VC-backed Circassia to float on LSE

Ellie Pullen
07 February 2014

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Circassia, a UK allergy treatment developer backed by several investors, has announced its plans to float on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) next month.

Invesco Perpetual, Lansdowne Partners and Imperial Innovations are all major shareholders of the company. Circassia has also been backed by Goldman Sachs and Tudor Capital, according to unquote" data.

Some of Circassia's institutional backers have expressed interest in upping their investments in the company through the IPO. The offering will predominantly comprise new shares in the company, with a small percentage of the offered shares to come from stock held by Circassia's directors.

JP Morgan Cazenove has been appointed global coordinator and sole sponsor, as well as joint book-runner alongside Peel Hunt. Canaccord Genuity and Shore Capital are acting as co-managers for the flotation.

The IPO is expected to raise around £175m and give the company a market cap of more than £500m. According to unquote" data, that would make the listing one of the largest IPOs of a venture capital- or private equity-backed UK healthcare company on the LSE in more than a decade.

Currently in the lead is former Blackstone portfolio company Southern Cross Healthcare, a UK company that floated on the LSE in August 2006 with a market cap of £423m, according to unquote" data. Following much-publicised financial woes, the company collapsed in 2011.

Second to Southern Cross on unquote" data is Pharmagene, which was backed by a large consortium of investors including 3i and Isis Equity Partners. In July 2000, the company floated on the LSE with a market cap of £142m.

Circassia has raised approximately £105m in funding to date from its investors. In January 2007, the company secured £6m from Imperial, Lansdowne and Tudor, with Imperial supplying £2m of the total. This was followed in January of the following year by a further £11m from Imperial, Lansdowne and new investors Goldman Sachs and Invesco. Imperial, Invesco and Lansdowne then committed a further £15m to Circassia in December 2009.

Imperial, which currently holds a 19.7% stake in the business, then led a £60m funding round for the company in April 2011. Invesco and other existing shareholders took part in the round, which saw the funding supplied in two tranches. The second tranche of £25m was supplied to the company in April 2012 alongside a fresh £12m investment from Imperial (which led the round), Invesco and other existing backers.

Oxford-headquartered Circassia was founded in 2006, when Steven Harris and Charles Swingland acquired the ToleroMune technology initially developed at Imperial College in London.

Using its ToleroMune technology, Circassia is developing a range of immunotherapy treatments for grass, house dust mite, ragweed and cat allergies. Its lead product, Cat-Spire, is a treatment for cat allergy and is currently in phase-III testing.

Circassia intends to submit applications for market approval of Cat-Spire in the second half of 2016. Its Ragweed-Spire, Grass-Spire and HDM-Spire treatments are currently in phase-IIb testing.

The company's CEO is Steve Harris. Circassia's board of directors includes Warburg Pincus executive-in-residence Francesco Granata as chairman, Imperial CEO Russ Cummings and Cathrin Petty, who recently joined JP Morgan Chase as co-head of its healthcare investment banking team for EMEA following a stint at Vitruvian Partners.