Intesa Sanpaolo, Quaestio SGR and Inarcassa also participated in the first closing of €95 million
The investment vehicle will focus on investment in startups in the life sciences sector

CDP Venture Capital and the European Investment Fund (EIF, part of the EIB Group) have announced their joint investment in Indaco Bio, a new venture capital fund specialising in financing technology transfer processes in the life sciences sector.

This investment in Indaco Bio comes under the partnership signed in September 2021 between CDP Venture Capital, via the Technology Transfer Fund, and the EIF enabling joint investment of up to €260 million made in equal parts to support fund managers specialised in deep tech startups, namely businesses developing cutting-edge technologies mostly conceived in the laboratories of universities and research centres of excellence.

This investment chiefly concerns the biotechnology and pharmaceuticals sectors, robotics, environmental sustainability, aerospace, agrifood tech, artificial intelligence and big data. These are the same investment principles guiding CDP Venture Capital’s national technology transfer hubs, which bring together the most advanced university centres in various sectors, financing researchers and providing them with a business partner to help them turn their invention into a market reality.

Ensuring the sustainability of these startups is the very essence of the partnership between CDP Venture Capital and the EIF, aimed at supplying a core of specialised investors and helping them to identify a pipeline of investible projects generated by the Italian research ecosystem.

The €95 million Indaco Bio fund goes live today thanks to the participation of CDP Venture Capital SGR, via the Technology Transfer Fund, and of the EIF, Intesa Sanpaolo, Quaestio SGR and Inarcassa. Fund-raising activities continue, however, with an endowment target of €150 million.

The new fund was established by Indaco Venture Partners SGR, a company founded in 2016 with over €350 million in funds under management, and is the first fund in the portfolio that focuses on the development of new drugs and therapies for people (biotech/pharma). The investment vehicle will be managed by Davide Turco, Elizabeth Robinson and Giovanni Rizzo, a new team of professionals with a wealth of experience in the venture capital and pharma sectors.

“In recent years we’ve seen how research applied to pharma and the entire drug discovery segment can affect people's quality of life and the role we want to have as a country system in the future”, stated Enrico Resmini, CEO and General Manager of CDP Venture Capital. “This co-investment partnership with the EIF was formed with the specific aim of developing a new generation of managers, like Indaco Bio, that understand the complexity of bringing to the market completely new inventions created in laboratories and supporting startups that can provide solutions to the great challenges of our time.”

“The COVID pandemic has illustrated the strategic importance of the biotech sector, which is vital for research into and the development of therapies to fight coronaviruses and other infectious diseases”, said EIF CEO Alain Godard. “I am pleased to announce that the excellent cooperation between the EIF and CDP Venture Capital has resulted in this joint investment in Indaco Bio, a fund dedicated to the development of new drugs and therapies that will enable an ecosystem of innovative biotech companies to be created in Italy, thus helping the country’s pharmaceutical industry to consolidate its leading position in Europe.”

“We are convinced that biotech/pharma research in Italy offers major opportunities that will, however, require a substantial increase in funding and specialised skills to turn these into new therapies. Indaco Bio’s launch aims to provide a tangible response to this need”, said Davide Turco, co-founder and CEO of Indaco SGR.

“Thanks to the foresight of our investors, starting with CDP Venture Capital and the EIF, we have a substantial capital endowment, which is an essential launching pad to generate the sizeable returns that can be achieved in this sector.”

Background information:

European Investment Fund (EIF)

The European Investment Fund (EIF) is part of the European Investment Bank Group. Its central mission is to support Europe's micro, small and medium-sized businesses by helping them to access finance. The EIF designs and develops both venture and growth capital, guarantees and microfinance instruments which specifically target this market segment. In this role, the EIF fosters EU objectives in support of innovation, research and development, entrepreneurship, growth and employment.

CDP Venture Capital SGR

CDP Venture Capital SGR is an investment management company (70% owned by CDP Equity and 30% by Invitalia) with over €1 billion of assets under management. Its goal is to make venture capital the backbone of Italy's economic development and innovation, creating the conditions for comprehensive and sustainable growth of the venture capital ecosystem. It has a series of funds aiming to support startups at all stages of their development, making both direct and indirect investments.

Press contacts:

EIF

Lorenzo Squintani, tel.: +39 665 790 312, l.squintani@eib.org

Website: www.eif.org – Press Office: +352 4379 21000 – press@eib.org

CDP Venture Capital SGR

Media Relations

Alessandra Acutis, alessandra.acutis@cdpventurecapital.it, +39 348 832 8308