Nurix Therapeutics, a US-based oncology therapy developer backed by pharmaceutical firm Celgene, priced its shares at $19 on Thursday and raised $209m when it went public on Friday.
The company issued 11 million shares on the Nasdaq Global Market and is trading under the ticker symbol NRIX. Nurix had initially planned to sell 8.8 million shares priced at $16 to $18.
Founded in 2009 as Kura Therapeutics, Nurix is working on small molecule drugs aimed at cancer and immune disorders.
The company commercialises research by co-founders John Kuriyan and Michael Rapé from University of California (UC), Berkeley, and Arthur Weiss, a professor at UC San Francisco.
A total of $43m to $46m of proceeds have been allocated to move NX-2127 – which targets cancers including leukaemia and non-Hodgkin lymphoma – through a planned phase 1b trial.
Another $28m to $31m will support the completion of a phase 1a study for immuno-oncology asset NX-1607. Nurix will also use $49m to $57m to drive the development of its preclinical pipeline, while any remaining capital will fund R&D and platform development.
Nurix received $120m in a round led by Foresite Capital in March 2020, with participation from Column Group (TCG), Third Rock Ventures, Tavistock Group’s Boxer Capital subsidiary, EcoR1 Capital, Redmile Group, Wellington Management and Bain Capital’s Life Sciences fund.
The company previously obtained $17m in series C capital from Celgene as part of a strategic partnership deal in 2015, adding to approximately $34.5m in earlier funding from backers such as Third Rock Ventures and TCG.
Bristol-Myers Squibb, the pharmaceutical firm that purchased Celgene in November 2019, held a 6.2% ahead of the offering that has been diluted to 4.4%.
TCG remains Nurix’s largest shareholder (18.2% post-IPO), followed by Third Rock (14.6%), while Foresite Capital (5.3%) is also a notable shareholder.
JP Morgan Securities, Piper Sandler, Stifel Nicolaus and Needham & Company are acting as underwriters for the offering. They have been granted a 30-day option to purchase up to an additional 1.65 million shares.
