NewLink Genetics became a public company during a volatile week in the capital markets as investors watched both Greece and Italy change their government leadership and begin to deal with their mounting debt problems. The developer of cancer immunotherapeutics sold 6.2 million shares at $7 a share to raise $43 million and begin trading on the Nasdaq Global Market under the symbol NLNK.

 

NewLink priced 30 percent below the bottom of its target range of $10 to $12 a share and raised the amount of shares it had planned to offer by 700,000 shares. The company also granted underwriters an overallotment option of 930,000 shares. Stifel Nicolaus Weisel, Canaccord Genuity, and Baird were lead managers of the deal.

 

NewLink has several cancer immunotherapies in development. The Ames, Iowa-based company will use the majority of the new funds to complete late-stage testing of its lead drug to treat pancreatic cancer in surgically resected pancreatic cancer patients. The trial is being performed under a Special Protocol Assessment with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. The investigational therapy also has Fast Track and Orphan Drug designations as an adjuvant treatment in this patient population.

 

Clovis Oncology also has a late-stage pancreatic cancer drug in development—this time a treatment for first-line metastatic cancer. It plans to price its IPO the week of November 14, targeting a $13 to $15 per share price range in the hopes of raising $130 million. Its venture backers have already committed to 39 percent of the offering, or $50 million. Clovis splashed on the scene in April 2009, founded by former executives of cancer drug developer Pharmion after it had been acquired by Celgene for $2.9 billion in 2008.

 

Another IPO hopeful, Verastem, raised $20 million in a series C round soon after it filed to go public with regulators. The new funding comes after it raised $32 million in a series B financing in July from Advanced Technology Ventures, Astellas Venture Management, Longwood Founders Fund, Bessemer Venture Partners, Cardinal Partners, and MPM Capital. The company has raised $68 million to date and plans to raise up to $50 million in its initial public offering.

 

Unlike most of the drug developers in the IPO queue, Verastem is a preclinical company focused on targeting cancer stem cells to treat breast and other cancers. Its founder and CEO Chris Westphal, a partner at Longwood Founders Fund, has a strong track record as founder and CEO of Sirtris, a biotech he took public and then sold to GlaxoSmithKline in 2008 for more than $800 million. Another plus for the company is ex-Genzyme CEO Henri Termeer who joined Verastem’s board of directors in June.

 

Termeer has been busy since he sold Genzyme to Sanofi for more than $20 billion in February. He is also an investor in NanoString Technologies, a Seattle-based provider of tools for translational research and molecular diagnostics. NanoString closed a $20 million series D financing round with new investors Termeer, GE, and BioMed Ventures, and participation by previous investors Clarus Ventures, Draper Fisher

Jurvetson, and OVP Venture Partners.

 

The investment in NanoString is the first by GE’s healthyimagination Fund and is aligned with its recently announced $1 billion commitment to new oncology R&D. NanoString will use the part of the new financing to advance development of its first molecular diagnostic, a breast cancer assay.

 

“The development and use of targeted cancer therapies requires understanding each patient's tumor at a molecular level,” says Termeer. “NanoString’s technology provides an invaluable tool in cancer research and drug development, and has the potential to enable a globally scalable approach to personalized medicine.”

Finally, Danish biopharmaceutical Lundbec is paying Otsuka Pharmaceutical $200 million upfront in a global alliance to develop and commercialize five early and late stage compounds for the treatment of central nervous system disorders. The deal includes development and sales milestones that could add another $1.6 billion to the Japanese company’s coffers if successfully met.

 

The two late-stage compounds from Otsuka are aripiprazole depot formulation and OPC-34712. Otsuka receives the rights to enter into co-development, and eventual co-promotion following approval, of up to three compounds after mid-stage clinical trials.

Both companies will share in the global sales, development and commercialization costs. Otsuka Pharmaceutical, a subsidiary of Otsuka Holdings, brings a strong presence in the North American and Asian CNS markets, and Lundbeck complements Otsuka's position with a strong presence in Europe.

 

Abilify is the trade name for aripiprazole and is Otsuka's top-selling CNS drug in collaboration with Bristol-Myers Squibb. Currently marketed in more than 65 countries and regions, Abilify had net sales in fiscal year 2010 of approximately $4.5 billion and is now one of the top-three products among anti-psychotic agents worldwide. The depot formulation is currently in late-stage trials in the United States as a once-monthly injection maintenance treatment for schizophrenia.

 

OPC-34712 is an investigational psychotherapeutic being in late-stage development as a better treatment over established therapies for schizophrenia and major depressive disorder.