The Long Island Capital Alliance Showcases Healthcare

MELVILLE, NY--(Marketwired - Nov 20, 2014) - The Long Island Capital Alliance ("LICA") , Long Island's leading non-profit capital formation and business development organization, today announced the successful completion of its Healthcare Capital Forum held on Friday, November 7, 2014. The event provided an opportunity to bring together capital providers, entrepreneurs, industry executives and businesses seeking capital, as well as to hear a panel of industry experts discuss financing alternatives for healthcare businesses on Long Island.

Five local healthcare products and services companies presented their business plans to an audience that included venture capital firms, investment banks, private equity firms, angel and individual investors. Each of the companies LICA selected for presentation at the capital forum possesses unique intellectual properties with catalysts for significant growth.

"The market for Long Island healthcare and life science companies is improving and we are proud to help bring these companies forward at our Capital Forums," said Neil Kaufman, Chairman of LICA. "Through our Healthcare and Biotechnology Capital Forums, we have now provided access to capital and business developments assistance for 22 companies. We are pleased with the support that the local investment community is showing to many promising businesses that leverage the LICA platform."

"The presenters were very strong," said David Calone, a panelist and CEO of Long Island-based venture capital and private equity firm Jove Equity Partners. "I am focused on the Long Island eco-system. It was exciting to see a number of strong Long Island companies who are continuing to grow and seek additional capital on Long Island."

"I was very impressed by the caliber of the presenting companies and the caliber of the panel," said fellow panelist Clayton Besch III, who also serves as Director of the Small Business Technology Investment Fund at Empire State Development. "I was anxious to meet more local investors, both Angels and professional investors, to consider co-investment with." 

Joseph Scaduto, Founder and CEO of Traverse Biosciences , commented, "We sincerely appreciated the opportunity to present at the LICA Healthcare Forum, and we compliment the organization on attracting a number of exciting bioscience companies from the region with high-quality presentations." He added, "We are grateful for LICA's ongoing efforts to identify and engage active members of the investment community to more seriously consider a growing deal-flow from Long Island across a range of high-technology industry sectors."

Healthcare Capital Forum Presenting Companies

The following companies made presentations at the Long Island Capital Forum:

AdMedDev : Affiliated with Stony Brook University, AdMedDev provides advanced sensors and wireless medical electronic devices used in tracking and analyzing data associated with medical specimens. The market size for this business is estimated at $3 billion and may service over 7,500 hospital and large health care providers.

Anschel Technology : Founded in 2011, Anschel produces the SightSaver ™, a patented FDA approved device for eliciting visual evoked physiological responses. There are over 2 million operations performed annually that can cause post-operative visual loss.  SightSaver provides a hygienic, safe, comfortable, and effective alternative to current solutions. 

PAXmed : As creator of four venture backed medical device companies, the company is a vehicle to accelerate the development of device start-ups utilizing capital efficiency strategies to enhance value creation and return on invested capital.

Symbiotic Health : Develops powerful microbiome-based therapeutics to cure and prevent infection caused by the depletion of symbiotic microbes due to antibiotics, addressing a $4.8 billion market.

Traverse Biosciences : Based out of Stony Brook University's Center for Biotechnology, Traverse is commercializing a proprietary pipeline of drug candidates to treat inflammatory diseases and age‐related conditions affecting humans and companion animals. FDA approval is being sought for a lead drug intended to prevent canine periodontal disease.

Healthcare Capital Forum Panel of Industry Investors

The following investment professionals participated in the panel discussion at the Long Island Capital Forum:

David Calone, Jove Equity Partners: David Calone is the CEO of Jove Equity Partners, LLC, a firm that manages private equity and venture capital investments. He serves on the Board of Directors of eight privately-held companies. Mr. Calone previously served as a federal prosecutor in the U.S. Department of Justice's Honors Program where he received a 2003 Attorney General's Award for his work in fighting terrorism-related and corporate international crime. Mr. Calone also served as a Special Assistant Attorney General in the New York State Attorney General's Office and was an associate at Paul Weiss Rifkind Wharton & Garrison in New York. He has a degree in economics from Princeton University and received a J.D. from Harvard Law School.

William Ho, AlephPoint Capital : William Ho founded AlephPoint Capital, a healthcare equity hedge fund, in 2014. Prior to AlephPoint, in 2010 he joined New Leaf Venture Partners, a leading healthcare venture capital fund, to launch the firm's efforts in the public equities markets. Previously, he has held senior positions on a derivatives trading desk of ICAP plc, as an equity research analyst covering the biotechnology industry at Bank of America, and at Piper Jaffray & Co. covering the biotechnology and life-sciences tools sectors. Earlier in his career, Mr. Ho held an operational role at CuraGen Corporation, a genomics biotechnology company, where he twice restructured the company, and was an associate in the healthcare investment banking group at SG Cowen. He holds an MBA from the University of Notre Dame and a BS in Biochemistry from McMaster University in Canada.

Antony E. Pfaffle, M.D., CorMedix Inc.: Dr. Antony E. Pfaffle is Chief Scientific Officer of CorMedix, Inc., a specialty pharmaceutical company. Dr. Pfaffle is the Advisory Chief Medical Officer at ParagonRx, which creates pharmaceutical safe programs. He has been the Director of Healthcare Research at Bearing Circle Capital, L.P., an investment fund, since May 2007. He was a Managing Director at Paramount BioCapital, Inc. and Senior Vice-President of Business Development at Paramount BioSciences, LLC from December 2005 to May 2007. Dr. Pfaffle was a Principal and Founder of Black Diamond Research, an investment research company, from July 2001 to December 2005. He is an internist who practiced nephrology at New York Hospital, Lenox Hill and Memorial Sloan-Kettering, and received his M.D. degree from New York Medical College in 1989.

Clayton Besch III, Empire State Development : Clayton Besch is Director of the Small Business Technology Investment Fund (SBTIF) at Empire State Development. The SBTIF provides early stage high-tech companies throughout New York with a potential source of venture capital to promote new job creation and economic growth. Previously, Mr. Besch worked at the New York State (NYS) Department of Economic Development, where he ran the Asian Office, introducing NYS companies to sales opportunities in Japan and Korea and introducing Japanese companies to strategic opportunities in NYS. He also spent a number of years at SOFTBANK INC. as development advisor, working with SOFTBANK's worldwide VC network, including GrandBanks Capital, Mobius Ventures and SOFTBANK Capital Partners. Mr. Besch is currently an observer on the boards of e2e Materials and Float Tech Inc. Mr. Besch holds a BS from Hamilton College in NYS, an MS from Nagasaki University and a PhD from Tokyo University.

Next LICA Capital Forum

LICA is hosting a Technology Capital Forum on Friday, January 30, 2015 from 8:00 a.m. to 10:45 a.m. at 68 South Service Road, Melville, NY. The capital forum provides an opportunity to meet capital providers, entrepreneurs, industry executives and businesses seeking capital, as well as to hear a panel of industry experts discuss financing alternatives for technology companies from the Long Island and the surrounding region.

For more information about the event, please contact LICA today or register online .

About the Long Island Capital Alliance

Since 1984, the Long Island Capital Alliance ( www.licapital.org ), formerly known as Long Island Venture Group, has been promoting business growth on Long Island. LICA seeks to create a productive and business-friendly environment that will afford area businesses access to the resources necessary to compete successfully in today's markets. LICA serves as a focal point for the exchange of ideas among new and existing business enterprises, successful entrepreneurs, investors, and service providers. Through quarterly capital forums and special meetings, LICA brings together members of the region's business community, and has been recognized as the place to turn to when small businesses need equity, debt, or other financing, or for investors to find an attractive investment opportunity.

LICA's mission is to encourage economic development on Long Island by facilitating capital formation for a broad range of companies in various industries, from early stage to mature, middle market, closely held and publicly-traded businesses. LICA accomplishes this primarily through education, networking, quarterly capital forums, periodic special educational meetings, and alliances with other regional organizations. LICA brings together members of the region's business community and serves as the finance arm for significant local business and organizations.

For more information on LICA and its next event, please contact LICA today or register online .