Investor to sow agri-tech seeds

By LIAM DANN

After taking his company on to the US Nasdaq stock exchange, New Zealand biotech pioneer Howard Moore has come home to help kick start the local sector.

Moore is executive director of the new $100 million Life Science Ventures fund being set up to invest in agricultural science start-ups.

He said the fund, put together jointly by Celentis - the commercial arm of AgResearch - and venture capital specialist Direct Capital, would be used to pick winners that could leverage off the nation's $200 billion agribusiness sector and help it grow.

The possibility of doing something that could benefit the whole economy was one of the attractions of the job.

Despite New Zealand being a world-class agricultural producer, the sector has not given rise to many high-tech companies.

"If we are to really accelerate the transfer of technology out of our research organisations and on to farms, we need an injection of additional capital," Moore said.

The venture capital structure in the US helped develop his own biotech company, Tercica, in 2000 with endocrinologist Professor Ross Clark.

Clark, an old rugby team-mate of Moore's, had been working on a genetically engineered version of insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1) at Genentech in San Francisco. When the company dropped the work in 1997, he and Moore bought the rights to the project.

They raised money for the deal from US venture capitalists and investors in New Zealand and Europe, and listed on the Nasdaq in March. Tercica has a market value of $335 million and 50 staff based in San Francisco.

Moore has more than 30 years' experience in the dairy industry. He is a former Kiwi Dairy Group executive and was involved in setting up Fonterra's biotech venture.

So far, the Government has committed $15 million to the Life Science Ventures fund.

There are also written commitments in place from financial institutions for further funding.

Moore said at the first close for investors in September it was likely that about $60 million would be in place. There would be a second close early in the new year to complete the funding.

The $100 million would be invested over five years.

"We'll be able to make about 20 investments in that time," he said.

Moore is hopeful that at least one investment could be in place by the end of the year.

There were several areas of science that had enormous potential for the wider agricultural sector.

An example would be start-up companies that developed new pastures with higher energy content or drought resistance..