specialty-pharma
(5)
The Firm That Bets on the Toolmakers, Not the Cure
For nearly four decades, Ampersand Capital Partners has skipped the lottery of drug discovery and quietly backed the companies that make the drug discovery possible. In May 2026 it closed a $1.5 billion fund in a single day.
Courier Health
Courier Health is a New York City software company building the first patient relationship management (CRM) platform purpose-built for life sciences. Its AI-powered system connects fragmented data across biopharma commercial teams to orchestrate the patient journey - from education and enrollment through benefits, prior authorization, therapy initiation, and adherence - helping patients with chronic and rare diseases start and stay on treatment. The company raised a $50M Series B led by Oak HC/FT in April 2026.
Shorla Oncology
Shorla Oncology is a specialty pharmaceutical company based in Clonmel, Ireland, with a U.S. base in Cambridge, Massachusetts, that develops and commercializes innovative oncology drugs for orphan and pediatric cancers. Founded in 2018 by Sharon Cunningham and Orlaith Ryan, Shorla focuses on indications where existing treatments are limited, in shortage, or poorly suited to patients - reformulating and reinventing cancer therapies into easier-to-administer forms such as oral liquids and ready-to-dilute vials. The company markets four FDA-approved products in the U.S. and is advancing an early-stage pipeline addressing rare cancers.
Sharon Cunningham
Sharon Cunningham is the CEO and co-founder of Shorla Oncology, a specialty pharmaceutical company she launched in 2018 with Orlaith Ryan out of Clonmel, Ireland, focused on reformulating oncology drugs for women's, orphan, and pediatric cancers. A PwC-trained chartered accountant with an MBA from UCD Smurfit, she relocated from Waterford to Boston in 2021 to lead Shorla's U.S. commercialization, which now includes four FDA-approved products. She was named EY Entrepreneur Of The Year Ireland 2024 (with Ryan) and represented Ireland at the EY World Entrepreneur competition in 2025.
Verix
Verix is a Santa Clara-based software company that builds Tovana, an AI-powered commercial optimization platform for pharmaceutical and life sciences companies. Tovana unifies fragmented commercial data - prescription records, lab results, demographics, and digital marketing signals - and layers predictive modeling, GenAI, and automation on top so brand and field teams can decide the next best action, find the right patients, target the right physicians, and forecast more accurately. Its no-code architecture and pre-built connectors let most deployments go live in 4-8 weeks, and the platform is used by global drugmakers including Bayer, Novartis, GSK, Roche, and Kyowa Kirin.