RENASANT BIO INC.

Atlas Venture\'s Opportunity Fund III is designed to help portfolio companies progress their investigational candidates.\n Nine months after closing a $450 million fundraise, Atlas Venture is back with another biotech financing vehicle, raising $400 million this time.The money, which Atlas has dubbed its Opportunity Fund III, is designed to help the VC’s portfolio companies progress their investigational candidates.The VC operates a two-fund model, using one tranche of funds to create new biotechs and support seed and early-stage rounds, while the \"opportunity\" funds are slated for continued investments in later-stage private and public financings for portfolio companies. Just last December, Atlas closed its fourteenth iteration of the early-stage fund, reeling in $450 million.Now, the VC will use its new oversubscribed financing to keep fueling those biotechs it has previously backed. This year alone, Atlas has put down money for B-cell-medicines-focused Be Bio, kidney-centered Renasant Bio, Scorpion spinout Antares Therapeutics and movement-disorder-focused Vima Therapeutics.\"We’ve been encouraged by the incredible progress made across our portfolio, despite the array of challenges faced by biotechs in the current environment,” Atlas said in a Sept. 4 release. \"Opportunity Fund III reinforces our commitment to raising funds tailored in size and strategy to our bespoke investment approach.” The general partners for the third opportunity fund are Kevin Bitterman, Ph.D.; Bruce Booth; Michael Gladstone and Jason Rhodes.The last time Atlas raised an opportunity fund was in 2021, when the VC circled up $300 million for its biotech portfolio.

Atlas Venture on Thursday announced the close of its oversubscribed third Opportunity Fund at $400 million. The growth fund will lend further support to the VC's existing portfolio of biotechs."We’ve been encouraged by the incredible progress made across our portfolio, despite the array of challenges faced by biotechs in the current environment," the Atlas partnership said in a joint statement. "Opportunity Fund III reinforces our commitment to raising funds tailored in size and strategy to our bespoke investment approach."The raise reinforces Atlas' dual-pronged financial strategy. The VC first backs seed and series A rounds from its early-stage funds — with its fourteenth iteration closing at $450 million last December — to form and incubate new biotechs. Then with its growth funds, Atlas continues to invest in late-stage private rounds or public financings for certain companies in its portfolio.Some of Atlas' investments this year include Vima Therapeutics, which is advancing an oral dystonia treatment; engineered B-cell medicine maker Be Bio; kidney disease company Renasant Bio; and Antares Therapeutics, a spin-off created to house Scorpion Therapeutics' non-PI3Kα assets after it was acquired by Eli Lilly at the start of the year.Atlas is the latest in a spate of VCs to close new funds this summer. At the high end, Orbimed and Frazier Life Sciences raised $1.9 billion and $1.3 billion, respectively, while smaller firms Hatteras and AN Venture each brought in $200 million. While private rounds have picked up in recent months, it's unlikely that the number of financings, or the amounts raised, will match last year's. For more analysis on how volatility and uncertainty in the US is affecting private biotech fundraising, see Vital Signs: How venture capital is making Europe great again.

Prolific biotechnology investment firm Atlas Venture said Thursday it raised $400 million to pump into its existing portfolio of drug startups, a move meant to support the companies that might struggle to secure further funding in the current climate.The new fund is Atlas third Opportunity Fund, an investment vehicle that provides cash to the growing startups Atlas has previously backed through its complementary early-stage fund. Atlas Opportunity Fund is designed to help those companies find the kind of follow-up investment rounds that can help them advance their drug prospects and that have been tougher to come by of late.“Weve been encouraged by the incredible progress made across our portfolio, despite the array of challenges faced by biotechs in the current environment, Atlas partners said in a joint statement. The new fund, which is smaller than some of its peers recent raises,also reinforces Atlas strategy of raising funds tailored in size and strategy to our bespoke investment approach, they added.Atlas last raise came in December, when it banked $450 million for the 14th iteration of its early-stage fund. At the time, partner Bruce Booth wrote in a blog postthat the modest haul reflected lessons learned after Atlas grew too quickly. Atlas, as a result, now wants to stay disciplined and focused on the model that we continue to try to perfect: seed-led venture creation, he wrote.Four of Atlas partners Booth,Kevin Bitterman, Michael Gladstone and Jason Rhodes are the general partners of the most recent fund.Atlas joins several other life sciences investors in closing a new fund this year, among them Omega Funds,Frazier Life Sciencesand Deerfield Management.The firm is known for supporting a number of successful biotech companies, including Alnylam Pharmaceuticals and startups like Mariana Oncology and Aiolos Bio that were sold to larger drugmakers. Though its on pace to make fewer investments in 2025 than last year, according to BioPharma Dive data, the firm has still launched young companies such as Antares Therapeuticsand Renasant Bio. '