Students at the UC San Diego Rady School of Management has made a $25,000 investment in an Austin-based pharmaceutical company. They’re part of a class leading the school’s venture capital fund.
Around 20 students take part in leading the Rady Venture Fund. In its three year history, the group has invested $100,000 in start up companies. Students hear pitches from companies looking for investors and then do extensive reviews of each one. When they find a company they believe is worthy of investment, they take it to a board of venture capital professionals for approval.
Rady students often have science and technology backgrounds and are interested in starting their own companies, according to Lada Rasochova, who leads the class and is the fund’s managing director.
“It helps them to think about, how do you analyze each of the opportunities that is coming at me and everybody is telling me my thing is important," said Rasochova. "How do you choose, how do you prioritize. So not only as an investor but as a leader of an innovation-driven organization."
Students joined several traditional venture capital firms in investing a total of $16 million in the Austin, Texas-based pharmaceutical company, Savara Pharmaceuticals.
