Poolbeg Pharma floats on AIM raising £25 million
On its first day of dealings, (POLB ) , a spin out of London-listed Open Orphan, announced that it has raised £25 million as part of its floatation on London’s AIM market.
Poolbeg Pharma, which is focused on developing treatments for infectious diseases, highlighted to investors that an oversubscribed fundraise resulted in an increased raise from £20 million to £25 million ‘despite some investor scale back.’
Existing Open Orphan shareholders, who will receive direct shares in the firm, now hold 51% of the stock. With Poolbeg’s shares priced at 10p, the firm holds a market value of £50 million.
In recent weeks, the Company has informed investors that it has earmarked some of the £25m proceeds to fund clinical trials for its advanced pipeline therapy for severe influenza.
Open Orphan has explained to investors that Poolbeg’s IPO comes at a time when, post-pandemic, there has been an explosion in the growth of the infectious disease pharmaceuticals market, which is estimated to grow to in excess of $250 billion by 2025.
Upon its admission to AIM, Poolbeg stated that its main drug asset, POLB 00, will be ready for Phase II clinical trials ‘with modest investment where they can be monetised / licenced to big pharmaceutical companies.’ The London-based firm told investors that it aspires to become a “one-stop shop” for Big Pharma seeking mid-stage products to licence or acquire.
The Group’s portfolio also includes PredictViral™ Biomarker platform for early prediction of severe disease and the Vaccine Discovery Platform which uses human challenge model data.
Open Orphan’s Board has said it believes that the assets in Poolbeg would be ‘best developed separately from the core services business’ to maximise shareholder value.
A spin-out transaction could secure separate financial resources for the assets, enable their accelerated development and achieve commercial milestones, the Company told investors.
In a research note released in April 2021, analysts at UK broker finnCap wrote of the news: ‘Having demonstrated its ability to spin-out non-core assets through Poolbeg Pharma, we have confidence in assigning value to Open Orphan’s portfolio of non-core assets.’
Also commenting on ORPH’s outlook, analysts at research firm Arden Partners said the group’s pipeline is ‘continuing to grow through interactions with key global pharma players with signed deals in 2021 already ahead of 2020, underpinning confidence in the outlook.’
In recent weeks, Jeremy Skillington, who was recently appointed as Chief Executive of Poolbeg, said in an interview that the firm plans to develop a “a conveyor belt of therapies”, and that the proceeds from the IPO could bring up to six assets to the saleable stage.
Cathal Friel, Poolbeg Pharma’s chairman and CEO of Open Orphan, will be the main shareholder of the spin out and will see his existing 12.6% stake go down to 7.3% by the share sale while he increases his number of shares from 31.4 million to 36.4 million.
Today, Skillington commented: "The IPO and funds raised have provided a strong platform to begin our rapid growth plan. With experienced management on board and the exciting assets acquired from Open Orphan, we look forward to delivering value to our shareholder base and generating innovation in the previously overlooked infectious disease space which is now one of the fastest growing markets and is expected to exceed $250bn by 2025.”
Addressing shareholders, Friel said, “We have been deliberate in creating a company with a capital light model that can create excellent returns and value for its shareholders with substantially less risk than the traditional biotech model, which is why I was so excited to invest £500,000 personally in the IPO alongside incoming investors.
“At the heart of Poolbeg is the desire to improve infectious disease treatments for patients and provide valuable assets big pharma needs to improve patient care. It's a win-win,” he added.
Friel said last week that Poolbeg was also planning to list on New York’s Nasdaq ‘in the coming months. He said: “I am certain that we can get it to a billion dollars market capitalisation within a year or two and that it can be a very large business. Going to Nasdaq is a statement of intent. We are going straight to Nasdaq in the summer of next year. Because we are going faster with Poolbeg we deliberately did not seek an Irish listing this time.”
In a new Q&A with Vox Markets, Chairman, Cathal Friel, and CEO of Poolbeg, Jeremy Skillington discuss the Company's ready made assets focusing on unmet clinical needs including their lead asset in severe influenza and the large data set ready for analysis.
Follow News & Updates from :
Disclaimer & Declaration of Interest
The information, investment views and recommendations in this article are provided for general information purposes only. Nothing in this article should be construed as a solicitation to buy or sell any financial product relating to any companies under discussion or to engage in or refrain from doing so or engaging in any other transaction. Any opinions or comments are made to the best of the knowledge and belief of the writer but no responsibility is accepted for actions based on such opinions or comments. Vox Markets may receive payment from companies mentioned for enhanced profiling or publication presence. The writer may or may not hold investments in the companies under discussion.