Rainer Wessel

EMBL Ventures GmbH (EMBL Ventures) is a venture investment arm of EMBL which was founded in 2001 by Drs. Stefan Herr, Christoph Antz and Jan Adams to provide start-up companies exploiting EMBL research and intellectual property with equity and expertise to build up and expand their business. Headquartered in Heidelberg, EMBL Ventures manages funds on behalf of institutional and private investors, forming a triad with EMBL (European Molecular Biology Laboratory) and EMBLEM (EMBL Enterprise Management Technology Transfer GmbH) to provide exclusive access to unique technology commercialization opportunities from the EMBL. In addition, their investment activities complement and exploit synergies with EMBL and EMBLEM, providing financial and strategic investors with access to an attractive private equity market and an international scientific and research community, respectively.

Ganymed Pharmaceuticals AG develops antibodies for the treatment of solid cancers. It focuses on developing ideal monoclonal antibodies that include cancer-selective targets for maximal high-precision anticancer potency, as well as mitigates the threat of toxicity. The company was founded by Özlem Türeci, Dirk L. Sebastian, Christoph Huber and Ugur Sahin in 2001 and is headquartered in Mainz, Germany.

QIAGEN GmbH provides products for preanalytical sample preparation and molecular diagnostics solutions. It develops and markets consumable products and automated solutions to molecular diagnostics laboratories, academic researchers, pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, and applied testing customers for purposes such as forensics, animal or food testing and pharmaceutical process control. The company was founded in 1984 and is headquartered in Hilden, Germany.

Axxima Pharmaceuticals AG provided drug discovery and development services. It was a drug discovery company in the field of kinase inhibition. It specialized in kinase-based drug discovery aimed at treating certain forms of cancer. It had also focussed on on HIV, Hepatitis C, tuberculosis and one particular herpes virus infections. The company was headquartered in Munich, Germany.