Company

Novartis

Swiss giant

Basel, OS

Disclosed deals

Every published round Novartis took part in, and every parcel of existing shares it bought off another holder. Deals we hold but haven't published yet are not counted.

Company	Stage	Announced	Amount	Role	Alongside	Sources
No published deals recorded yet.

Portfolio

Companies Novartis has backed in a published round, and companies whose existing shares it bought off another holder.

Company	What it does	First invested	Rounds	Led
No portfolio companies recorded yet.

Funds

Fund closes reported for Novartis, as distinct from the investments it has made.

Fund	Announced	Committed	Target	Close	Sources
No fund closes recorded for Novartis yet.

Portfolio companies acquired

Companies Novartis has backed that another company then bought. An exit for the holding, not a deal Novartis did.

Company	Bought by	Kind	Announced	Price
No portfolio company of Novartis is recorded as having been acquired.

What Novartis bought

Companies Novartis acquired or merged with, per published coverage. Buying a company is not investing in one: nothing here counts in the deals column.

Company	Kind	Announced	Price	Sources
Spinifex Pharmaceuticals	Acquisition	29 Jun 2015	US$700m (A$911m)	Startup Daily (24 Jul 2025), Business News Australia, materresearch.org.au, @AuManufacturing, Startup Daily (15 Nov 2023), GBS Ventures (8 Sep 2016), anthillonline.com, GBS Ventures (30 Jun 2015), clinicalleader.com, novartis.com

Name	Role	Sources
David Epstein	Head of Novartis Pharmaceuticals	novartis.com

Coverage

Stories naming Novartis. Where several outlets covered the same round, they are bundled under whichever ran the fullest account.

12 deals

Brandon Capital's $60m taypayer-funded biotech bets

Brandon Capital has put roughly $60 million of National Reconstruction Fund money into ten biotech companies and warns R&D tax changes would hurt deep tech; portfolio company Myricx Bio went to Novartis.

Also australiatimes.com

Series D+ ~$452m

Brisbane biotech AdvanCell just raised a record $450 million

Brisbane radiopharmaceutical developer AdvanCell has closed an oversubscribed Series D round, led by Ally Bridge Group and Alpha Wave with several institutional investors returning, to fund late-stage prostate cancer trials and US manufacturing.

Forbes Australia 16 Jul 2026 AdvanCell AstraZeneca Bristol-Myers Squibb Novartis POINT Biopharma Ally Bridge Group Alpha Wave Bain Capital Life Sciences Brandon Capital Eli Lilly Fidelity Qatar Investment Authority (QIA)Sanofi Ventures T. Rowe Price Andrew Adamovich Philina Lee

2 deals

Brandon Capital scores its biggest return ever with $2.1bn biotech acquisition

Novartis is acquiring London biotech Myricx Bio for US$1.1 billion upfront plus milestone payments, handing Melbourne venture firm Brandon Capital a record return on the startup it seeded in 2019.

Forbes Australia 7 Jul 2026 Myricx Bio Novartis QIC Ventures Aware Super Brandon Capital CSL HEST A Hostplus Mohit Rawat Dr Roberto Solari Dr Stephen Thompson

Seed €18m

Sanofi's mega US$1.6 billion Vicebio buyout once again shows the value of Aussie uni IP

Sanofi is buying Vicebio for up to US$1.6 billion in the biggest-ever exit of Australian university IP, with UQ keeping equity; the article also recalls the Inflazome and Spinifex sales and Vicebio's Medicxi seed.

Startup Daily 24 Jul 2025 Vicebio Novartis Roche Sanofi Spinifex Pharmaceuticals UniQuest University of Queensland Medicxi

Unnamed stage $1m

UQ biotech innovation partnership forges a second startup

UniQuest and Molecule to Medicine have formed Curlew Bio to develop anti-inflammatory drugs, backed by $1 million from UniQuest's Extension Fund; the article also recalls Novartis's 2015 purchase of Spinifex Pharmaceuticals.

@AuManufacturing 4 Mar 2025 Curlew Bio Lucia Bio Mater Research Institute-UQ Molecule to Medicine Novartis Queensland Emory Drug Discovery Initiative Spinifex Pharmaceuticals The University of Queensland Translational Research Institute UniQuest UniQuest Extension Fund Dr Dean Moss Professor Katharina Ronacher Kirsty McCarthy Dr Tom McCarthy

Funding announcement

Professor got nothing from the $2.8b sale of his molecule, and that's okay

Profile of scientist-entrepreneur Andrew Wilks covering the GSK sale of his cancer molecule, his SYNthesis BioVentures fund's family-office backers, and portfolio plays including Aculeus Therapeutics.

3 deals

Manufacturing news briefs – stories you might have missed

Roundup of Australian manufacturing news: Matrak closes a Series A, Queensland Pacific Metals receives an R&D tax refund, ARENA funds a household energy trial, Ampcontrol appoints a transformation chief, plus policy and launch briefs.

Also @AuManufacturing

Key hire

Manufacturing news briefs — stories you might have missed

Briefs roundup: Main Sequence adds Alison Deans as venture partner; Starpharma hands the CEO role to Cheryl Maley; DroneShield lands a $2.2 million repeat order; Q-CTRL will deliver quantum training with QUIN.

Fund close $6.8m

Pioneering VC fund Uniseed doubles its backers as five universities, including Monash, UTS and Macquarie, chip in

Uniseed adds Monash and a four-university NSW collaboration, lifting its third fund by $6.75 million to $56.75 million; the article recalls past portfolio sales to Novartis, Shire and Schneider Electric.

6 deals

Brandon Capital news

Index of the venture firm's portfolio updates: financing rounds for AdvanCell and ENA Respiratory, grant awards via incubator programs, two closes of Fund Six, board hires, and Myricx Bio's completed sale to Novartis.

Also Brandon BioCatalyst portfolio·Brandon Capital portfolio·Uniseed·Brandon Capital portfolio·Brandon BioCatalyst portfolio·Brandon BioCatalyst portfolio·Brandon Capital portfolio·Brandon Capital portfolio·Brandon Capital portfolio·SmartCompany·AFR Technology·Startup Daily·Startup Daily·SmartCompany·Startup Daily·Startup Daily·@AuManufacturing·finance.yahoo.com·enarespiratory.com·Mirage News·advancell.com.au·Forbes Australia·datapile.co·Dealroom·Forbes Australia·datapile.co·Biotech Dispatch·fundedstartupsdaily.com·fundedstartupsdaily.com

2 deals

Uniseed invests $1m in PERKii's $4m funding round

Venture fund Uniseed led a million-dollar slice of probiotic drinks maker PERKii's four-million-dollar round, its first deal from its new $50 million fund, to fund a national launch.

Also Startup Daily

3 deals

Australian pain drug innovation company Spinifex Pharmaceuticals sold to Novartis for US$200m plus milestone payments

GBS Ventures reports Novartis has agreed to acquire chronic-pain drug developer Spinifex Pharmaceuticals for US$200 million upfront plus milestones, recalling the company's 2005, 2008 and 2014 venture rounds and its Australian investors.

Also GBS Ventures·novartis.com·clinicalleader.com·Startup Daily·Startup Daily·anthillonline.com·@AuManufacturing·materresearch.org.au·Business News Australia

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