Foresite Capital raises nearly $1 bln for healthcare bets
By Manas Mishra
Feb 25 (Reuters) - U.S. investment firm Foresite Capital said on Thursday it had raised $969 million to invest in healthcare companies, making it the firm's largest fundraise to-date.
The announcement comes on the heels of several other large fundraises by venture capital firms that have been looking to tap into a recent boom in the value of high-growth startups.
Investors have been betting the pandemic will push more economic activity online, and increasingly investing in startups that aim to enable the digitization of sectors such as banking, retail and healthcare.
Joshua Kushner's Thrive Capital earlier this month raised $2 billion for a pair of early and late-stage funds, while last month, VC firm TCV raised $4 billion for its 11th fund, making it the biggest fund in its 25-year history.
Earlier this month, Palo Alto-based Sapphire Ventures and San Francisco-based Top Tier Capital Partners also raised $1.7 billion and $1.2 billion, respectively, in new funds.
With the latest fund raise, Foresite now has about $4 billion in assets under management.
"We're very focused on companies that can generate products that benefit patients quickly," said Vik Bajaj, a managing director at the firm.
Foresite's past investments include gene editing start-up Inscripta and gene sequencing company 10X Genomics, shares in which have more than doubled in value in the past one year. (Reporting by Manas Mishra in Bengaluru; Editing by Shinjini Ganguli)
