University of California Board of Regents, Oakland, at its Thursday meeting is expected to vote on whether to create UC Ventures, a stand-alone venture capital investment vehicle and to make an initial commitment of $250 million, said Dianne Klein, spokeswoman, in an e-mail.
If approved by the regents, UC Ventures expects to accept outside institutional investors as well, she wrote.
UC Ventures staff would handle day-to-day responsibilities. The University of California plans to create an independent advisory board of “leading figures in Silicon Valley and the rest of California,” a news release said. The advisory board members will be announced in the coming months.
The initial $250 million commitment will be made from UC's $8.3 billion endowment. As of June 30, the regents oversaw a $90.6 billion portfolio.
The venture would seek to generate attractive, risk-adjusted returns by investing in commercial opportunities arising from University of California research. UC's chief investment office would hold certain key governance rights and help UC Ventures develop in-house expertise.
If approved, University of California officials plan to launch UC Ventures in 2015.
Also, the University of California endowment returned a net 18.7% for the fiscal year ended June 30, surpassing its benchmark of 16.5%, according to material prepared for a board meeting last week.
The endowment had an asset allocation of 46.1% alternatives, 43.1% equity, 10.2% fixed income and 0.6% cash.
For the three-, five- and 10-year periods ended June 30, the endowment returned an annualized net 9.7%, 12% and 7.7%, surpassing their policy benchmarks of 7.7%, 10.1% and 7.1%, respectively.
William Ryan, director of client relations services in the office of the chief investment officer of the regents, could not immediately be reached for additional information.
