The long weekend didn’t slow down the IPO train barreling down the tracks. More life sciences companies announced and closed their initial public offerings, bringing millions more to their coffers.
The long weekend didn’t slow down the IPO train barreling down the tracks. More life sciences companies announced and closed their initial public offerings, bringing millions more to their coffers.
On the heels of “landmark clinical data” for the safety and efficacy of in vivo CRISPR genome editing in humans, Intellia filed for a massive $600 million IPO. Intellia and Regeneron’s NTLA-101 is a single-dose treatment for ATTR, a rare, progressive and fatal disease that causes the liver to abnormal TTR produce protein that tends to misfold. It’s the first CRISPR therapy to be administered systematically, delivered via lipid nanoparticles instead of viruses.
“These are the first ever clinical data suggesting that we can precisely edit target cells within the body to treat genetic disease with a single intravenous infusion of CRISPR,” said Intellia’s president and chief executive officer John Leonard. “The interim results support our belief that NTLA-2001 has the potential to halt and reverse the devastating complications of ATTR amyloidosis with a single dose... With these data, we believe we are truly opening a new era of medicine.”
Selling 4.755 million shares of its common stock at a whopping $47 a share, Kymera rounded up $223.5 million in its Nasdaq debut. The company is advancing multiple assets to treat a broad range of immune-inflammatory diseases, hematologic malignancies and solid tumors. Kymera’s most advanced program is KT-474 in Phase I for IL-1R/TLR-driven conditions and diseases, such as atopic dermatitis and rheumatoid arthritis. Each of the company’s assets addresses high impact targets within the IL-1R/TLR or JAK/STAT pathways.
Virginia-based Acumen sold one-shy of a million shares of its stock last week, taking in $160 million in IPO funds and trading under the ticker symbol ABOS. Acumen is developing a novel approach to targeting target amyloid-beta oligomers, (AβOs), which the company believes to be a key underlying cause of Alzheimer’s disease. Funds will be funneled into its targeted immunotherapy drug candidate, ACU193, currently in Phase I for patients with mild cognitive impairment and dementia from AD. Early-stage trial data is anticipated by the end of next year.
ArriVent Biopharma
Launching to identify compounds “validated through rigorous discovery and development processes in China,” ArriVent has $150 million in Series A funds to get started. The new funding will be used to advance the company’s potential best-in-class epidermal growth factor receptor tyrosine kinase inhibitor (EGFR TKI) furmonertinib, a lung cancer treatment that has been licensed from Allist Pharmaceuticals. Allist’s furmonertinib previously received approval in EGFR T790M mutation-positive locally advanced or metastatic non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) in March 2021.
Med-tech company CVRx landed $126 million in fresh funds from its IPO last week. CVRx developed the first neuromodulation device to treat the symptoms of heart failure (HF), dubbed Barostim Neo. Already having scored FDA approval, the device sends out electrical pulses that cause the brain to regulate imbalances in the nervous system, acting as a treatment for heart failure. Earnings from the IPO will fuel the commercialization of Barostim Neo as well as fund further R&D to apply the tech to other indications.
Aerovate Therapeutics
With lightning speed, Aerovate debuted on the Nasdaq less than one year after its launch. Raising $121.5 million in its IPO, the Boston company will advance AV-101, its dry powder inhaled formulation of the drug imatinib for the treatment of pulmonary arterial hypertension. The drug is a generic cancer treatment for forms of leukemia and stomach tumors. The company believes that its inhaled formulation should decrease the adverse effects of the oral product revealed by reducing systemic exposure to the drug while simultaneously increasing the dose of medicine delivered directly to diseased lung tissues.
Co-founded by Nobel laureate and CRISPR pioneer Jennifer Doudna, Ph.D., Caribou scooped up $115 million in Series C funds four short months ago. Now the company has placed a $100-million place holder to add its name to the Nasdaq ticker. Funds from the IPO will funnel into Caribou’s three off-the-shelf CAR-T therapies. The lead is an anti-CD10 candidate, CB-010, which is currently in Phase 1 for B-cell non-Hodgkin lymphoma. The raise will also support IND-enabling activities for CB-011 and CB-012, both for relapsed or refractory multiple myeloma but with different targets.
On the heels of a $125 million crossover round in March and a company acquisition, Absci is raring to hit the market. Filing for a $100 million placeholder, the company’s platform is built to design and generate protein-based drug candidates and help screen them for optimal functioning. The acquisition of Viva Biotech’s synthetic biology company Totient provides Absci with antibody and target discovery technology. With seven partners for various drug candidates, Absci has not yet had a candidate licensed for clinical or commercial use.
With around 240 applications circulating in over 1,000 hospitals globally, cloud-based software-as-a-service provider Sophia Genetics is ready to take it public. Drug development, clinical trials, real-world patients all provide mountains of data to sort through. AI dramatically speeds the process for discovery and development. Funds from the IPO will continue to build out the platform, expand marketing efforts as well as maintain existing partnerships. Sophia filed for a $100 million raise.
Rallybio
Three-year-old Rallybio reported a positive proof of concept and turned around with a filing for a $100 million IPO in the space of a day last week. RLBY211 is a polyclonal anti-HPA-1a antibody aimed at suppressing a pregnant mother’s immune response to prevent it from attacking baby’s platelets when the baby is carrying an inherited platelet protein foreign to the mother. FNAIT occurs in about one in every 2,000 births and is usually treated after birth. Rallybio also has a subcutaneous monoclonal antibody in the works for the same indication expected in the clinic early next year. Between the two treatments, the company hopes to eliminate the risk of FNAIT.
Just a few weeks after introducing its latest tech, cell analysis solutions developer Cytek Biosciences is ready to take a swing at the market, filing for a $100 million IPO. The company’s Aurora and Northern Lights systems are flow cytometers that deliver full-spectrum profiling. With over 750 instruments in 620 companies around the world, Cytek’s latest release is a cell-sorting system that delivers high-resolution capabilities at the single-cell level to resolve and sort challenging cell populations, regardless of assay complexity.
Antheia
Synthetic biology startup Antheia raised $73 million in Series B financing to support the company’s efforts to bring its first plant-based medicine to market and support the production of necessary active pharmaceutical ingredients and materials. The financing will enable the company to use its synthetic biology platform to engineer the molecules necessary to support the development of essential medications that rely on plant-based materials, avoiding the recurring supply disruptions from natural and man-made disasters. Its synthetic biology platform was developed to enable resilient and agile production of these essential medications, including analgesics, antitussives, chemotherapeutics, and neurotransmitter inhibitors.
