66ten is WEHI’s first strategic investment fund and one of the largest of its kind dedicated to backing early-stage discoveries within an Australian medical research institute.

In terms of health outcomes, its commercialisation focus is not a detour from discovery – it’s the pathway to impact. Without this crucial step, breakthroughs don’t reach patients and their potential to improve lives is lost.

Spearheaded by WEHI Ventures, 66ten is already drawing attention as a smarter, faster model for translating science into globally investable biotech.

What sets WEHI Ventures apart is its deep bench of expertise.

The team brings together world-class scientific and commercial experience, including former WEHI lab head Dr Leigh Coultas, Dr Lee Booty (former GSK scientist), Dr Heshan Peiris (former Genentech principal scientist), Dr Nicholas Liau (former GSK and Denali Therapeutics scientist), Dr Amanda Woon (former Exogene Head of R&D and Immunocore scientist) and CEO Dr Anne-Laure Puaux, who brings global pharma leadership.

Dr Puaux believes 66ten is fuelling the future of biotech in Australia.

“We’re not just investing in great ideas,” she says. “We’re building the bridge between brilliant Australian science and investable biotech businesses that can thrive in global markets.”

Funded largely through royalties from the blockbuster cancer drug venetoclax, the 66ten fund represents a unique reinvestment of success back into WEHI’s research translation.

Four of the investments to date are in independent biotech companies at seed and series A stages (early funding rounds for startups). Other investments are in the pre-seed space, maturing from small proof-of-concept stage to preparing to be spun-out.

Two ventures that reflect these different stages are TrueIron (pre-seed project) and Proxima Bio (biotech company).

“These examples show how we can flexibly support ventures from nascent concepts to more developed co-investment opportunities – seed funding for company creation, plus support for promising start-ups to bloom,” says Dr Puaux.

TrueIron – iron deficiency diagnostic  

TrueIron is an early-stage, pre-seed diagnostic concept developing a point-of-care test for iron deficiency – an unmet medical need worldwide, and the first diagnostic program backed by 66ten.

By leveraging WEHI’s expertise in protein production, antibody development and iron metabolism, alongside specialised knowledge in point-of-care test development, researchers are creating a diagnostic to deliver a quicker, more precise measure of iron status.

Designed to remain accurate even in the presence of medications or inflammation, the tool will be especially valuable in clinics and community settings – particularly for managing chronic heart and kidney conditions.

Proxima Bio – next-gen degrader medicines

In contrast, Proxima Bio is a WEHI spin-out, with WEHI Ventures being part of its investment syndicate together with Tin Alley Ventures and Tenmile.

Its next generation medicines – cell surface degraders – target previously undruggable, disease-causing proteins, with powerful potential for autoimmune conditions and cancers.

The project has attracted enough capital to employ a growing team and establish its operations at Jumar Bioincubator. Proxima Bio is co-led by WEHI Ventures principal scientist Dr Amanda Woon, now Chief Operating Officer, and co-founders and WEHI alumni, Dr Jason Brouwer (Chief Scientific Officer) and Dr Jonathan Bernardini (Chief Executive Officer).

The 66ten fund is dedicated to ideas and intellectual property developed at – or in collaboration with – WEHI.

“Being embedded inside WEHI is our unique advantage,” says Dr Puaux.

“Exciting research can lead to new therapeutic or innovation programs. We help identify, shape, package and prepare these ideas for the next stage of investment.”

Often, the WEHI Ventures team – skilled in both science and commercialisation – is working side-by-side with researchers in the lab and the Business Development team.

“We don’t just write cheques – we embed deep scientific and commercial expertise into the earliest stages of a project’s development,” she says.

This early engagement with pharmaceutical partners and global venture investors reduces the risk of projects dying in the “valley of death” between lab discovery and market viability.

The team’s access to cutting-edge research is supercharged by WEHI’s advanced drug development platforms, including the National Drug Discovery Centre and the CSL-WEHI Centre for Biologic Therapies.

These platforms and facilities blend world-leading spatial omics, robotics and computer science to accelerate unprecedented discovery.

“This extensive ecosystem – all under the same roof – means we’re sitting in the same room with people who’ve successfully developed antibody-based therapies, led drug discovery programs and worked at globally leading pharma and biotech companies,” says Dr Puaux.

WEHI Ventures operates with global standards in mind – and a hard edge on outcomes.

Dr Roslyn Hendriks is chair of the 66ten Investment Review Committee. This Committee is a powerhouse group of seven academic, biotech and investment leaders shaping the fund’s evolution.

“Our goal isn’t just to translate science,” says Dr Hendriks. “It’s to accelerate innovation that matters – projects that will have the greatest health impact potential – and to do so in a way that attracts serious capital, strategic partnerships and commercial acumen.”

The fund’s early performance is impressive, and its impact is felt beyond WEHI. The deal flow from WEHI and its collaborators has enabled high quality investments in numbers that have exceeded initial projections.

Two of the four portfolio companies involve partners like Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre and the University of Melbourne.  In addition, a growing number of teams are advancing pre-seed projects backed by WEHI Ventures.

The ambition is to deploy the full $66 million by 2033, planting the seeds for more spinouts. The fund is currently on track to reach this goal. By diversifying across drug modalities, disease areas and investment stages, WEHI Ventures is managing risk while maximising opportunity.

Professor Ken Smith, director of WEHI, says the initiative has potential to be transformative – not just for the institute, but for Australia’s life sciences sector more broadly.

“If 66ten didn’t exist, much of this breakthrough science would simply not see the light of day in our generation,” says Prof Smith.

“In just two years, the fund has catalysed discoveries that might otherwise have taken decades to move beyond the lab.

“We’re creating a sustainable model that fast-tracks health outcomes to patients, while reinvesting success back into the discovery engine.”

The reinvestment loop is perhaps the most compelling part of the story. Returns from 66ten’s portfolio flow directly back into WEHI, strengthening its pipeline and enabling the next wave of biotech breakthroughs.

In a country often criticised for under-investing in commercialisation, WEHI Ventures offers a compelling counter-narrative: where science, strategy and capital converge to forge a globally relevant, impact-driven biotech sector.

And with Australia’s medtech, biotech and pharma sectors now cumulatively the largest value-adding export industry outside of primary industries, 66ten is poised to help drive critical growth in Australia’s future economy.