Age: 31
Home base: San Francisco, California
Big deals: Precision Nanosystems, Loop Genomics, Apama Medical
El-Bibany describes her role in health tech venture capital as “bridging the gap between academia and industry.” It’s a task she’s ideally suited for. Having focused her research on stem cell engineering, microbiome research, and DNA damage and repair as a student, El-Bibany got sidetracked from her goal of pursuing a Phd when an opportunity arose to join Rising Tide VC in 2014. She built the firm’s entire health tech and biotech practice. From there, she was hooked on investing.
Her first investment ever was in Precision Nanoystems, which was acquired by Danaher Life Sciences last year. Other key investments she has made are in Loop Genomics which was acquired by Element Biosciences and Apama Medical, which was acquired by Boston Scientific. El-Bibany doesn’t view her wins as only financial successes, and cites advances in healthcare as a driving motivation. Her advice to startups? Start with the problem, not the solution. “Oftentimes, we see interesting technology that is built and then teams search for a problem to solve it with,” she explained. “Other times, we see teams that have very well characterized the problem at hand, and then build a technological solution to fix it. I usually encourage teams to do the latter,” El-Bibany says.
This Spotlight was originally featured in Fortune. Find the full list of investors here: https://fortune.com/2022/09/23/top-vc-investors-health-tech-startups/