Kurma Partners

Early-stage healthcare and biotech funding in Europe

Working in European healthcare and biotechnology, Kurma Partners is a significant funder of companies in those fields. It invests at various stages of maturity, from the creation of a company through to later capital expansion. Its model begins with academic research. It builds a network of partners among major European research centres, aiming to turn scientific findings into medicines or medical devices for serious diseases where patients have few treatment options. The firm says its ambition is to work with those centres to build the healthcare industry of the future.

How the company-building model works

Kurma works closely with research teams early in a project to plan how their discoveries will be validated. It then brings in healthcare industry experts and, later, experienced entrepreneurs to form high-technology companies. Where it has founded a company, it provides capital from its own funds and invites other investors to join. The firm says this approach sets it apart from most healthcare investors and has enabled it to build more than ten companies over the past decade. It also backs younger businesses that already exist, adding its expertise and network to their development, and it says it has helped finance more than forty companies, many of which are now recognized leaders in their sectors.

Funds, partners and the European footprint

The first closing of Kurma Biofund III took place in 2018, and the firm opened an office in Germany in 2019. Some of its vehicles draw support from InnovFin Equity, a European Union instrument under Horizon 2020, backed by the European Fund for Strategic Investments created under the Investment Plan for Europe. That fund exists to support productive investment across the Union and to widen access to finance. The firm's partners are European academic researchers and the founders and executives who go on to build the resulting businesses.

Sustainability and governance commitments

The firm describes itself as a player in healthcare and therefore committed to sustainable development. It says its activity fits a proactive impact and ethical policy and contributes to the United Nations goal of good health and well-being. Kurma wrote an ESG charter in 2020 and joined the UN Principles for Responsible Investment in June 2021. It applies inclusion and exclusion criteria to any question of medical bioethics, and it gathers extra-financial data from its portfolio companies by questionnaire, with the results published in each annual report. It also says it is developing an ethics charter for its portfolio companies.