Biotech investment.(PUERTO RICO)

0 Comments | Caribbean Update, July, 2009

San Juan-based Advent-Morro Equity Partners recently announced its first biotechnology investment in Elixir Pharmaceuticals Inc., based in Cambridge, Mass. specializing in development of therapies to combat metabolic diseases such as diabetes and obesity, reports Caribbean Business (May 28, 2009).

Advent-Morro will pitch in US$250,000 of a US$12.5 million financing of Elixir as part of a syndicate of other venture-capital funds specializing in life sciences including Physics Ventures, Oxford Biosciences, Arch Ventures and MPM Capital. Novartis Pharmaceuticals is also investing. Elixir has raised US$130 million prior to this equity round. Elixir will use the $12.5 million to develop an obesity treatment that involves a hormone called ghrelin, which is produced in...