Richard Baxter Managing Director & Operating Partner
Rich Baxter brings to Birch Lake several decades of fundraising and investment experience across complex capital structures, including control equity and minority equity investments, senior secured debt financings, royalty financings, and public bank debt and bond transactions. He has deep vertical expertise in virtually every healthcare sector, from large pharmaceutical brand royalties and ultra-orphan specialty pharma companies to contract research and contract manufacturing organizations, hospitals, surgery centers, home healthcare, and healthcare IT.
Rich co-founded the healthcare group for the Drawbridge Special Opportunities Fund at Fortress Investment Group, which invested approximately $1 billion in emerging life sciences companies. He also led other successful healthcare investment teams as co-head of the royalty and credit group at OrbiMed Advisors LLC and co-head of the healthcare team at Hayfin Capital Management LLP, where his team deployed $1.4 billion in capital over four years. Rich co-founded New Health Capital Partners, a health care focused special situations fund which raised and invested over $150 million.
Prior to his investment career, Rich served as Chief Business Officer at Concurrent Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a platform technology company and held senior roles at PathoGenesis Corporation and ViroPharma Incorporated, specialty pharma companies, and SmithKline Beecham Pharmaceuticals, a large cap pharma company. Rich earned his A.B. (cum laude) from Princeton University and his Masters of Business Administration from Harvard Business School.