Mass General Brigham Ventures Research
Investment Thesis
Mass General Brigham Ventures is the early-stage venture capital arm of Mass General Brigham, the Boston health system that includes Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women's Hospital. It was founded in 2008 to bring new life science technologies out of the system's research community and into companies. The firm invests in next-generation life science companies built on intellectual property created inside Mass General Brigham, and it sources deals from the system's five research and teaching hospitals, the largest teaching affiliate of Harvard Medical School. The firm describes its preferred position, with first access and rights to deal flow, as an advantage conventional venture funds cannot reproduce.
Sector Focus
The firm names three areas:
- Therapeutics: first-in-class drugs, including novel modalities, in areas of significant unmet need.
- Digital health: information and communications technology that improves care delivery.
- Diagnostics, devices and tools: methods, metrics and tools for research insight and clinical decision-making.
In practice the portfolio is overwhelmingly therapeutics and biotech (immunology, oncology, gene therapy, neurology, ophthalmology), with a small number of care-delivery and health services companies such as Harbor Health, InStride Health and Tuesday Health. Third-party data lists 29 of 31 tracked rounds as health and life sciences.
Stage Focus
Initial investments go in at the seed and Series A stages. The firm says that when it invests it expects to support the company through its entire financing lifecycle, so it also participates in later rounds (for example Series B through D rounds in Claris Bio, Abcuro and InStride Health). Its venture team also runs Mass General Brigham's translational acceleration platform, including the Amplify pre-commercial fund, which moves projects to the seed stage.
Check Size
The firm does not publish a check size. Third-party records show it joining rounds of $5M to $200M. These are total round sizes, not the firm's own checks. Its separate Artificial Intelligence and Digital Innovation Fund states an initial investment of $0.5 to $1.5 million as a co-investment in a venture-led round, one to three per year with digital health investors.
Lead Tendency
Third-party data records the firm as lead or co-lead in about 10 percent of rounds and a participant in about 90 percent. It acts as a syndicate partner and seeks strong co-investor syndicates.
Recent Activity
Recorded participation in 2025 and 2026 includes Oyster Therapeutics ($60M Series A, Nov 2026), Abcuro ($66M Series D, Aug 2026), Claris Biotherapeutics ($118M Series B, Jul 2026), InStride Health ($30M Series C, Jun 2026), Violet Therapeutics ($5M seed, May 2026), Nocion Therapeutics ($23M Series B, Jan 2026), Affinia Therapeutics ($40M Series C, Oct 2025), Predicta Biosciences ($23M Series A, Oct 2025) and Abcuro ($200M Series C, Feb 2025). Frequent co-investors include F-Prime Capital, GV, Pontifax, Sanofi Ventures, Alexandria Venture Investments, General Catalyst, RA Capital and Samsara BioCapital.
Portfolio Highlights
The firm reports 66 companies invested in since 2008 and 20 exits: eight IPOs and 12 acquisitions. It reports more than $450 million in assets under management as of its team page. Exits include Scorpion (acquired by Eli Lilly, Jan 2025), Verve Therapeutics (IPO 2021, acquired by Eli Lilly, Aug 2025), Amolyt Pharma (AstraZeneca, Mar 2024), Akouos (IPO 2020, acquired by Lilly, Dec 2022), Translate Bio (IPO 2018, Sanofi 2021), Syntimmune (Alexion, 2018), Tilos (Merck, 2019), CoStim (Novartis, 2014) and IPOs of Denali, Editas, Keros, Magenta and Spero. The portfolio page lists 17 active companies.
Team
- Roger Kitterman: co-founder and Managing Partner; SVP Venture, Business Development and Licensing at Mass General Brigham.
- Meredith Fisher: Partner; early-stage investments and company creation, boards at BraveBio, ClarisBio, CrossTalk, Falcon Bio, Sena and Violet.
- Carl Berke: Partner; 30+ years moving technology from lab to market, boards at InStride Health, Tuesday Health, Pykus, PredictaDx and Walden BioScience.
- A further partner (first name Jay) with 25+ years in biotech business development sits on the Keros board and represents the firm at Modal, 65 Therapeutics and 20 Bio.
- Stacey Brenner: Senior Director, Investor Relations and Finance.
- Thomas Backus: Venture Associate and Commercial Lead for Amplify.
Decision Process
The firm does not publish its decision process. It is a partnership of several partners backed by a health-system parent. It takes board seats and observer seats across the portfolio.
Founder Preferences
The firm backs inventors, scientists and entrepreneurs, mainly those commercializing technology from Mass General Brigham labs and clinics. It builds companies from the start, including entrepreneurs in residence. Founders without Mass General Brigham intellectual property are unlikely to fit the core mandate.
Geographic Focus
Boston and Massachusetts first, because deal flow comes from Mass General Brigham hospitals. Third-party data shows co-investments mainly in the US (26 of 31 rounds), with a few in Europe and India.
Gaps
Check size, fund size and decision timeline are not disclosed on the firm's pages. The website given for the task, massgeneralbrigham.org, is the health system homepage; the ventures pages live on research.massgeneralbrigham.org. The team page names one partner by first name only, so that person is not in the team list.