Camden Partners Holdings, LLC, a Baltimore, Maryland-based private equity firm specializing in lower-middle market companies, announced the final closing of its debut venture capital fund, Camden Partners Nexus Fund, LP.
Nexus is investing in early-stage biomedical technology companies (drugs, devices, diagnostics and data analytics) with strong intellectual property developed through federally-funded research and development grants. The strategy focuses on commercializing technologies emerging from the different divisions of Johns Hopkins (Medicine, University, Applied Physics Labs), the University of Maryland and other leading academic and research institutions.
Camden added this new strategy in early 2016, when partners Dr. R. Jacob Vogelstein, George C. Petrocheilos and David L. Warnock co-founded Nexus, along with serial entrepreneur Davis Oros. Oros currently serves as the Chairman of the Nexus Senior Advisory Board.
Nexus has made six investments to date, in Sisu Global Health, Ashvattha Therapeutics, Oprheris, eNeura, Cage Pharmaceuticals and Personal Genome Diagnostics (PGDx).
A unique component of Nexus is its Senior Advisory Board, comprising world-renowned scientists, serial biotechnology entrepreneurs and industry leaders. These Board members are partners in Nexus and assist the management team both in sourcing deals and on technical due diligence within their respective fields of expertise. The Board includes Nobel-Prize Winner Dr. Adam Riess; Dr. Bert Vogelstein, one of the world’s leading experts in cancer; Dr. Henry Brem, the Neurosurgeon-in-Chief of Johns Hopkins Medicine; neuroscientist Dr. Solomon Snyder, who co-founded Nova Pharma and Guilford Pharma; as well as Dr. Justin Hanes, the founder of Kala Pharma and GreyBug Vision; Dr. Geoff Ling, the former founding Director of DARPA’s Biomedical Technologies Office; and Tom V. Brooks, the now-retired Vice Chairman & Executive Vice President of Constellation Energy Group.
Nexus secured commitments from a national diversified investor base comprised of sophisticated investors and family offices.
