US medical device company Bard has acquired Israeli hernia mesh developer LifeBond for close to the $60 million that the company has raised to date, sources inform "Globes." Bard is a division of Becton Dickinson (BD).
LifeBond was founded in 2007. Its main investors are Pitango and medical device investor Robert Taub, who founded Omrix, which developed similar sealant technology and was sold to Johnson & Johnson for $438 million. Taub invested in LifeBond due to his deep understanding of the sector even though the company's product was likely to be a rival to Omrix. J&J also invested in LifeBond seeing its product as complementary to Omrix's.
Other investors in LifeBond include Adams Street Partners, China's Sino Biopharmaceutical Ltd., Glenrock, Aurum Ventures, Giza, and Zitelman Group.
LifeBond was founded by Ishay Attar,Orahn Preiss-Bloom, and Nir Mashkif. Attar is a medical engineer and entrepreneur who also founded other startups including Biochange, Outsense and Eximore, and Preiss-Bloom is a biomedical engineer and biomechanical researcher who also founded the medical device startup Ossio.
The pair founded the company after the Second Lebanon War in 2006 when they saw the need for technology to stop soldiers bleeding after various injuries.
The company developed a product to minimize post-operative complications such as staple-line leakage in GI and bariatric surgeries. In clinical trials LifeBond switched its emphasis from its first product to a hernia mesh to prevent leakages after hernia surgery. The product is about to enter clinical trials but because the company has regressed in development terms, the size of the exit is less than might have been hoped for.
Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on January 15, 2020
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