Dr. Jean Deleage Ph.D. (1940–2011) was an early

venture capital Venture capital (often abbreviated as VC) is a form of private equity financing that is provided by venture capital firms or funds to startups, early-stage, and emerging companies that have been deemed to have high growth potential or which ha ...

investor An investor is a person who allocates financial capital with the expectation of a future Return on capital, return (profit) or to gain an advantage (interest). Through this allocated capital most of the time the investor purchases some specie ...

responsible for the founding or co-founding of three notable venture capital firms since 1971:

Sofinnova Sofinnova is the name shared by two venture capital firms, Sofinnova Partners and Sofinnova Ventures. The name Sofinnova is a contraction of the French, "Société de Financement de l’Innovation" or, Innovation Venture Capital Company. Both fi ...

, Burr, Egan, Deleage & Co. and

Alta Partners Alta Partners is a venture capital firm based in San Francisco which invests primarily in biotechnology and life science companies. History The company was founded in 1996 by Dr. Jean Deleage, Ph.D., who was also a founder of the venture capi ...

Career

Deleage began investing in venture capital in 1971 with the formation of

(officially founded in 1972). Five years later, in 1976, Deleage founded Sofinnova’s US business, based in

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

, Sofinnova, Inc. In 1997, when Sofinnova split into two firms, the US business would come to be known as Sofinnova Ventures. In 1979, Deleage, who worked left Sofinnova to co-found a new, bi-coastal venture capital firm Burr, Egan, Deleage & Co. (BEDCO), with

Craig Burr Craig L. Burr (born 1945) is an early venture capital investor, notable for his role in the founding of two venture capital firms, Burr, Egan, Deleage & Co. (BEDCO) in 1979 and Alta Communications in 1996. Career In 1979 Burr co-founded Burr, Egan ...

and

William P. Egan William P. Egan is an American venture capitalist. He is the founder and general partner at Alta Communications, a venture capital firm, and Marion Equity Partners, a private equity firm, both based in Boston, Massachusetts. Egan also founded Alta ...

, who had worked together at

TA Associates TA Associates, founded in 1968, is one of the early modern-era private equity firms in the United States. The firm leads buyouts and minority recapitalizations of profitable growth companies. TA invests across five industry groups: technology, hea ...

. BEDCO was one of the largest and most active venture capital firms in the 1980s and early 1990s. Deleage and BEDCO were early investors in a number of notable venture backed companies including

Cephalon Cephalon, Inc. was an American biopharmaceutical company co-founded in 1987 by pharmacologist Frank Baldino, Jr., neuroscientist Michael Lewis, and organic chemist James C. Kauer—all three former scientists with the DuPont Company. Baldino s ...

Chiron In Greek mythology, Chiron ( ; also Cheiron or Kheiron; ) was held to be the superlative centaur amongst his brethren since he was called the "wisest and justest of all the centaurs". Biography Chiron was notable throughout Greek mythology ...

and

Genentech Genentech, Inc., is an American biotechnology corporation headquartered in South San Francisco, California. It became an independent subsidiary of Roche in 2009. Genentech Research and Early Development operates as an independent center within R ...

. Additionally, Deleage facilitated a significant partnership between BEDCO and Sofinnova, leading to a number of

co-investments An equity co-investment (or co-investment) is a minority investment, made directly into an operating company, alongside a financial sponsor or other private equity investor, in a leveraged buyout, recapitalization or growth capital transaction. In ...

. BEDCO invested in

information technology Information technology (IT) is the use of computers to create, process, store, retrieve, and exchange all kinds of data . and information. IT forms part of information and communications technology (ICT). An information technology system (I ...

communications Communication (from la, communicare, meaning "to share" or "to be in relation with") is usually defined as the transmission of information. The term may also refer to the message communicated through such transmissions or the field of inquir ...

, and

healthcare Health care or healthcare is the improvement of health via the prevention, diagnosis, treatment, amelioration or cure of disease, illness, injury, and other physical and mental impairments in people. Health care is delivered by health profe ...

biotechnology Biotechnology is the integration of natural sciences and engineering sciences in order to achieve the application of organisms, cells, parts thereof and molecular analogues for products and services. The term ''biotechnology'' was first used b ...

companies, and at its zenith managed $700 million in assets. The principals of BEDCO separated in 1995 and 1996, leading Deleage to found

along with

Garrett Gruener Garrett Gruener is an American venture capitalist, most known as the founder of Ask.com and a co-founder of Alta Partners. He was also a candidate for the 2003 California recall special election from the Democratic Party, finishing 28th in a field ...

, a former partner at BEDCO. Alta Partners is one of several successors to BEDCO founded in the mid-1990s and has raised over $1.9 billion of investor commitments since inception.

Education

Jean received a master's degree in Electrical Engineering from the

École Supérieure d'Électricité École may refer to: * an elementary school in the French educational stages normally followed by secondary education establishments (collège and lycée) * École (river), a tributary of the Seine flowing in région Île-de-France * École, Sav ...

and a Ph.D. in Economics from the

Sorbonne Sorbonne may refer to: * Sorbonne (building), historic building in Paris, which housed the University of Paris and is now shared among multiple universities. *the University of Paris (c. 1150 – 1970) *one of its components or linked institution, ...

Other affiliations

In 1984, Dr. Deleage was awarded the

Ordre National du Merite A suite, in Western classical music and jazz, is an ordered set of instrumental or orchestral/concert band pieces. It originated in the late 14th century as a pairing of dance tunes and grew in scope to comprise up to five dances, sometimes with ...

. In 1993, Deleage was also awarded the

Legion of Honor The National Order of the Legion of Honour (french: Ordre national de la Légion d'honneur), formerly the Royal Order of the Legion of Honour ('), is the highest French order of merit, both military and civil. Established in 1802 by Napoleon ...

by the French government in recognition of his career accomplishments. Deleage was a member of the board of directors of Rigel Pharmaceuticals, Inc., TorreyPines Therapeutics, Inc. and several private companies.

External links

Company profile at BioSpaceDecember 17, 2007: Alta Partners invest $25 million investment in Anesiva, (Nasdaq:ANSV)
*Gupta, Udayan.
Done Deals: Venture Capitalists Tell Their Stories
2000

* ttps://web.archive.org/web/20120215082404/http://people.forbes.com/profile/jean-deleage/47837 Jean Deleage(Forbes Profile) {{DEFAULTSORT:Deleage, Jean 1941 births 2011 deaths Supélec alumni University of Paris alumni Venture capitalists