Chad Waite

OVP Venture Partners has led a massive $15 million investment in Limerick BioPharma -- a South San Francisco company that is developing treatments to reduce side effects of drugs.

As part of the deal, OVP's Chad Waite has joined the board of the company, which also named existing board member Corey Goodman as chairman. Other investors in the deal include ARCH Venture Partners, Sevin Rosen Funds and Altitude Funds.

OVP didn't say how much of the series C financing it contributed, but as lead investor it likely added a significant chunk to the round. Typically, OVP plays on a smaller financial scale, investing in early-stage deals where it can play a bigger role in the formation of the product and business model.

But that's not always the case, said OVP 's Sara Morris.

"The majority of our investments are in early-stage companies - that remains a constant - but we have and will continue to do later-stage deals that make sense," Morris said.

OVP recently participated in the $30 million venture round for NanoString and the $9 million round for Adapx, but in both cases the Kirkland venture firm was an earlier-stage investor and didn't lead the larger rounds.

In a press release, Waite was obviously bullish on Limerick's prospects.

"Limerick's novel platform has led to the development of an attractive pipeline of products for metabolic disease, immunosuppression, and mitigation of opiate side effects," he said.  "The company is now well-positioned to capitalize on this platform and to exploit the commercial potential of its growing library of biochemical activators of cellular transport. Early human trials are quite promising."