Sheffield University spinout Diurnal began trading on Aim, on Christmas eve, raising $44.6m.
Diurnal, a UK-based pharmaceutical spinout from Sheffield University, has started trading on London’s alternative investment market, Aim.
The company went live, under ticker symbol DNL, on December 24 2015. It raised approximately £30m ($44.6m) by placing new ordinary shares of 5p each in the Company at 144p per share. Following its admission to the market the company issued 52,210,759 shares to give a market capitalisation of approximately £75.2m at the placing price.
The company, at time of writing, is trading at 153p per share.
Diurnal develops products to treat hormone deficiencies and is backed by intellectual property investor IP Group and the EU and Welsh government-supported Finance Wales.
Concurrently IP2IPO, a subsidiary of IP Group, provided £4.7m to Diurnal as a five-year, interest-free, unsecured convertible loan that is convertible at the placing price.
Finance Wales and university commercialisation firm Fusion IP, which has since been acquired by IP Group, first invested in Diurnal’s £450,000 round in 2009. IP Group invested a further £6m in August 2014, giving it a majority stake of 51.7% in the company.
Martin Whitaker, chief executive of Diurnal, said: “Our vision is to become the world’s leading endocrinology specialty pharmaceutical company targeting under-served patient needs in chronic hormonal diseases. We have identified a number of such needs which we estimate represent a combined market opportunity of more than $11bn.
