Under copyright Constraint(s) on Use: This work is protected by the U.S. Copyright Law (Title 17, U.S.C.). Use of this work beyond that allowed by "fair use" requires written permission of the UC Regents. Responsibility for obtaining permissions and any use and distribution of this work rests exclusively with the user and not the UC San Diego Library. Inquiries can be made to the UC San Diego Library program having custody of the work. Use: This work is available from the UC San Diego Library. This digital copy of the work is intended to support research, teaching, and private study.
Rights Holder and Contact
UC Regents
Description
A 27-year veteran of venture capital investing, Mr. Fleming has helped raise and manage six venture funds totaling more than $500 million and has served on the boards of 19 venture-backed companies. He has extensive experience in all aspects of venture management and finance, including fund-raising, investor relations, operations and portfolio development. He has made investments, managed portfolio companies, raised funds, pursued business development, taken companies public and successfully exited investments through public-market sales and buyouts. In 1993, Mr. Fleming co-founded Forward Ventures. In his capacity as a founding managing member he served as the initial president and CEO of Triangle Pharmaceuticals (acquired by Gilead Sciences, Inc. [NASDAQ:GILD]), Actigen (now part of Corixa/GlaxoSmithKline [NYSE:GSK]), GenQuest Corixa/GlaxoSmithKline [NYSE:GSK]), and CombiChem (acquired by DuPont [NYSE:DD]), and now part of Deltagen [Pink Sheets:DGEN]. Mr. Fleming was a founding board member of Arizeke Pharmaceuticals, Ciphergen Biosystems (now Vermillion, Inc. [NASDAQ:VRML]) and Gryphon Therapeutics, and formerly served on the boards of Acorda Therapeutics [NASDAQ: ACOR], Converge Medical, Doctors on Line, EndiCOR, First Dental Health, IntensiCare, Kemia, Inc., MitoKor, and Tandem Medical. He currently serves as a director of Ambit Biosciences [NASDAQ: AMBI], and was a founding director of Nereus Pharmaceuticals. Mr. Fleming serves as a director of CONNECT, San Diego's support organization for the academic-to-early-stage community, and is a past president of the Biotechnology Venture Investors Group. Mr. Fleming enjoys extensive networks throughout the venture, entrepreneurial, scientific, medical and pharmaceutical communities. Venture funds he has managed have made investments in more than 70 private and public companies, a number of which have gone public and/or been acquired by pharmaceutical companies. He has helped start more than 15 companies and served at founding CEO of eight. At Forward, Mr. Fleming has made investments in almost every segment of the health-care industry, including pharmaceuticals, biologics, diagnostics, devices, services and software. He has managed both platform and product companies/investments in the portfolio and led or participated in financings at all levels from pre-start-up to PIPES in public companies, in both debt and equity. Before establishing Forward Ventures, Mr. Fleming served as the chairman, president and CEO of GeneSys Therapeutics (merged with Somatix and acquired by Cell GeneSys [NASDAQ:CEGE]). He began his venture career with Ventana Growth Funds in San Diego in 1986. Virtually all the major investors in the Ventana funds were overseas corporations in the Nordic countries, Europe and Japan. While at Ventana, Mr. Fleming gained extensive experience helping limited partners realize their strategic as well as financial goals through the venture program. He earned his B.A. from Amherst College and his M.B.A. from the UCLA Graduate School of Management. [Source: Forward Ventures website] Born digital Special Collections & Archives, UC San Diego, La Jolla, 92093-0175 (https://lib.ucsd.edu/sca) Restricted Content: Full interview restricted until July 1, 2026. Redacted version is posted.
If you're wondering about permissions and what you can do with this item, a good starting point is the "rights information" on this page. See our terms of use for more tips.
Share your story
Has Calisphere helped you advance your research, complete a project, or find something meaningful? We'd love to hear about it; please send us a message.
