Investing in Hard Science Innovations with Strong IP to Solve Defined Global Challenges.
Transforming Frontier Science
At Zoic Capital, we partner with visionary founders at the intersection of hard science and impactful solutions. Our investments focus on frontier technologies that are backed by robust intellectual property, targeting well-defined problems that reshape industries and improve lives.
Our Investment Thesis
We invest in trailblazing ventures from Seed to Series A, focusing on the first three rounds of capital to propel frontier science into commercial success. Our core pillars:
01
Hard Science
Backing bold, transformative technologies.
02
Strong IP
Protecting innovation with a solid foundation.
03
Defined Problems
Tackling real-world challenges with measurable impact.
04
Market Buy In
Early signal from the market validating demand or appetite.
Portfolio
We’ve invested in, incubated, or founded the following companies.
Meet The Team
In 2014, Neal founded Zoic to address the systematic underfunding of early-stage health technology startups, and focus on identifying, funding, and developing the next era of health. Neal works closely with his portfolio companies to provide strategic and operational value beyond capital, supervising workshops to build a large-scale IP development strategy, and codeveloping deals with potential strategic acquirers.
Neal has over 15 years of successful experience in the tech startup space. In 2007, Neal co-founded of Ambature, a superconductor company leading the charge towards room-temperature superconductors, a key technology to enabling quantum computers and fusion reactors. As founding CEO, Neal led the company to raise $20M in funding and create 3,700 patent claims, accounting for more than half of patents in the world in the field. In 2019, Neal co-founded HDT Bio, an RNA-based immunotherapy company that has received hundreds of millions in government funding to advance the battle against the world’s deadliest infectious diseases and cancer, and distribute their advances to patients globally.
Neal’s accomplishments at Ambature and HDT have made him a valuable and trusted source of advice for other CEOs. He has served on the Board of Directors of 10 other startups and has offered guidance to over 100 CEOs through his mentoring role at Creative Destruction Labs.
Ian has been with the firm since its inception in 2014. An undergraduate student at that time, Ian created his own degree program to equip himself to quickly master health venture capital, from financial modeling to clinical trial design. Ian’s entrepreneurial nature made that unconventional decision an easy one.
When Zoic was founded, Ian led the fundamental analysis of potential investment opportunities and crafted the founding Zoic investment thesis: 10X returns are reliably generated only by 10X improvements on the status quo. He has evaluated over 3,000 life sciences companies, serves as an Advisor and/or board member to six companies, and plays a key role in the firm’s investment decisions.
In the ensuing years, Ian has taken a lead role in establishing the firm’s workflows and operations. He has negotiated and drafted the key provisions of investment contracts, and manages the firm’s information storage, communication, and security protocols.
In his spare time, Ian advises an investment group dedicated to leveraged buyouts of small privately-held companies. He is also an avid reader, and particularly enjoys exploring mass psychology, the evolution of knowledge, anthropology and complexity science.
Adrian joined Zoic in 2021 after graduating from the Harvard Chemical Biology Program, bringing over a decade of interdisciplinary technology experience to help with the firm’s stringent due diligence operations. His initial work examined the investment landscape in the post-pandemic era, identifying fields and technologies ripe for innovation where a strategic investor could find an edge, and scouting for seed-stage companies that fit this criteria.
Adrian now oversees new investments at Zoic, reviewing over 1000 health startups a year searching for the rare companies with the potential to transform their field, and supporting them in developing the mastery required to build their technology into an ecosystem. He leads investment committee meetings, identifying the most de-risked investment opportunities that fit the Zoic thesis, and manages the firm’s evolving investment strategy, conducting research modeling emerging technologies and characterizing signals of scientific revolution. As a patent practitioner, he works to develop and safeguard the intellectual property of the Zoic portfolio, leading IP strategy workshops for portfolio companies. He also supports startup mentoring network Creative Destruction Labs as a Scientific Advisor, assessing and assisting dozens of health startups.
Adrian has a broad background in biotechnology and methods development research, and consults on technology and intellectual property strategy for startups, searching for poetry in the distillation of far-reaching ideas into simple principles. In his spare time Adrian enjoys composition, of both music and puzzles. He sings baritone in barbershop, and is an avid vegan chef and food science enthusiast.