# Isaac Ciechanover

> Isaac Ciechanover is a seed investor at Polaris Partners backing Biotechnology and Medical. See 2 investments, check sizes, portfolio. Updated Aug 2026.

- Type: Angel Investor
- Fund: [Polaris Partners](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/polaris-partners)
- Location: San Francisco, United States
- Total investments: 2
- Last investment: Mar 2021
- Lead investor: 50%
- Last updated: Aug 2026
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/isaac-ciechanover-9584b0170/

Isaac Ciechanover is a physician, investor and entrepreneur driven by a passion to improve the practice of medicine. Motivated by the belief that the majority of medical discoveries still lie ahead, he has dedicated the past 20 years to working with entrepreneurs and life sciences organizations to advance medicine through innovation and technology.He founded Atara Biotherapeutics in October 2012. Previously, he was a partner in the life sciences practice at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. Earlier as Celgene’s Executive Director in Business Development, he spearheaded the company’s venture capital efforts and led licensing and M&A activities with an aggregate value of more than $6.7 billion. Also at Celgene, he was Global Project Leader for the company’s first clinical-stage biologic therapy. Isaac has also held business development and venture capital roles at Amylin Pharmaceuticals, Pequot Ventures’ healthcare practice and Pfizer. Intellectually curious (and undeterred by student debt), Isaac holds a B.A. in Psychology from Stanford University, an M.Phil. in Epidemiology from Cambridge University, an M.D. from Weill Cornell Medical College and an MBA from Harvard Business School. For fun, he enjoys cycling, scuba diving and building Lego with his two children. His all-time favorite albums are Pink Floyd’s “The Dark Side of the Moon,” Radiohead’s “OK Computer” and Ruggero Leoncavallo’s Italian opera, Pagliacci, with Herbet Von Karajan conducting.

## Investment focus

### Industry

| Industry | Investments | Share |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Biotechnology | 2 | 100% |
| Medical | 1 | 50% |
| Genetics | 1 | 50% |
| Biopharma | 1 | 50% |
| Health Care | 1 | 50% |

7 industries tracked in total.

### Stage

| Stage | Investments | Share |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Seed | 1 | 50% |
| Series C | 1 | 50% |

## Investments

| Company | Description | Amount | Stage | Date | Website |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| EGenesis | EGenesis operates as a biotechnology company. The Company focuses on leveraging genome editing technology to deliver safe and effective human transplantable cells, tissues, and organs. eGenesis serves patients worldwide. | $125M | Series C | Mar 02, 2021 |  |
| Auron Therapeutics | Auron Therapeutics is to develop therapies to cure cancer by radically changing the paradigm of cancer therapeutics from cell killing, to transformation of malignant cells into normal cells. This transformation, called differentiation therapy, reactivates endogenous cellular programs to elicit tumor cell maturation and the transition from cancerto normal tissue. Its unique platforms allow for integration of large-omic datasets and miniaturized high throughput flow cytometry to rapidly identify and validate multiple targets and drugs in primary human patient samples. | $12.8M | Seed | Jan 28, 2021 |  |

2 of 2 investments shown.

## Co-investors
- [Eli Lilly](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/eli-lilly) — VC Fund, 2 deals together
- [Leaps by Bayer](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/leaps-by-bayer) — VC Fund, 2 deals together
- [Qiming Venture Partners USA](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/qiming-venture-partners-usa) — VC Fund, 2 deals together
- [Samsara BioCapital](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/samsara-biocapital) — VC Fund, 2 deals together
- [Alta Partners](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/alta-partners) — VC Fund, 1 deal together
- [Arkin Bio Ventures](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/arkin-bio-ventures) — VC Fund, 1 deal together

## About Polaris Partners

VC Fund · Boston, United States

Polaris Partners invests in healthcare and biotechnology companies. Their healthcare portfolio companies' care delivery models include digital health, consumer-centric businesses, patient-provider solutions, data science, and analytics. Their life sciences and biotechnology portfolio companies focus on molecules and platforms, therapeutics,and genomics.

5 contacts available at Polaris Partners.

| Name | Title | Profile |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Isaac Ciechanover | Partner | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/isaac-ciechanover |
| Sharif Vakili | Associate | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/sharif-vakili |
| Alan Crane | Partner and Entrepreneur | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/alan-crane |
| Alexandra Cantley | Partner | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/alexandra-cantley-1374 |
| Amir Nashat | Managing Partner | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/amir-nashat |

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## FAQ

### What does Isaac Ciechanover invest in?

Isaac Ciechanover invests primarily in Biotechnology, Medical and Genetics startups, most often at Seed and Series C stage. Most of the 2 investments tracked by Shizune back companies in United States. The Investment Focus section breaks down every industry, stage and country in the portfolio.

### When did Isaac Ciechanover last invest?

The most recent investment recorded for Isaac Ciechanover closed in Mar 2021. Shizune tracks 2 investments in total for this profile, including round sizes, stages and portfolio companies, all sourced from confirmed public funding rounds and refreshed monthly.

### Is Shizune's investor data accurate?

Yes — every stat on this profile is calculated from confirmed public funding rounds monitored across hundreds of sources since 2020. This profile was last refreshed in Aug 2026 and is updated monthly. Spotted something off? Use the “Suggest an edit” link near the top of the page.

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