SOFINNOVA-PARTNERS
Sofinnova Partners , a leading European life sciences venture capital firm based in Paris, London and Milan, announced today three new investments from the Sofinnova Telethon Fund, its early-stage fund dedicated to investments in rare, genetic diseases. The startups, AAVantgarde Bio , Alia Therapeutics , and Borea Therapeutics , are developing promising new therapies for rare, genetic diseases.
Graziano Seghezzi, Managing Partner at Sofinnova Partners, commented: “These investments mark an important step in our mission to support the excellent scientific research coming out of Italian academic and research centers. They also highlight the exceptional flow of new investment opportunities in Italian biotech, and the important role that venture capital plays in enabling ground-breaking treatments to reach patients suffering from rare, genetic diseases who today have very few therapeutic options.”
The Sofinnova Telethon Fund is the largest fund entirely dedicated to biotechnology in Italy. The team is led by technology transfer specialists Lucia Faccio and Paola Pozzi, Partners at Sofinnova Partners, who are based in the firm’s Milan office.
The three new seed investments, totaling €6M, align with the fund’s investment strategy to seek out and support the best Italian science and the most promising entrepreneurs to develop world-class companies in the field of rare, genetic diseases.
AAVantgarde Bio, based in Milan, is developing gene therapies for inherited retinal disorders. The founder, Professor Alberto Auricchio, is a highly recognized scientist and a pioneer in the field of gene therapy. The company’s technology builds on existing AAV, or adeno-associated virus-based platforms, which are the main viral vector technology used in gene therapy applications. Existing AAV-based platforms have been limited by capacity, and AAVantgarde Bio responds to this challenge by enabling delivery of large genes to tissue and cells in vivo. The company is a spin-off of TIGEM, an international research institute based in Naples that is owned and managed by the Telethon Foundation.
Alia Therapeutics, based in Trento, is developing next generation CRISPR-based medicine for safer on-target in vivo gene editing approaches to the treatment of retinal degeneration. Alia is a spin-off of the University of Trento and was accelerated at BiovelocITA, Italy’s first biotechnology accelerator co-founded in 2015 by Sofinnova Partners and two serial entrepreneurs, Silvano Spinelli and Gabriella Camboni. It is the second company to emerge from the accelerator, following the success of Enthera Pharmaceuticals, another Italian startup that is part of Sofinnova Partners’ portfolio. This round of financing also included participation from BiovelocITA, Indaco Venture Partners, and a group of Italian investors brought together by Banor SIM and Banca Profilo.
Ms. Pozzi, Partner at Sofinnova Partners, board member of AAVantgarde Bio and an investment partner in Alia Therapeutics, commented: “We are delighted to support these innovative biotech startups as they advance promising programs towards preclinical and clinical development. Both companies have highly qualified scientific teams with globally recognized expertise in the field of gene therapy and gene editing. We are confident in the potential of these companies to tackle the limitations of existing therapies and develop treatments to diseases that do not have adequate solutions today.”
Borea Therapeutics, based in Milan, is advancing a new generation of gene therapies that would enable targeting of specific tissues and cells. The company’s innovative technology could enable viral vectors to reach areas like the central nervous system (CNS) and peripheral nervous system (PNS), thus opening the door to new therapeutic options. Borea Therapeutics was co-founded by Professor Paul Heppenstall and the European Molecular Biology Lab (EMBL), an intergovernmental research organization with six research sites throughout Europe, including one in Rome. The company’s research activities are performed in collaboration with Scuola Internazionale Superiore di Studi Avanzati (SISSA), a scientific center of excellence in Trieste.
Ms. Faccio, Partner at Sofinnova Partners and a board member of Borea Therapeutics, commented: “One of the major limitations of gene therapy is the difficulty of selectively targeting specific cells or tissues. Borea Therapeutics’ technology has the potential to pinpoint specific tissues and cells, which would enable the use of lower doses, making treatment safer and more effective for patients. This could be the next breakthrough in gene therapy.”
About Sofinnova Partners
Sofinnova Partners is a leading European venture capital firm in life sciences, specializing in healthcare and sustainability. Based in Paris, London and Milan, the firm brings together a team of professionals from all over the world with strong scientific, medical and business expertise. Sofinnova Partners is a hands-on company builder across the entire value chain of life sciences investments, from seed to later-stage. The firm actively partners with ambitious entrepreneurs as a lead or cornerstone investor to develop transformative innovations that have the potential to positively impact our collective future.
Founded in 1972, Sofinnova Partners is a deeply-established venture capital firm in Europe, with 50 years of experience backing over 500 companies and creating market leaders around the globe. Today, Sofinnova Partners has over €2 billion under management. For more information, please visit: www.sofinnovapartners.com
View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210630005320/en/
About Business Wire
Subscribe to releases from Business Wire
Subscribe to all the latest releases from Business Wire by registering your e-mail address below. You can unsubscribe at any time.
Latest releases from Business Wire
KPMG Enters Strategic Relationship With Uniphore to Build AI Agents Powered by Industry-Specific Small Language Models19.1.2026 07:00:00 CET | Press release
Collaboration uses KPMG’s knowledge in small language models to accelerate delivery of business outcomes to clients across banking, insurance, energy and healthcare Uniphore, the Business AI company, today announced a strategic relationship with KPMG LLP to operationalize AI agents across internal and client-facing workflows, supporting the firm’s continued effort to move from experimental AI pilots to production-grade deployment. As part of the collaboration, KPMG will work with Uniphore to build AI agents using Uniphore’s Business AI Cloud as a platform for agentic AI and fine-tuned small language models (SLMs), supporting clients across regulated industries including banking, insurance, energy and healthcare. Built on a sovereign, composable, and secure architecture, the platform integrates with KPMG’s existing enterprise systems and data environments, meeting governance and compliance requirements essential to regulated industries. This initiative reflects KPMG’s broader effort to
International Chamber of Commerce, Carbon Measures Announce First Group of Global Experts for Carbon Accounting Panel19.1.2026 06:00:00 CET | Press release
Panelists include senior global leaders from business, academia, and civil society. The International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) and Carbon Measures today announced the first cohort of experts selected to serve on the Technical Expert Panel on Carbon Accounting, which will define the principles, scope and real-world applications of a carbon emissions accounting system. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260118104674/en/ The panelists are distinguished leaders and experts across industry, science, civil society, and academia – representing diverse disciplines, geographies, and professional backgrounds. The panel will apply their experience across sustainability, technology, public policy, and industrial and financial systems to establish a timely, accurate and verifiable ledger-based carbon emissions accounting system. This system will track product-level emissions across the value chain and support real-world deci
AI-Powered Creator Monetisation Platform, Fanvue, Hits $100m Run Rate and Raises $22m Series A Investment - as Leading Global Creators Rush to Join the Platform19.1.2026 01:01:00 CET | Press release
Fanvue, the AI-powered creator monetisation platform with a $100m-plus run rate, has announced a $22m Series A investment round. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260112458975/en/ Joel Morris, Will Monange and Harry Fitzgerald (left to right) Fanvue has bet big on AI-powered tools changing the face of an industry estimated to be worth over $500B by 2030. The platform, which recently crossed $100m annualised revenue, has over 17 million monthly active users, and is home to 250,000 creators who are using Fanvue’s pioneering AI tools to scale their businesses and earn. Instead of competing with legacy platforms, Fanvue is defining a new category, the Creator AI Economy. Fanvue’s belief is that the next generation of creators will accelerate their earnings through utilising technology. And it’s happening in real time. According to Fanvue, just over 93% of creators on the platform used at least one of the platform’s
Andersen Consulting udvider sit udbud af humankapital med tilføjelsen af Jakarta Consulting Group16.1.2026 21:09:00 CET | Pressemeddelelse
Andersen Consulting styrker sine kompetencer gennem en samarbejdsaftale med Jakarta Consulting Group (JCG), der er et rådgivningsfirma, som er kendt for sin ekspertise inden for organisatorisk transformation, humankapitalstrategi og ledelsesudvikling. Med hovedsæde i Indonesien har JCG rådgivet virksomheder inden for brancher som ejendom, minedrift og produktion gennem strategisk og kulturel transformation. Med kerneydelser, der omfatter virksomheds- og administrationsrådgivning, hr-rådgivning, vurdering samt virksomheds- og ledelsestræning, er virksomheden kendt for sin evne til at transformere virksomheder og ledere med agilitet, kulturel intelligens og handlingsorienterede løsninger. "Vi har altid ment, at bæredygtig transformation begynder med mennesker – når ledere udvikler sig, følger organisationer med," siger Patricia Susanto, CEO for Jakarta Consulting Group. "Ved at kombinere Andersen Consultings globale perspektiv med vores regionale indsigt kan vi tilbyde kunderne mere helh
ClickHouse Raises $400M Series D Led by Dragoneer to Accelerate Expansion Across Analytics and AI Infrastructure16.1.2026 15:30:00 CET | Press release
Company acquires Langfuse to enter LLM observability and introduces a native Postgres service to unify transactional and analytical workloads ClickHouse, a leader in real-time analytics, data warehousing, observability, and AI/ML, announced today the close of its Series D financing, raising $400 million. The round was led by Dragoneer Investment Group, with participation from Bessemer Venture Partners, GIC, Index Ventures, Khosla Ventures, Lightspeed Venture Partners, accounts advised by T. Rowe Price Associates, Inc., and WCM Investment Management. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260116008883/en/ ClickHouse Co-Founders (left to right): Yury Izrailevsky, Aaron Katz, Alexey Milovidov The financing follows a period of sustained, accelerating growth for ClickHouse. The company now serves more than 3,000 customers on its fully managed service, ClickHouse Cloud, with ARR growing more than 250 percent year over year
In our pressroom you can read all our latest releases, find our press contacts, images, documents and other relevant information about us.
Visit our pressroom