A new venture creation and private equity firm officially launched in Princeton to focus on investing in therapies for diseases that disproportionately affect underserved populations, including ethnic minorities and the LGBTQ+ community. 

According to a Nov. 1 announcement, Syridex Bio is a minority-led firm founded by a team of experts with decades of experience in life sciences, entrepreneurship and investing. 

“Syridex Bio is founded on the fundamental belief that everyone deserves the opportunity to live a healthy life,” Squire Servance, Syridex Bio founder and managing partner, said in a statement. 

Servance has worked in the biotechnology, pharmaceutical and life sciences industries for more than a decade. Prior to founding Syridex, he served as senior vice president, general counsel and corporate secretary at Repligen Corp., a bioprocessing-focused life sciences company, and also worked for health care company Baxter International Inc. 

“Accelerating progress toward health equity requires unified action by a range of leaders and stakeholders, and it is increasingly clear that the investor community must play a central role,” Servance added. “Driven by our focus on positive impact, we leverage a market-based approach to invest in therapies that intentionally serve the underserved – thus, laying the foundation for true equality in health care and opening the door to a brighter, healthier global future.” 

According to the company, the pandemic revealed vast health care inequities and was the catalyst for Syridex Bio’s founding. 

The firm said its “investment targets include in-development drugs and medical therapies that tackle the world’s greatest health outcome disparities.” 

The advisory board includes: 

• Kamil Ali-Jackson, an entrepreneur, executive, board member and legal counsel for companies and has also co-founded specialty pharmaceutical and biopharmaceutical companies 
• Owen May, founder and CEO of May Davis Partners 
• Anindya Roychowdhury, former partner and head of deal advisory at KPMG 
• Veleka Peeples-Dyer, a life sciences executive who advises companies on U.S. Food and Drug Administration regulatory, legal and global compliance matters 

“Syridex Bio’s investment strategies intend to offer investors market-based pathways to address the most acute disparities across the health care system,” Ali-Jackson said. “Investors who channel capital into such potentially transformative therapies will gain access to a compelling opportunity with competitive returns, while also actively driving social justice in health care.” 

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