Venture capital firm Truffle Capital’s newly-created startup company Nanosive SAS, has signed an exclusive global licence agreement with Yale University, giving Nanosive worldwide and exclusive rights to develop and exploit a technological platform for a wide range of applications in dermo-cosmetics, in particular sun protection, the prevention of cancer and ageing of the skin.
Truffle Capital, which focuses on creating and financing start-ups with disruptive technologies in life sciences and information technology, invested in Nanosive through its new Truffle BioMedTech Fund which has already collected USD102 million and its Truffle Innove FRR France fund.
The licenced technology is based on an innovative process of encapsulation of actives in polymers which present remarkable properties of adhesiveness. It was developed at Yale University in the laboratories of Professor W Mark Saltzman, Goizueta Foundation Professor of Chemical and Biomedical Engineering, and Prof. Michael Girardi MD, ViceChairman, and Program Director at the Department of Dermatology, Professor Saltzman and Professor Girardi as scientific co-founders of Nanosive will co-chair its Scientific Advisory Board and will lead sponsored research programs for the company in their laboratories.
“We are excited about working with Truffle Capital and this opportunity to advance our photoprotection technology,” says Saltzman.
“This partnership will allow us to develop our novel strategies for the safe and effective prevention of skin cancer, as well as the prevention of changes associated with photoageing,” adds Girardi.
Philippe Pouletty, MD, co-founder and CEO of Truffle Capital and Chairman of Nanosive, and his Truffle Capital partners Antoine Pau, Alain Chevallier and Vincent Gardès, says: “This agreement represents a new achievement in the deployment of our Truffle BioMedTech Fund strategy which is to source disruptive technologies worldwide in the best universities to build BioMedTech start-ups in France.”
John Puziss, PhD, Director of Business Development in the Office of Cooperative Research at Yale, adds: “We are delighted to partner with Truffle Capital in launching Nanosive, and we look forward to working together to develop this important technology.”
This is the second license agreement within a few months between a new France-based Truffle start-up company and one of the top 10 US universities.
Nanosive’s operations will be located in the newly created Obratori incubator of L’Occitane Group, in Marseille, France.
