UPenn launches a $10 million fund for seed investments in companies founded by Penn researchers
The new fund, called StartUP will make investments of up to $250,000 in promising companies that have at least one founder affiliated with the University of Pennsylvania.
The University of Pennsylvania launched a fund backed by $10 million from the university to make seed investments in companies founded by Penn researchers, officials announced Monday.
The fund, called StartUP, will invest up to $250,000 in companies founded by Penn researchers and based on innovations created at the university. Any profits will be put back into the fund, Penn said.
“This new fund addresses the critical need for seed investment capital at the earliest stages of company formation and will further accelerate innovation across the university,” Penn’s vice provost for research, David Meaney, said in a statement. Meaney is on the faculty at Penn’s School of Engineering and Applied Science.
The university’s Office of the Chief Investment Officer will manage the fund. The innovation office will evaluate applicants with the help of external advisers. Factors in investment decisions include overall feasibility and commercial potential.
The new investment fund builds on efforts already underway at the Penn Center for Innovation, the Wharton School, and Penn Medicine, which in 2018 started a fund to invest $50 million in biotech companies.
Penn has led the nation recently in licensing revenue from faculty inventions, thanks largely to revenue from COVID-19 vaccines that were based on mRNA technology developed 20 years ago by Penn researchers Drew Weissman and Katalin Karikó.