US-based medical diagnostics company LipoScience. previously backed by corporates including General Electric, plans to raise up to $86.3m in its initial public offering (IPO).
The filing contained no details concerning the number of shares due to be offered or the expected price, but it was confirmed that investment banks Barclays Capital, UBS Investment Bank and Piper Jaffray will underwrite the IPO. The company plans to list on Nasdaq.
LipoScience had previously filed for an IPO of up to $100m, in March 2002, but was forced to abandon their plans later that year due to insufficient interest from potential investors. Piper Jaffray, then known as Bancorp Piper Jaffray, also acted as one of the underwriters for the earlier IPO.
The company’s round of series F funding in 2006 raised $13m from a range of investors including GE Capital Equity Investments, an investment division of US-based conglomerate General Electric and Varian, the US-based scientific instrument manufacturer now owned by Agilent Technologies, which owns 6% of LipoScience.
Private equity firms Camden Partners and Invesco Private Capital, and venture capital firms Pappas Ventures, Sightline Partners and Three Arch Partners also invested in the F round.
Prior to this, LipoScience raised more than $15m in a series E round of funding, closing in August 2003. Partners in this round included GE Capital Equity, Three Arch and Pappas in addition to US-based investment bank Piper Jaffray.
Founded as an offshoot from research carried out at North Carolina State University, LipoScience develops proprietary tests for diabetes and heart disease based on Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR), which produces a digital representation of the molecules present in a blood sample.More than 5 million of the company’s test have been ordered by customers.
The company plans to use the funds raised by the IPO to invest in its research and development program in addition to increasing its sales and marketing staff.