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Carolina Research Ventures Fund

Apply for Funding About Us

About Us

We invest in ventures that commercialize or develop technology and inventions of UNC faculty, trainees and staff.

Our Vision

To ensure that startups and other University-sourced companies have the opportunity to fully develop and deploy technology generated here, UNC-Chapel Hill launched Carolina Research Ventures (CRV). CRV has created an early stage investment fund (the Fund or CRVF) to provide critical discovery and development capital. The goal of the CRVF is to unlock the potential of UNC-Chapel Hill technologies and advance the commercialization of these technologies by providing early-stage capital and industry expertise.

Who We Are

CRV is overseen by a Board of Directors composed of entrepreneurs, researchers, scientists, and investment professionals. By charter the Board must include two appointees from the UNC-Chapel Hill Board of Trustees, two appointees from the UNC Healthcare System, the University Vice Chancellor for Finance, the CEO of the UNC Management Company or their designee, and three at-large positions elected by the other Board members. In addition, the Vice Chancellor for Commercialization and Economic Development is a Board observer.

The Fund is managed as a joint venture with Hatteras Venture Partners. A team from Hatteras, including Clay Thorp, Christy Shaffer, PhD, and Michael Dial, PhD, will oversee the operations of the Fund and its investment portfolio. Michael Dial is the lead Hatteras member for the Fund. Additional information about the Hatteras team can be found at www.hatterasvp.com

Qualifications & Details

Funding

Guidelines to help you determine whether your venture meets the required set of characteristics necessary to qualify for our funding.

Who Should Apply?

The fund will exclusively invest in ventures that (1) seek to develop or commercialize technology and inventions created at the University or through the use of University resources, and (2) at the initial investment are seed to early-stage ventures. Anyone employed full-time or part-time by UNC Chapel Hill including faculty, trainees and staff may apply.

Industry Types

UNC-CH-affiliated companies including but not limited to those in Life-sciences (biopharma, medical devices, diagnostics, healthcare IT and tech-enabled services), IT Software and Hardware, Applied Sciences, Material Sciences or AgBio . As technologies evolve so do descriptive categories. If your technology does not fit the above categories but meets other qualifications please consider applying to CRVF.

Investment Size

Initial investments are likely to be between $100,000 and $250,000 with follow-on investments as appropriate, throughout the company’s development.. As the company grows and has increased capital needs additional non-University financial resources, such as corporate partners, venture capital, or other investors, are expected to also help finance the company.

What Type of Venture Qualifies?

The capital will fund discovery and development stages of companies. Companies are expected to not yet have a product fully developed and, in most cases, will be pre-revenue. The purpose of this capital is to help launch new commercial entities and therefore it is expected that applicants will have not raised more than $2.5 million from outside equity sources such as institutional venture capital (excludes grants, SBIRs, etc).

Submitting an Application

Our Application Process

Preparing to Apply

Studying, Researching, Preparing

Stage 1

Look into the requirements and suggestions detailed on this page to ensure that you meet all qualifications to apply for our funding.

Preliminary Submission

Strategy, Equity, Capital Raising

Stage 2

This is your first step into the application process. Using the form provided on this website, please submit your application to our system and we will review it as soon as possible. You will be notified by us if you have progressed to the second phase of the application process.

Investor Presentation

Vision, Details, Long-Term Plan

Stage 3

A good applicant typically includes detailed information about the technology or invention in addition to information on how they will commercialize it as a management team and entrant of their given competitive market. The CRV Board of Directors will then decide on their involvement.

You may find the application for the Carolina Research Ventures Fund here

Apply Here

Collectively, we innovate

Together, We Transform

As a center of scholarship, research and creativity, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill develops transformative ideas in its classrooms, clinics, studios and laboratories. As a public university we are committed to accelerating this knowledge into the commercial marketplace so it can improve the quality of life and provide economic development for the citizens of North Carolina, the nation and beyond. Closing the funding gap for early-stage startups is critical.

To ensure that start-ups and other University-sourced companies have the opportunity to fully develop and deploy technology generated here, UNC-CH launched Carolina Research Ventures (CRV). CRV has created an early stage investment fund (the Fund or CRVF) to provide critical discovery and development capital. The goal of the CRVF is to unlock the potential of UNC-CH technologies and advance the commercialization of these technologies by providing early stage capital and industry expertise.

Directors and Observers

Board

Sallie Shuping-Russell, Chair (Bio)

Mng Dir, BlackRock Private Equity Ptns Former UNC Trustee & UNC Healthcare Director

Lowry Caudill (Bio)

Co-Founder, Magellan Labs UNC Trustee, Former Chair

HAYWOOD COCHCRANE (Bio)

BOARD OF TRUSTEES AT THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA AT CHAPEL HILL

Trey Crabb (Bio)

Exec Dir., Healthcare M&A, Morgan Stanley UNC Healthcare Director

Matt Fajack (Bio)

Chief financial officer and vice chancellor for finance and administration at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Terry Magnuson (Bio)

Vice Dean of Medicine for Research Chair & Prof Genetics; Prof, Biomedical Engineering

Randy Myer (BIo)

Prof. of Entrepreneurship, KFBS Chair, NC Idea

Judith Cone (Bio)

Judith Cone, Observer, Vice Chancellor for Innovation, Entrepreneurship and Economic Development

Steve Lerner (Bio)

Entrepreneur & Mng Ptn, Blue Hill Group Former UNC Trustee

Jon King (Bio)

CEO UNC Management Company Chief Investment Officer, UNC Inv. Fund

Hatteras Venture Partners

Fund Partner

MICHAEL DIAL, PHD

CLAY B THORP

CHRISTY SHAFFER, PHD

Mike has worked extensively with early stage tech and life science companies for the past decade. Prior to joining Hatteras, Mike was a Vice President in Silicon Valley Bank’s Corporate Finance Group where he focused on emerging life science companies and venture capital funds. Prior to SVB, he held research scientist positions in the Department of Biochemistry at UNC-Chapel Hill, the Laboratory of Structural Biology at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, and the UNC-Duke Michael Hooker Proteomics Center. He has performed research in the fields of cell cycle regulation, proteomics, and cancer therapy. Mike has published seven peer reviewed scientific articles and has presented at numerous international scientific conferences.

Mike is the manager of the Carolina Research Ventures Fund, a fund dedicated to UNC-Chapel Hill related start-ups. He also serves as the President of KinoDyn and is an observer on the boards of Spyryx Biosciences, Lysosomal Therapeutics, NuSirt BioPharma and Curoverse. He holds a doctorate in biochemistry and biophysics from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Mike has served on various committees and panels for the North Carolina Biotech Center, Council for Entrepreneurial Development, Southeast BIO, PTP NEXT and Durham’s Partnership for Children.

Clay is an entrepreneur turned venture capitalist. Since 1995, Clay has co-founded seven companies in the life science arena and co-founded Hatteras in 2000. Since co-founding Hatteras, Clay has been instrumental in building the firm from its origins with a $3 million seed fund to a venture capital partnership that manages almost $300 million across four funds. Clay has led investments in a range of life science companies, including biopharmaceutical, medical device, diagnostics, and research informatics.

Clay was the lead investor and led the strategic transaction process for ArtusLabs that resulted in its sale to PerkinElmer in 2011. He was a co-founder and served as CEO and Chairman of Synthematix, Inc., a chemistry informatics company that was acquired in April 2005 by Symyx Technologies (SMMX). He was the co-founder and head of corporate development for Novalon Pharmaceutical Corporation, where he led financing efforts and was head of business development from inception until Novalon’s sale to Karo Bio for $106.7 million in May of 2000. Prior to Novalon, Clay was the co-founder and president of Xanthon, Inc., a bioinformatics company with electro-chemical detection technology for direct analysis of DNA, RNA and proteins.

Clay currently serves as Executive Chairman of PhaseBio Pharmaceuticals and Chairman of GeneCentric Diagnostics. He is also on the boards of Clearside Biomedical, Curoverse, Lysosomal Therapeutics, and Orig3n. In 2014, Clay served as Co-Chair of the Innovation-2-Jobs Working Group for the Governor of the state of North Carolina. He serves on the Board of Visitors of the Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center at the University of North Carolina and on the board of the NC School of Science and Mathematics. He holds a Masters of Public Policy from Harvard University and a B.A. in mathematics and art history from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Seasoned entrepreneur and biotech executive, Christy Shaffer, Ph.D. has over 25 years of experience in the life science industry. Followng her career as a clinical scientist, international project leader and Associate Director of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine at Burroughs Wellcome Co., she joined Inspire Pharmaceuticals in 1995 as the first, full-time employee. She was responsible for raising over $300m for the company, including taking the company public in 2000. As President and CEO, Christy grew the company from 20 scientists to nearly 250 employees with revenues of over $100 million. Under her leadership, Inspire was named as “Best Place to Work for Scientists” by the Scientist magazine, and “Best Place to Work in North Carolina.” Christy retired from Inspire in 2010 and the company was acquired by Merck in 2011.

Christy serves as a board member of five Hatteras portfolio companies and chairs three of them: G1 Therapeutics, Spyryx, Clearside (Chair), KinoDyn (Chair), and GrayBug (Executive Chair). Christy is a receptor pharmacologist by training, earning her Ph.D. in Pharmacology from the University of Tennessee Health Science Center, Memphis TN in 1985. She received her post-doctoral training at The Chicago Medical School and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Portfolio Companies

The goal of CRV is to unlock the potential of UNC-Chapel Hill technologies and advance the commercialization of these technologies by providing early-stage capital and industry expertise. The fund began in 2016 and expects to make three to four investments per year.

G1 Therapeutics

G1 Therapeutics is a clinical-stage company developing small-molecule therapies to address significant unmet needs in oncology. The company is leveraging its proprietary kinase drug discovery platform to advance a pipeline of first-in-class compounds and best-in-class drug candidates.

Bivarus

Bivarus brings an entirely new science of measuring the patient experience with its patented cloud-based analytics platform. Measuring and improving the patient experience has become one of the top priorities of the healthcare system, and Bivarus is redefining how healthcare leaders capture and operationalize patient-generated insights to improve patient care and service operations. Organizations rely on Bivarus’ real-time analytics platform to gain meaningful insights into the unique drivers impacting the patient experience, buying behavior and provider performance.

strideBio

StrideBio, Inc is a gene therapy company focused on creating and developing novel adeno-associated viral (AAV) vector technologies and therapeutics for rare diseases. Our STRucture Inspired DEsign approach holds the potential to generate unique AAV capsids capable of overcoming the challenges of pre-existing neutralizing antibodies and improving gene transfer efficiency in patients. This powerful new approach has broad application, enabling gene addition, gene silencing and gene editing modalities for a wide range of diseases, including rare genetic diseases. StrideBio is headquartered in Durham, NC.