US-based genomic healthcare technology developer Syros Pharmaceuticals closed an initial public offering that allowed pharmaceutical company WuXi PharmaTech to exit at $57.5m yesterday.
Syros issued an initial four million shares priced at $12.50 last week before selling an additional 600,000 shares to its underwriters. The company’s stock closed at $18.00 on Nasdaq yesterday afternoon.
Founded in 2011, Syros develops therapeutics medicines that aim to control expression of disease-driving genes by targeting the non-coding region of the genome.
The company will use the IPO proceeds to fund a proof-of-concept phase 2 clinical trial of SY-1425, a lead product candidate being developed to treat myelogenous leukaemia and relapsed high-risk myelodysplastic syndrome. It also plans to launch a phase 1 trial for an acute leukaemia treatment early next year.
Syros had raised $125m in funding from WuXi PharmTech, life sciences real estate company Alexandria’s Alexandria Venture Investments unit, Flagship Ventures, Arch Venture Partners, Polaris Partners, Aisling Capital, Redmile Group, Deerfield Management, Casdin Capital and Fidelity Management and Research.
The IPO prospectus, released before the underwriters bought the additional shares, states WuXi PharmaTech’s stake was diluted form 7.2% to 6% in the offering.
Other key Syros shareholders include Flagship Ventures, which initially came out with a 19.4% stake, Arch Venture (18.6%), Fidelity (8.1%), Deerfield (7.4%) and Polaris (5.2%).
Cowen and Company and Piper Jaffray were joint book-running managers for the IPO, while JMP Securities was lead manager and Wedbush PacGrow co-manager.