Phoenix Equity Partners announces investment in Sygnature Discovery
Phoenix Equity Partners (“Phoenix”), a leading UK middle-market private equity firm, today announces an investment in Sygnature Discovery Limited (“Sygnature” or “the Company”) alongside the current management team, led by Founder and CEO Dr Simon Hirst. The deal will provide Sygnature with additional investment to support the Company’s continued development and growth.
Sygnature is a leading provider of outsourced drug discovery services to UK and overseas with a global client base of biotech and pharma companies. Sygnature operates from a modern, purpose-built facility in Nottingham and employs 200 staff, many of whom are PhD scientists. Phoenix will work with the Sygnature management team to accelerate the growth of the business.
Kevin Keck, Partner at Phoenix, said: “Sygnature is a very well-respected drug discovery business with a strong reputation in an attractive and growing segment of the pharma services sector. Simon and his team have built a great company with a fantastic track record of undertaking high quality scientific research. We are delighted to be partnering with them at a time of continuing rapid growth and significant opportunity in the drug discovery market.”
Dr Simon Hirst, CEO of Sygnature, commented: “We are extremely proud of our people and our culture at Sygnature, which is focused on accelerating drug discovery programmes towards the clinic in a range of debilitating and often fatal diseases. We are excited to be working with Phoenix – our partnership will provide us with investment and strategic input to expand our business further and to provide a broader range of expertise for our customers.”
Sygnature is Phoenix’s fourth investment from its 2016 Fund and third this year, following investments in The Travel Chapter, Rayner Surgical and Global Freight Solutions.
About Phoenix Equity Partners
Phoenix Equity Partners is a leading private equity investor in medium-sized, UK-based companies. Founded in 2001, the firm has successfully invested more than £1bn in over 40 companies, across a wide range of sectors, backing entrepreneurs and management teams with bold plans to build great businesses. The firm is independently owned by its executives, managing funds on behalf of leading institutions from around the world.
For more information, visit: www.phoenix-equity.com
About Sygnature Discovery
Sygnature Discovery operates a fully-enabled research facility in Nottingham, UK, housing over 180 experienced research scientists with the professional skills required to take on board the most demanding of drug discovery programmes and drive them towards a successful outcome. The company undertakes target validation, hit identification, hit-to-lead and lead optimisation projects. Sygnature’s capabilities include medicinal chemistry, bioscience, computational chemistry, DMPK and protein crystallography (in collaboration with affiliate company, Peak Proteins). Since 2011, ten drug candidates have entered the clinic (Phases I and II) which were invented at Sygnature.
For further information, visit: www.sygnaturediscovery.com