Arthritis Treatment and Cure

Published August 5, 2010

While bankers and other Wall Street observers debate whether the initial public offering window really has opened for the industry, specialty pharma firm Horizon Pharma Inc. stepped up with its own filing for a proposed $86 million IPO.

Horizon's move came only a day after Trius Therapeutics Inc. managed to squeeze through the window – albeit with fewer shares and a lower price than originally hoped – netting about $45.6 million to support its late-stage antibacterial program. A day after its debut, Trius' stock (NASDAQ:TSRX) gained 9.4 percent, or 47 cents, closing Wednesday at $5.47.

And NuPathe Inc., of Conshohocken, Pa., is expected to price its offering of 5 million shares this week. That firm, which anticipates using proceeds on commercialization activities related to its transdermal sumatriptan product, Zelrix, recently set a price range between $14 and $16 per share. (See BioWorld Today, May 18, 2010.)

So far this year, eight companies have succeeded in pricing IPOs, starting with Ironwood Pharmaceuticals Inc.'s February offering – hailed as a major victory among biotech circles following the IPO desert of 2008 and most of 2009. Though Ironwood wasn't exactly followed by a flood of newly listed firms, there has been a steady trickle, with even a few more true biotechs with development-stage programs such as Anthera Pharmaceuticals Inc., AVEO Pharmaceuticals Inc. and Tengion Inc. hitting the public markets. (See BioWorld Today, March 2, 2010, March 15, 2010, and April 12, 2010.)

While Horizon falls more on the specialty pharma side, it's still not looking at its first FDA approval until early next year at the earliest. The Northbrook, Ill.-based firm, which has not yet disclosed the number of shares or share price for its proposed IPO, is hoping to use those proceeds for regulatory and commercial activities related to its gastrointestinal-friendly pain products.

HZT-501, a combination of nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug ibuprofen plus famotidine, is under FDA review, with a PDUFA date of Jan. 21, 2011. That drug is designed to treat mild to moderate pain, osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis pain while reducing the risk of NSAID-induced upper GI ulcers.

Horizon isn't the only firm to work on safer NSAIDs. Earlier this year, Pozen Inc. and partner AstraZeneca plc won approval for their combination naproxen-esomeprazole arthritis drug Vimovo. Another naproxen-based drug, naproxcinod from NicOx SA, however, failed to get the FDA's OK last month. (See BioWorld Today, May 3, 2010, and July 23, 2010.)

Earlier in its pipeline, Horizon also is working on a naproxen combo drug, HZN-602, which is in Phase I testing for mild to moderate pain and arthritis pain.

But shortly behind HZT-501, Horizon has Lodotra, a programmed-release formulation of low-dose prednisone acquired in the April merger with Merck KGaA spinout firm Nitec Pharma AG, of Reinach, Switzerland. That program yielded positive Phase III data, and the company anticipates a fourth quarter new drug submission. (See BioWorld Today, April 2, 2010.)

Horizon, which was founded in 2005, had about $28.5 million in cash as of March 31. As of June 30, the firm had about 29.8 million shares outstanding.

Jefferies & Co. Inc. and Piper Jaffray & Co. are acting as joint book-running managers, while JMP Securities LLC and Lazard Capital Markets LLC are serving as co-managers for the offering.

If successful, Horizon plans to list on Nasdaq under the ticker "HZNP."

In other financings news:

• ALDA Pharmaceuticals Corp., of Vancouver, British Columbia, is seeking an extension of the exercise period of an aggregate of 6 million outstanding share purchase warrants issued as part of the nonbrokered private placement of common share units which closed Sept. 16, 2009. It would extend the exercise price for one more year, until Sept. 16, 2011, though the warrant exercise price of 40 cents per share will remain the same.

• Gemin X Pharmaceuticals Inc., of Malvern, Pa., completed an $8 million Series E round, with participation from preferred stockholders Caxton Advantage Life Sciences Fund LP and Sanderling Venture Partners. The firm is exploring strategic opportunities for lead candidate obatoclax, a pan Bcl-2 inhibitor that recently showed promising Phase IIb data in small-cell lung cancer.


source; www.bioworld.com