CNN Video Clip on Athletes’ Performance: http://cnnmon.ie/K2GVlU

By Jon Flint, Co-Founder & Managing General Partner, Polaris Venture Partners

It’s an exciting time to be an investor in Athletes’ Performance (AP), the trailblazing performance training network for both elite athletes and those wanting to achieve peak fitness.

The NFL draft begins today and AP has been working with 94 former college football players, readying them for this important moment in their lives.  For the players and AP coaches, this becomes a very personal time.  Over the course of their training period together a bond has formed and hopes are high [not unlike the relationship between a company and an investor].

Some of the player names are well-known:  2011 Heisman Trophy winner Robert Griffin III, QB, Baylor; Andrew Luck, QB, Stanford, Matt Kalil, OL, USC and Trent Richardson, RB, Alabama.  Other player names will become more recognized after the draft, particularly when they hit the field and everyone can see their hard work paying off.

Certainly, AP’s hard work has paid off too.  From 2006 when we made our investment in AP to today, the company’s revenues have grown five-fold—from $5 million to over $25 million.  And really, AP’s scaling has only just begun.

Why this success?  Simple.  There is nothing like having excellence as your mission.  Excellence is gravity.  How do you get the best coaches and continual thinking about exercise innovation?  Tell your employee prospects that you are going to the best place in the world to practice the career you’ve always wanted.  This is both honest and self-fulfilling.

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By Alan Spoon, General Partner, Polaris Venture Partners

Watch out providers of mobile phones, Research In Motion (RIM) just acquired Paratek Adaptive RF, in which Polaris Venture Partners was a lead investor. Paratek honed a patented technology that cleverly exploits composite ceramics to provide handsets with extraordinary tunability, together with big improvements in battery life and antennae design.

Integrating Paratek’s technology into mobile phones is a game changer for two reasons.  First, the technology allows mobile devices to upload and download large amounts of data faster, making for longer battery life, which — together with Paratek’s more effective antennae design — means devices can become smaller/thinner.

Second, the technology — Tunable RF — improves the mobile user experience by reducing dropped calls and allowing reliable data flow as users move across an ever growing number of frequency bands from provider to provider.

Congratulations to RIM for bringing aboard a powerful set of innovative technologies that RIM customers will surely appreciate in our global wireless lives.

Obviously people are key to technology creation and implementation.  The Paratek team is comprised of remarkable engineers and execs who will join the RIM family to bring Paratek forward.  Leading the charge at Paratek have been some great entrepreneurs:   Ralph Pini, chief executive officer and president; Tom Lambalot, chief commercial officer; James Oakes, chief technology officer; and of course, James DiLorenzo, chairman and chief technology operations officer.  Paratek was dripping with absolute talent who brought abundant, relevant experience from Motorola, Raytheon, AT&T, SmartLink Radio Networks, etc.

This team delivered for its several VC investors and for next generation mobile users. Congratulations to the Paratek team and to RIM for tapping their talent and technology.

MIT's Mike Cima and MicroCHIPS' Bob Farra Present at AAAS 2012 Annual Meeting Press Conference

By Terry McGuire, Co-Founder & Managing General Partner, Polaris Venture Partners

Big things sometimes come in small packages.  That’s certainly true for the MicroCHIPS drug delivery device, which is no bigger than a memory stick.

Today in the journal Science Translational Medicine, PVP’s MicroCHIPS reports the first successful clinical trial with its implantable, wirelessly controlled and programmable microchip-based drug delivery device.

In the trial, seven patients with osteoporosis received the MicroCHIPS implant, which contained daily doses of the marketed bone building drug teriparatide.  Instead of patients taking daily injections of the drug, the device released the appropriate dosages at very specific times each day of the trial.

Why is this important? Simple.  Patients were allowed to forget for a period of time that they had osteoporosis.  The device relieved them from the daily rituals that create the burden of disease.  And no less important, the patients, their physicians and families were comforted by knowing that compliance wouldn’t be an issue.

It’s not hard to envision the positive medical implications from this device, and not just for those roughly 80 thousand patients who take daily injections of teriparatide now.

As we celebrate today’s moment, let’s remember how big a triumph this really is.  After all, the MicroCHIPS device is not an iteration of a known device.  It is truly the first of its kind (something that is harder and harder to say anymore).

What does that mean?  Well, let me identify a few big areas.

First, the company needed to design and fabricate a way to reliably and safely open a small, single drug reservoir with an electric signal.  At the same time, they needed to develop a hermetic seal that would ensure the drug couldn’t escape or allow moisture to ingress into the reservoir. The microchip needed to protect the drug for long periods of time while in the body and the opening of each reservoir couldn’t damage the drug when it came time to release each dose.

They then needed to wrap this technology around wireless, programmable hardware and create software along with it.  While all this development was occurring, they also needed to establish a process that allowed small quantities (micrograms) of complex protein drugs to be filled in the individual reservoirs.

Doesn’t sound simple does it.  Well, big ideas never are.

Today’s positive clinical trial results are a very rich affirmation for all of those at MicroCHIPS and MIT who believed in this possibility.  Bob Farra, Bob Langer, Michael Cima, Norm Sheppard and others (including Polaris) never gave up on the mission of the company and believed in the technology.

We congratulate them on this very important achievement.

MIT Postdocs Hear from Company Builders About Entrepreneurship

By Paulina Hill, Senior Associate (aka the apprentice)

My Alma mater MIT and Polaris Venture Partners, where I’m transitioning from bench researcher to venture capitalist, recently hosted the first MIT Postdoctoral Entrepreneurship Symposium. The event was truly the first of its kind at MIT (I wish had been exposed to such an event when I was a postdoc).  The symposium’s goal was to educate postdocs about company building and working in industry, and to help them form connections with entrepreneurial leaders.

MIT's Bob Langer discusses becoming an entrepreneur with Polaris partner and MIT alumnus Alan Spoon

Over 100 postdocs attended the symposium and participated in a dynamic conversation with Polaris partners and members of our extended family, including several MIT company building all-stars.

Having recently transitioned out of a postdoc position in Bob Langer’s lab in the Chemical Engineering department at MIT, I appreciated the questions posed to the panelists by the familiar faces in the crowd — my recent, former colleagues.

Can you still publish at a small company?

How do you go about finding a job in a startup?

How did you start your first company?

And the million dollar question: Can you ever go back to academia after crossing over to the “dark side” of industry?

Postdocs pay close attention to panelists

Indeed, I’m still learning the answers to some of the questions myself now that I’ve been thrown into the deep-end of the pool to learn how to support company building. Fortunately, I have great mentors to rely on who are guiding me through the venture capital apprentice process.

Over the course of the event, especially during the one-on-one cocktail discussions, more personal questions were raised:

What the heck do you do all day at a small “company” of 2-3 people with no access to lab space?

Don’t you have to know something about business to work in a company? 

What if you have a PhD in a field that has nothing to do with what the startup is doing?

Reception gave postdocs opportunity to ask individual questions

It became clear that our next generation of entrepreneurs, as brilliant as they are, have a plethora of unanswered questions about startups. Unfortunately, in the academic setting, postdocs are prepared for very little other than…academia.  Finding different perspectives away from the lab bench can be challenging.

Former MIT postdoc Peter Hecht, CEO of Ironwood Pharmaceuticals, discusses careers in industry

Fortunately, postdocs don’t need to build a new network, they just need to tap into an already existing one. MIT, Polaris, and the extended Polaris community can offer postdocs many great mentors, making the process of identifying career choices exciting and less isolated.  And what I have experienced from this welcoming network of great entrepreneurs is that there is an eagerness to share experiences, offer guidance, and make connections.

I look forward to sharing more posts as my apprenticeship continues.

Eighth Polaris Series- A Invested Life Science Co. Acquired, Achieved Successful IPO In Last Three Years

By Amir Nashat, Avila Therapeutics Board Member and Partner at Polaris Venture at Partners

 The risk of early-stage investing in life sciences companies might be overstated, at least for those firms that have a strong model and work within a dynamic community of scientific and medical visionaries.

Polaris Venture Partners’ Avila Therapeutics provides another example where the model for pursuing important, innovative drugs works.  This morning it was announced that global biotechnology cancer therapeutics powerhouse Celgene will acquire five-year-old Avila for $350 million in cash plus an additional $575 million in potential regulatory and development milestone payments.

Avila is one of eight Polaris life science companies in the last three years that has moved to acquisition or achieved a successful initial public offering.   Polaris was an early Series-A investor in each. Today, the total present value of these deals is over $3 billion, including acquisition dollars and the current trading value of common stock.

One common thread that binds each of these companies was their compelling scientific foundation and transformative potential for treating disease.

In our model, these areas are essential and go hand-in-hand with strong teams.  In the case of Avila, we were fortunate to back a truly unique team of repeat entrepreneurs, led by our CEO Katrine Bosley and our Chairman Dan Lynch.  Avila CEO Katrine Bosley and Avila VP of Business Development Nagesh Mahanthapa, one of the company’s first full-time employees, were backed by Polaris in prior companies (Adnexus Therapeutics and Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, respectively).

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See CNBC interview: http://video.cnbc.com/gallery/?video=3000066684#

                Several successful biotechnology companies in our portfolio have begun on a white board in a lone office over several months, and are now providing important therapies to patients, or are in human clinical trials.  Examples range from Momenta, the nearly billion-dollar market cap company, to Cerulean, the private biotech now in Phase 2 clinical trials with its exciting nanotechnology.

The “virtual” biotech model has been proven, and can lead to transformative health care companies.  How does it happen?  Broadly, you need great teams, transformative ideas, and a business model that allows for partnerships as well as independent drug development success.

But more narrowly, and at the outset, you need the step-by-step proving ground that the virtual model provides. Tapping into a core team of very talented, experienced individuals at the early stages of company formation allows entrepreneurs to identify and to understand key technical and business risks.

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Taoiseach Enda Kenny Speaks with Noel Ruane

The opening of Dogpatch Labs Europe today was the culmination of many months of work:  understanding Dublin’s technology ecosystem, identifying the right Entrepreneur-in-Residence (EIR) to lead the new site, and locating a home for a new community of residents.

We celebrated the launch of this new community with many leaders and neighbors who will be integral to Dogpatch Labs Europe’s success, including Taoiseach Enda Kenny, our advisors at Innovation Fund Ireland and the National Pensions Reserve Fund, as well as colleagues from nearby technology companies, including Twitter, Google, Facebook, LinkedIn, Zynga, PayPal, eBay, AOL, and Yahoo.

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