UBC spinoff set to raise $48 million with IPO

BIOTECHNOLOGY University of B.C. spinoff OncoGenex Technologies Inc. plans to raise as much as $48 million US in an initial public offering.

The biotechnology company that focuses on cancer therapies announced Wednesday it has f iled a registration statement with t h e U. S . S e c u r i t i e s a n d Exchange Commission and a preliminary prospectus with Canadian securities regulators.

OncoGenex is seeking listings with Nasdaq under the symbol OGXI and on the Toronto Stock Exchange under OGX.

News of the offering was welco m e d by K a r i m a h E s S a b a r, executive director of BC Biotech, who said it is evidence that B.C.’s science and innovation are gaining important recognition.

“I think it is fantastic,” she said. “OncoGenex is a very solid little company; they have been very sys te m a t i c a n d focused and strategic in their development and this is the right time for them to do their IPO.

“This i s g re a t , we a re n ow starting to do IP Os in the big leagues, on Nasdaq — which is not to say the TSX isn’t important — but at the end of the day we need to end up there.”

The company was co-founded by c h i e f s c i e n t i f i c off i ce r D r. M a r t i n G l e ave, wh o wa s the recipient of a BC Biotech innovation and achievement award last spring, and chief executive officer Scott Cormack.

Gleave, who is also director of the Prostate Centre at Vancouver General Hospital, is the principal inventor behind the company’s product pipeline which addresses treatment resistance in cancer patients. The 25-person company focuses on prostate cancer, non-small cell lung, breast, ovarian and bladder cancers and multiple myeloma, diseases which collectively account for approximately 44 per cent all cancer deaths in the U.S.

OncoGenex has already been well received by investors since its start in 2000, raising more than $35 million in three rounds of financing. At the time of the filing, Ventures West, H.I.G. Vent u r e s , Wo r k i n g O p p o r t u n i t y Fund, BDC Venture Capital and Milestone Medica collectively control more than 79 per cent of OncoGenex’s outstanding common shares.

Es Sabar said the funding will further the development of the biotech industry’s critical mass.

“We want to keep a fair chunk of our companies growing here, to build that cluster,” she said. “Our focus is to build anchor companies here, to build critical mass and to accelerate the commercialization of technology that comes out of our universities.

“ We a r e r e a l l y e x c i t e d ; w e think this i s go o d for OncoGenex, good for B.C. and it will motivate the next round of companies that are coming along ….”