US-based oncology therapy developer Turning Point Therapeutics raised approximately $167m from an initial public offering today that gave exits to pharmaceutical firms GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) and Eli Lilly.
The IPO consisted of 9.25 million shares issued on the Nasdaq Global Market and priced at $18.00 each. The company had set a $16 to $18 range earlier this week, and had initially planned to sell just over 8.8 million shares.
Turning Point is developing precision small molecule cancer drugs intended to address the limitations of current treatments. Its approach focuses on tyrosine kinase inhibitors that target the genetic drivers of cancer.
The company had planned to direct $51m to $59m of the funds to clinical development of its lead drug candidate, repotrectinib, including the phase 2 version of an ongoing phase 1/2 trial for non-small-cell lung cancer and advanced tumours.
Up to $48m was earmarked for preclinical development of two more candidates, TPX-0046 and TPX-0022, both of which are expected to enter clinical testing this year.
The offering follows $145m of funding, $80m of which was raised in an October 2018 mezzanine round that included $6.4m each from Lilly Asia Ventures and SR One, subsidiaries of Eli Lilly and GSK respectively.
The round was co-led by venture capital firms Foresite Capital and VenBio Partners, each of which provided $15m, and included Nextech Invest, HBM Healthcare Investments and Orbimed.
SR One and Lilly Asia Ventures had already co-led Turning Point’s $45m series C round in mid-2017 with $10m investments, participating alongside OrbiMed and existing investors Cormorant Asset Management and SV Tech Ventures.
Lilly Asia Ventures and SR One each owned 8.2% stakes pre-IPO which were cut to 5.6%, as does OrbiMed. Cormorant Asset Management is the company’s largest investor, with a 9.2% stake post-IPO, and its other notable backers include Foresite Capital and VenBio, which each hold 4.3% of its shares.
Joint book-running managers Goldman Sachs, SVB Leerink and Wells Fargo Securities, and lead manager Canaccord Genuity have the 30-day option to buy almost 1.39 million additional shares, boosting the size of the offering to almost $192m.
This article was amended on April 18 to reflect the publishing of the IPO prospectus.
