Zcube joins Mission Bay Capital Fund with $1M investment

Mission Bay Capital, LLC, has added a new limited partner to its first venture fund, bolstering the fund's ability to invest in promising bioscience companies emerging from the University of California.

Zcube, Srl, the research corporate venture of Italian pharmaceutical leader Zambon Co., SpA, joined the Mission Bay Capital Fund with a $1 million investment. Zcube is the only European company to contribute to the Mission Bay Capital Fund, to date.

The new partnership brings the total fund to $8.5 million, according to Regis Kelly, PhD, executive director of the California Institute for Quantitative Biosciences (QB3), who also serves as an unpaid director of Mission Bay Capital.

"Zcube is a valuable new partner for Mission Bay Capital, both in helping generate important funds for UC entrepreneurs and in contributing significant expertise in commercializing innovative drug delivery systems," Kelly said, noting that Zcube also has been invited to be a member of the QB3 Industrial Advisory Board. "This is a significant area of research for QB3, especially at UCSF. Zcube's expertise will help evaluate that research to move important scientific projects out of the laboratory and into public use."

The project aims to identify UC research that looks promising for commercialization and provide the venture funding and external review to confirm the commercial potential of the technology, Kelly said. This will enable research entrepreneurs to advance their projects to the proof-of-concept stage and ultimately help prepare them for subsequent investments to support the company's growth.

"Mission Bay Capital is directly aligned with Zcube's efforts to support emerging life science companies that can improve health into the future," said Lorenzo Pradella, PhD, business and operational development director at Zcube.

"Zcube had been considering certain investment opportunities in the United States," Pradella continued. "Mission Bay Capital is a very promising initiative, providing us with the possibility of collaborating with QB3, one of the most advanced and productive US incubators, with a significant focus on a key area for us: the field of drug delivery."