Recent Articles in IPO/Stock Watch

San Diego’s Artiva Bio raised $167 million in a NASDAQ IPO to support clinical trials of its cell therapy portfolio. Artiva was spun out of South Korea’s GC Cell and has global rights (ex-Asia, Australia and New Zeeland) to GC Cell’s portfolio. The IPO was priced at $12 per share, lower than the expected $14-$16 range, but Artiva upped the number of shares in the IPO. Founded in 2019, Artiva develops natural killer (NK) cells that are developed from cord blood, making them allogeneic, unlike CAR-T therapies that are derived from a patient’s own cells. More details....

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Elpiscience, a Shanghai company focused on tumor microenvironments, has filed to IPO on the Hong Kong Exchange. Founded in 2017, the company says immune and non-immune cell types in the tumor microenvironment secrete factors that activate inhibitory signals, creating a barrier for immunotherapies. Elpiscience expects its candidates will make immunotherapies more effective. In late 2023, Elpiscience announced a $1.7 billion collaboration with Japan’s Astellas Pharma (TSE: 4503) to develop a novel bispecific macrophage engager, ES019, that was developed on Elpiscience’s BiME® platform. The company has raised $240 million in three VC rounds. More details....

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Sichuan Biokin Pharma, the parent of Baili Pharmaceutical, filed to stage an IPO on the Hong Kong Exchange that could bring in $500 million. Baili is an generics/Traditional China Medicines company that established an innovative drug development company, SystImmune, in Seattle 10 years ago. Last December, SystImmune partnered BL-B01D1, its lead anti-HER3 ADC that also targets EGFR, with Bristol Myers Squib in a blockbuster $8.4 billion deal. The agreement included provisions for an $800 million upfront payment and another $500 million in near-term milestones. The $500 million target of the IPO is a very ambitious goal in the currently cautious IPO market, but Biokin has an enviable track record that could make it happen. More details....

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Suzhou Ascentage Pharma filed to list its shares in the US. In 2019, the company completed a $53 million Hong Kong IPO at a market capitalization that approached $900 million. The company develops drugs that restore the normal process of cell death to treat cancers and other diseases. Two weeks ago, Ascentage signed a $1.3 billion deal ($100 million upfront) with Japan’s Takeda for a global option (ex-China) on its lead product, a third-generation BCR-ABL tyrosine kinase inhibitor for chronic myeloid leukemia and other hematological cancers. The drug, olverembatinib, is already approved in China. More details....

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XtalPi, a Shenzhen-Boston AI drug discovery company, raised US$126.8 million in a Hong Kong IPO, the third-largest Hong Kong IPO of the year. Xtalpi was initially backed by China’s 10Cent and has raised over $780 million in venture capital, with the last $400 million round at a $2 billion valuation. Established in 2015 by three postdoctoral physicists at MIT, XtalPi combines quantum physics, AI, cloud computing, and large-scale robotics to provide R&D discovery services for small molecule and biologic drugs. The formal name of the company is QuantumPharm. More details....

Stock Symbol: (HK: 2228)

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