Hatteras Venture Partners

Hatteras Venture Partners is a Durham, North Carolina-based venture firm that has been backing health innovation companies for more than two decades. Operating from one of the most important biomedical clusters in the United States, with proximity to Research Triangle Park, Duke, and UNC, the firm draws on deep regional ties to academic medicine and translational research while investing nationally across biotech, medtech, and digital health.

The firm’s thesis covers biotech, medical devices, and digital health, with growing interest in generative AI applied to drug discovery, clinical workflow, and care delivery. Portfolio companies including HistoSonics, a histotripsy non-invasive ablation platform, and Tune Therapeutics, an epigenetic editing company, reflect Hatteras’s appetite for technically ambitious bets that can transform standards of care. The firm is comfortable with both platform-driven biotech investments that require multi-round capital commitments and capital-efficient medtech and digital health plays that can reach commercial milestones with disciplined spend.

Hatteras invests at Seed, Series A, and Series B with check sizes of $5M to $25M. The geographic focus is primarily the United States, with a notable concentration in companies emerging from or operating near Southeast research universities. Founders should expect Hatteras to lead or co-lead rounds, take board seats, and participate substantially in follow-on rounds for companies that hit milestones.

The team brings scientific, medical, and investing backgrounds, with multiple partners holding clinical or PhD credentials. This depth is particularly relevant for biotech and medtech founders, who find that diligence conversations are conducted at a level of scientific specificity that generalist firms cannot match. Decisions move through a partnership-driven process with formal IC approval, and the firm is candid about where conviction is or is not building.

Hatteras’s working style is high-conviction and patient. The firm understands the timelines and capital intensity of regulated healthcare innovation and structures its support accordingly, with reserves dedicated to follow-on participation through clinical and commercial milestones. Portfolio founders describe partners who are deeply engaged on scientific strategy, regulatory pathway, and corporate development, with strong networks across pharma business development, hospital systems, and academic medical centers. Reporting expectations are formal and aligned with regulated-product disciplines. The firm is not a good fit for founders who want a hands-off capital partner; Hatteras takes board seats with intent and engages substantively. For health innovation founders, particularly those leveraging Southeast research institutions or building in capital-intensive translational categories, Hatteras represents one of the most experienced specialist partners operating today, with a track record of building companies that reach meaningful exits through both M&A and public markets, and with a brand that opens doors with strategic acquirers and follow-on investors when the time comes.