healthcare sector including biotechnology, pharmaceuticals, medical devices, and healthcare services.
Media Contacts
Suzanne Brady, Director of Business Development - [email protected]
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