Vives, the Belgium-based seed capital fund established by Université catholique de Louvain (UCLouvain), has raised €25m ($27.7m) for the initial close of a multi-university venture fund from investors including insurance provider Axa Belgium, L’Echo reported on Tuesday.
UCLouvain’s tech transfer office Sopartec and University of Luxembourg have also backed the vehicle dubbed Vives Inter-University Fund, which is due to reach a final close of about $55.4m by the end of 2019.
The fund also has partnerships in place with Luxembourg’s National Research Fund and Luxembourg Institute of Health, both inked during a state visit to Luxembourg by Belgium’s monarchy.
Other limited partners include financial services firm BNP Paribas’s Fortis Private Equity unit, banking firm ING Belgium, financial services firm Belfius Bank and Insurance, Belgian state-owned investment firm SFPI-FPIM, the EU-owned European Investment Fund, investment firm Sofina and venture capital firm Nivelinvest.
Vives’s third vehicle will invest up to $5.5m in companies founded on university research on a sector-agnostic basis but, unlike its predecessors, will also target UCLouvain’s academic partners across Europe, particularly in nearby countries such as Luxembourg, the Netherlands and France.
Vives has made 27 investments and raised a total of $443m since it was founded in 2004. Its portfolio companies include immunotherapy developer Iteos Therapeutics, a UCLouvain and Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research spinout which raised $74m of series B capital in June 2018.
Vive’s second fund, Vives II, raised $61m in 2011, following the launch of an inaugural vehicle sized at $17.5m in 2004.
– A version of this article first appeared on our sister site, Global University Venturing.