VC-backed Prosensa raises $78m in IPO

The company's venture capital backers – Abingworth Management, Gimv, Life Sciences Partners (LSP), Idinvest Partners, Medsciences Capital and New Enterprise Associates (NEA) – are not believed to have sold shares in the IPO. However, their stakes have been diluted in accordance with the new shares offering.

Prosensa offered 15% of the company's shareholding, with an over-allotment option of an additional 900,000 shares being offered to the underwriters in a 30-day period following the IPO. The flotation values the company, which is trading on Nasdaq under the ticker symbol RNA, at $408m.

Prosensa's shares started trading on 28 June at $20, a 53.8% increase on the initial IPO share price, and did not dip lower than $17. The fresh funding from the flotation will be used to further develop the company's product, drisapersen, which is aimed at Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) patients.

According to Prosensa's SEC filing, the percentages of beneficial shares owned by the company's private equity backers will dilute between 1-3.2% each.

Abingworth first invested in Prosensa in January 2007 via its Abingworth Bioventures IV fund, alongside LSP and Medsciences Capital. The firms raised €13.5m for the company as part of the series-A round.

In December 2008, Prosensa raised a further €18m with contributions from existing backers Abingworth, LSP and Medsciences, as well as new investors Idinvest and Gimv, the latter of which committed €4.25m.

Last January, new investor NEA led a €23m funding round in which all existing investors injected additional capital into the company.

Prosensa hired JP Morgan and Citigroup as joint book-runners for the flotation. Leerink Swann was appointed lead manager, while Wedbush PacGrow Life Sciences and KBC Securities acted as co-managers.

Company
Prosensa was founded in 2002 and is headquartered in Leiden. The company currently employs 85 staff and recorded turnover of €7.9m for 2012, as well as an operating loss of €10.3m. As of the end of March this year, the company had accumulated debt totalling €6.4m, €400,000 of which consisted of bank loans.

Prosensa is primarily focused on targeting neuromuscular and neurodegenerative disorders such as DMD, myotonic dystrophy and Huntington's disease. The company's current project is the development of the drug candidate drisapersen, which is aimed at improving muscle function in DMD patients.

People
Hans Schikan is Prosensa's CEO. The company's supervisory board comprises Gimv partner Patrick van Beneden; NEA general partner David Mott; LSP managing partner Martijn Kleijwegt and LSP employee Daan Ellens; and former Idinvest employee Rémi Droller, who is now a managing partner at Kurma Life Sciences Partners.

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