C-Bridge hits $400m first close on China healthcare fund

The was vehicle launched earlier this year with a target of $650 million. The hard cap has been set at $800 million and a second close is expected in the coming weeks, according to a source familiar with the situation. C-Bridge closed its second fund in May 2017 at the hard cap of $400 million and the vehicle is said to be now fully deployed.

The firm looks set to benefit from the recently implemented change to Hong Kong’s listing requirements, allowing zero-revenue biotech companies to pursue IPOs in the territory. Ascelits, a Chinese drug developer that has received substantial backing from C-Bridge, was the first company to apply for a listing under the new regime.

“Having a timely supply of liquidity drives the growth of healthcare in China. This move by Hong Kong fills in the last gap – the whole financing chain is now in place for the industry,” Wei Fu, C-Bridge’s founder and CEO, told AVCJ in May. While noting that a lot of companies that were preparing for US listings are now targeting Hong Kong, Fu added that only those with good products and high visibility are likely to be able to go public.

The regulators have introduced various measures to ensure that only reasonably mature businesses can pursue IPOs. Ascletis is a case in point: The company’s revenue is currently negligible, but its first drug, a treatment for hepatitis C, is set to go on sale this year and a 145-person team has been assembled to handle commercialization.

Ascletis is also a good example of C-Bridge’s tendency to back businesses with a clear path to monetization. When the GP first invested in Ascletis in 2014 as part of a $55 million round, it was confident the hepatitis C drug would be approved in China. The $100 million Series B took place in early 2017, not long after the approval came through.

Investment activity by C-Bridge in the past 18 months includes taking a controlling stake in Anrei Medical Device, joining funding rounds for CMLabs, CMAB Biopharma, and Nuance Biotech, and backing the merger of Third Venture Biopharma and Tianshizhen Biotechnology. The merged entity, I-Mab Biopharma, recently completed a $220 million Series C round, with participation from C-Bridge, among others.

At the same time, C-Bridge has formed a sizeable team of around a dozen managing directors based in Shanghai, Beijing, New York, Boston, and San Diego. Recruits include Abbas Hussain, a senior partner who was most recently global president for pharmaceuticals and vaccines at GlaxoSmithKline.

The US-based executives are in part tasked with identifying specific intellectual property that can be brought to China. C-Bridge then builds an execution team around this IP, effectively creating a company. Several other healthcare investors have taken a similar approach, launching incubation programs that put the assets and team in place from the beginning with a view to expediting the clinical trials process.

C-Bridge was founded in 2014 by Fu, who was previously head of principal investment at Hong Kong-listed financial services company Far East Horizon and before that worked for Goldman Sachs and Temasek Holdings. The GP raised $200 million for its debut fund the same year. Co-investment has been a prominent feature of Funds I and II.

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• Topics
• Greater China
• Healthcare
• Fundraising
• GPs
• China
• C-Bridge Capital