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Key Takeaways:
The company's PARP inhibitor drug for advanced cancers was approved in China last year and is being covered by the public health insurance program
With a big R&D budget, Impact Therapeutics remains deeply in the red and needed IPO cash to pump into its drug pipeline
As the battle against cancer enters an era of precision medicine, investors are starting to bet on a new type of drug that can exploit genetic weaknesses in tumor cells.
These "synthetic lethality" therapies are designed to work on mutated cells that have already lost one of the two protein pathways they use to keep growing. By inhibiting the second route, the drugs can wipe out cancer cells, leaving healthy tissue unharmed.
The Hong Kong stock market welcomed its first maker of these specialized anti-cancer drugs on May 13, when Impact Therapeutics Inc. (7630.HK) pulled off a stunning debut. Its shares doubled on the first day of trade, closing at HK$41.86, after a public offering that was oversubscribed by more than 2000 times.
Impact Therapeutics sold about 41.98 million shares at HK$20.1, pricing the offer at the top end of the indicative range, to deliver gross proceeds of about HK$844 million ($108 million) and net returns of about HK$759 million in an IPO jointly sponsored by Goldman Sachs and CICC.
Founded in 2009, the innovative drug company specializes in synthetic lethality techniques, targeting cancer cells that have already lost one of two ways to repair their DNA. When the drug blocks the back-up path, the tumor cell accumulates damage and eventually dies in ...
