A Special Purpose Acquisition Company
Targeting the Life Science Companies that Enable and Support Innovation
Advantage
Synergy: Eli Casdin’s Investment Platform, Keith Meister’s Capital Markets & Board Expertise
Since 2012, Eli Casdin and his investment team’s returns have flowed from their reputation, built over years, as investor-partners, working from the inside to drive and support new developments. Their tireless, on-the-ground research, close relationships with the brightest scientists and management teams and investments focus on the long-term. Their industry connections now include hundreds of critical business builders, specialists, and innovators, which we believe will allow CM Life Sciences III to push forward into new opportunities while also capturing value overlooked, or left behind.
Keith Meister has an extensive history of creating value and effecting change at companies, by creating buy-in from management teams, directors, and shareholders. Focused on identifying market dislocations and adept at spotting differentiated points of view, Mr. Meister and the Corvex Management team have built success based on deep industry understanding and a willingness to take the longer term view while capitalizing on market inefficiencies. Prior to founding Corvex Management, Mr. Meister was Chief Executive Officer / Principal Executive Officer of Icahn Enterprises, a NYSE listed diversified holding company, where he grew assets from $1.5 billion to $18 billion while generating greater than 20% annual returns for shareholders. Mr. Meister has served as a director of 16 public companies and helped those companies structure and execute over $80 billion in transactions including spin-offs, asset sales, mergers, acquisitions and various forms of capital market transactions.
CM Life Sciences III was founded to take advantage of a dynamic life science sector buoyed by innovation yet fragmented, where many companies are under-resourced and under-scaled. Significant and under-appreciated opportunities for consolidation are ready for engagement by a team versed in the trends and themes, and who can bring together the strongest of the new companies and management teams to capitalize on near- and far-term opportunities. CM Life Sciences III is bringing together the unique industry experience, operational expertise, and investment savvy of Eli Casdin and Keith Meister.
Opportunity
Research
Diagnose
Develop
*Revenue estimate for 2020
Investment Opportunities
OPPORTUNITY: The innovation-productivity cycle in life sciences is creating enormous and varied opportunities across the development continuum and ecosystem.
Ecosystem
Services and tools supporting drug discovery, development and manufacturing.
Identifying operationally focused companies with regulated products and services that have long and lucrative life cycles.
Life Science
Tools
High value tools and services for R&D across academia, government and industry.
Tremendous opportunity to combine workflows and solutions to create powerful synergies and growth.
Synthetic
Biology
New markets exploiting technological advances in engineering of biological systems.
From human health to industrial markets the syn-bio manufacturing platform is the future few appreciate.
Diagnostics
Molecular diagnostics industry now realized with limited public opportunities for exposure.
Imbalance between channel and content capabilities creates synergy opportunities.
Board of Directors
Eli Casdin – CEO
INDUSTRY LEADER IN LIFE SCIENCE INVESTING
Eli Casdin, Chief Investment Officer and Founder, founded Casdin Capital in 2011, which manages $3.3B, targeting public and private growth equity in the life sciences ecosystem. For the last 17 years, Eli has analyzed and invested in disruptive technology and their application, by developing a deep understanding of the disruptive technologies and from cultivating relationships with industry leading experts and scientists since the beginning of this industry. Prior to founding Casdin Capital, Eli was a vice president at Alliance Bernstein “thematic” based investment group where he focused on the implications of new technologies for the life science and healthcare sectors. He published the black book, “The Dawn of Molecular Medicine” detailing the accelerating wave of innovations in life sciences, and the next wave.
Keith Meister – Chairman
SIGNIFICANT EXPERIENCE AS OWNER/OPERATOR AND PUBLIC COMPANY BOARD MEMBER
Founder and CIO of Corvex Management, which manages $2.5bn, targeting high quality businesses that can benefit from constructive shareholder engagement, while generating a 20% annual return for shareholders. Served as director of 16 public companies and helped structure and execute over $80bn in transactions. Previously Vice Chairman and CEO of Icahn Enterprises. During Keith’s tenure assets grew from $1.5 billion to $18 billion while generating substantial shareholder returns. Served as director of 16 public company boards. History of creating shareholder value through improved corporate governance, capital allocation and operations.
Christian Henry – Board Member
Christian Henry, who will serve as a Director following completion of this offering, is Chairman of the Board of Pacific Biosciences of California, Inc. (Nasdaq: PACB), since 2020, and of WAVE Life Sciences Ltd. (Nasdaq: WVE) since October 2017. Mr. Henry previously served as Executive Vice President & Chief Commercial Officer of Illumina, Inc. (Nasdaq: ILMN), an applied genomics technology company, from 2015 through January 2017, and previously served in various senior leadership roles at Illumina, Inc. from 2006 to 2015, including Chief Financial Officer, Chief Commercial Officer, General Manager, Genomic Solutions and General Manager, Life Sciences. Mr. Henry holds a B.A. in biochemistry and cell biology from the University of California, San Diego and an M.B.A., with a concentration in finance, from the University of California, Irvine.
Kwame Owusu-Kesse – Board Member
Kwame Owusu-Kesse, who will serve as a Director following completion of this offering, is Chief Executive Officer of Harlem Children’s Zone, a nationally acclaimed, anti-poverty organization that has pioneered the field of comprehensive, place-based services. As CEO of Harlem Children’s Zone, Mr. Owusu-Kesse oversees HCZ’s comprehensive programming, ranging from life-shaping early development and innovative education programs to community health and wellness and outreach initiatives, and is responsible for leading the implementation of a multifaceted five-year strategic plan that leverages program data to refine strategies, pursue innovative solutions to further improve participant outcomes, create efficiencies to reduce costs without reducing effectiveness and improve operations and procedures. Mr. Owusu-Kesse received a B.A. in economics from Harvard College, an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School, and a Master’s degree in public policy from Harvard Kennedy School.
Chad Robins – Board Member
Chad Robins, who will serve as a Director following completion of this offering, is Chief Executive Officer, Co-Founder and Chairman of Adaptive Biotechnologies Corp. (Nasdaq: ADPT), a commercial stage biotechnology company that aims to translate the genetics of the adaptive immune system into clinical products to diagnose and treat disease, since 2009. Mr. Robins has led Adaptive Biotechnologies Corp. in building a proprietary immune medicine platform that fuels businesses across life sciences research, clinical diagnostics, and drug discovery and guided the company through its initial public offering in 2019. Under his leadership, Adaptive Biotechnologies Corp. successfully launched the clinical diagnostic clonoSEQ®, the first and only FDA-authorized NGS-based test to detect and monitor minimal residual disease in certain B-cell cancers. Mr. Robins holds an M.B.A. from The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and a B.S. in Managerial Economics from Cornell University.
Harlan Robins – Board Member
Harlan Robins, who will serve as a Director following completion of this offering, is Chief Scientific Officer and Co-Founder of Adaptive Biotechnologies Corp. (Nasdaq: ADPT), since 2009. Prior to co-founding Adaptive Biotechnologies Corp., Dr. Robins served in various roles in the Computational Biology Program at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, including as an Assistant Faculty Member from 2006 to 2011, as an Associate from 2011 to April 2016, and as a Full Member and the Head of the program from April 2016 to June 2019. Dr. Robins holds a B.S. in Physics from Harvard University and a Master’s degree and Ph.D. in Physics from the University of California, Berkeley, with a visiting appointment to the California Institute of Technology. Dr. Robins received postdoctoral appointments in the particle theory group at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel and at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, NJ.
Summary
Big Market
- Life Sciences is an enormous addressable market undergoing massive secular growth and ripe for consolidation.
- Broad universe of private companies with intrinsically valuable assets and defensible IP.
Strong Team
- Casdin’s network and deep sector expertise are matched with Meister’s track record of creating value at large, public companies.
- Top tier independent directors enhance industry connectivity and operational experience.
Unique Platform
- CMLS III leverages Casdin proprietary deal flow and reputation as leading investor in the public and private life sciences market.
- With over 100 private company investments, Casdin has built a deep pipeline and a network of respected venture partners, research institutions, scientists and entrepreneurs.
Ideal Structure
- CMLS III provides needed capital and a unique buy-and-build strategy for growing Life Science companies which find it hard to access public capital markets but need to scale.
- Public currency enables business owners to participate in upside as CMLS III platform grows and create a next generation life science platform.
News
EQRx to Accelerate Growth with $1.8 Billion Raise through Proposed Combination with CM Life Sciences III
EQRx, Inc., a new type of pharmaceutical company committed to developing and delivering important new medicines to patients at radically lower prices, and CM Life …
SEC Filings
Link to all items filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission