UPDATE 1-France's DrugAbuse aims to raise $25 mln in IPO
Wed Jun 14, 2006 9:42am ET
PARIS, June 14 (Reuters) - France's DrugAbuse Science (DAS), which develops treatments tackling drug and alcohol addiction, aims to raise 20 million euros ($25.2 million) in an initial public offering of shares.
It said on Wednesday it would issue about 1.8 million shares at 11.10 euros each and sell them via a private placement to specialised investors as it seeks to fund late-stage clinical trials of drug Naltrexone Depot, which treats alcohol dependence.
DAS hopes to benefit from a growing market to fight addiction with drugs. Those sales are estimated to be 300 million euros ($377.9 million) this year but should boom in coming years because only 10 percent of 40 million potential patients are now being treated with drugs, the company said.
Following the IPO, 40 percent of DAS's share capital would be traded on the Alternext exchange, while management would own 10 percent and other investors -- CDC ECI, 3i and Nomura International -- would own the rest.
The offering will close on June 28, and the shares start trading at the beginning of July.
BioNest Partners, which is managing the share sale, said the IPO was priced conservatively to value the company at about 45 million euros. The brokerage estimated that its value could amount to as much as 57 million euros and that DAS could become profitable as early as in 2009.
DAS expects to submit Naltrexone Depot, a once-a-month injection, for marketing approval in the United States and Europe in the first quarter of 2009 and forecasts the drug's annual sales could reach 300 million to 500 million euros.
It hopes to find a U.S. partner to help it launch and sell the drug, which would compete with Vivitrol, a monthly injection which was developed by Alkermes (ALKS.O: Quote, Profile, Research) and is marketed and sold by Cephalon (CEPH.O: Quote, Profile, Research) of the United States.
Naltrexone is a new formulation of an existing compound.
DAS is also developing a drug that tackles cocaine addiction, DAS-431, and is in Phase II clinical trials. It may be launched in the market in 2012. |
