Week In Review: China Renaissance Sets $7 Billion Goal For New VC/PE Funds, Including Biotech/Healthcare

China Renaissance, a Beijing investment bank and VC/PE investor, plans to expand its investment funds operations, climbing from $3 billion assets-under-management currently to $10 billion over the next three years (see story). At the moment, the company runs two funds: Huaxing Growth Capital, focused on technology, media and entertainment, and Huaxing Healthcare. The company plans to build up its healthcare/biotechnology investments and add funds for mezzanine debt, hedge funds and other sectors.

MicroPort Scientific (HK: 00853) , a Shanghai medical device maker, will pay $190 million to acquire the cardiac rhythm management business of Italy’s Liva Nova (Nasdaq: LIVN) (see story). The two companies are already partners. In 2014, Micro Port and LivaNova, then known as Sorin Group, established a $20 million China JV to offer LivaNova’s cardiac rhythm devices in China. Established in 1998, MicroPort aims to provide affordable high-quality medical devices in China and abroad, many of them minimally invasive.  

Canada’s Acasti Pharma (Nasdaq/TSX: ACST) signed a $133 million non-binding term sheet with an unnamed China pharma for China/Asia rights to its hypertriglyceridemia drug candidate (see story). CaPre, a prescription medication, is a highly concentrated omega-3 phospholipid derived from krill. Acasti believes CaPre is more readily absorbed into the body than competing omega-3 products. Earlier this year, Acasti announced Phase III trials of the candidate, which will use the abbreviated 505(b)(2) pathway for approval in the US.  

3D Medicines, a Beijing biopharma, closed a $101 million funding round (see story). 3DMed says its name stands for its three separate oncology technologies: diagnostics, data, and drug development. The company offers next-gen sequencing for early-stage cancer detection, precision medicine diagnosis and innovative drug development. The funding was led by China Reform Holdings (via China State-Owned Assets Venture Investment Fund) and joined by ChinaEquity Group and several unnamed investors.