The two pharmaceutical companies are going public and anticipate raising more than $250 million to advance research and development programs and support their business initiatives.
John Smith/VIEWpress
Two pharmaceutical companies, Longboard Pharmaceuticals and Prometheus Biosciences, are going public and anticipate raising more than $250 million to advance research and development programs and support their business initiatives.
San Diego-based Longboard, which launched last year, announced it will begin trading on the Nasdaq exchange this morning at $16 per share. The stock will trade under the ticker symbol LBPH. The company expects to net $80 million in its initial public offering. Longboard is focused on the development of centrally acting product candidates designed to be highly selective for specific G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs).
Longboard, which was formerly known as Arena Neuroscience, was formed by parent company Arena Pharmaceuticals in March 2020 with a mission to develop novel central nervous system (CNS)-targeted assets discovered by Arena’s validated GPCR research engine. Its lead clinical program is LP352, a next-generation 5-HT2C agonist, for treatment-resistant developmental and epileptic encephalopathies. LP352 is currently in Phase I.
Longboard is also developing LP143, a centrally acting, full agonist of the cannabinoid type 2 receptor (CB2), and LP659, a centrally acting, next-generation, highly selective S1P receptor modulator. The asset, still in preclinical phase, could be directed against ALS and other neuroinflammatory disorders. Another asset in its pipeline is LP659, an S1P receptor modulator for multiple neuroinflammatory disorders.
Citigroup, Evercore ISI, Guggenheim Securities and Cantor are acting as joint book-running managers for the offering.
Also launching on the Nasdaq exchange this morning is Prometheus Biosciences, a San Diego company focused on the development of therapeutic and companion diagnostic products for the treatment of inflammatory bowel disease. Shares of Prometheus will trade under the ticker symbol RXDX. The stock opens today at $19 per share. Prometheus said it anticipates gross proceeds from its IPO to be $190 million.
Earlier this month, Prometheus began dosing patients in the multiple ascending dose (MAD) portion of the Phase Ia study of its lead asset PRA023, a humanized IgG1 monoclonal antibody (mAb) that has been shown to block tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-like ligand 1A (TL1A). PRA023 is being developed for the treatment of the two most common forms of IBD, ulcerative colitis (UC) and Crohn’s disease (CD). The MAD portion of the study comes about three months after Prometheus commenced dosing in the single ascending dose portion of the clinical trial.
SVB Leerink, Credit Suisse, Stifel and Guggenheim Securities are acting as joint book-running managers for Prometheus’s offering.
Prometheus and Longboard are the thirty-first and thirty-second biotech companies to go public this year, according to BioPharm Catalyst’s IPO calendar.
