Rehovot-based drug development company NeuroDerm(Nasdaq:NDRM) has raised $67 million in its Nasdaq secondary offering at a company value of $365 million. NeuroDerm has developed a system for subcutaneous delivery of drugs for treatment of diseases, mainly Parkinson's Disease, as a substitute for the current oral delivery of the drug.
With its share price of $17, the company raised 16% more than planned compared with the share price of $15.60 when its prospectus was filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). With underwriters options the offering could reach as high as $75.5 million, far higher than the planned $58 million. The underwriters for the current offering are Jeffreys and Cowen & Co and the accountants are PwC Israel.
NeuroDerm's shares rose 8.3% on Nasdaq yesterday to $17.13.
The company's impressive secondary offering comes eight months after NeuroDerm raised $45 million in its IPO at $10 per share.
Managed by CEO Oded Lieberman, NeuroDerm's principal shareholders are chairman Robert Taub (19%), Uwe Wascher (17%), and Prof. Shmuel Cabilly (15.5%). Taub, a resident of Belgium and an active investor in the Israeli biomedical sector, is a cofounder of Omrix Biopharmaceuticals, sold to Johnson & Johnson for $438 million.
Like NeuroDerm, Omrix also entered the stock exchange at a substantially lower value than it initially sought (only $143 million). Also like NeuroDerm, its share posted exceptional rises in its first year of trading, and the company was eventually sold at triple its IPO value. Wascher is a close friend of Taub; the two men also jointly invested in a number of companies, including Omrix. Cabilly, an Israeli, was a researcher at Genentech who discovered a patented drug that gained that company hundreds of millions of dollars in royalties. He is also an active investor in the Israeli biomedical sector.
The company's clinical plan is undertaking a trial against the oral drug with the appropriate dosage of the drug for patients with severe cases of Parkinson's in the first half of 2015. At the same time, a trial is underway to test only the levels of the product in the blood. Results are expected by the end of the year, after which a Phase III trial will be necessary. The company hopes its product will be approved in 2018.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on July 16, 2015
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