The Taiho Ventures, Memorial Sloan and Hartford HealthCare Endowment-backed cancer drug developer has filed to raise up to $86.3m.
US-based oncology drug developer Oric Pharmaceuticals has filed for an $86.3m initial public offering that will give corporates Taiho, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center and Hartford HealthCare the chance to exit.
Oric is working on therapeutics intended to overcome cancer’s resistance mechanisms. Part of the proceeds will fund two ongoing phase 1b trials of a small molecule antagonist called ORIC-101 in tandem with other drugs for prostate cancer and advanced or metastatic solid tumours respectively.
Additional proceeds will support progress of a second product candidate, a small molecule inhibitor known as ORIC-533, for which the company is looking to file an investigational new drug application in the first half of 2021.
The offering comes after more than $175m in funding, including a series D round in August 2019 sized at $55.7m according to the IPO filing. It included Taiho Ventures and Hartford HealthCare Endowment, on behalf of pharmaceutical firm Taiho and care provider Hartford HealthCare, as well as cancer researcher Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.
The round was co-led by Arrowmark Partners and Invus Opportunities and also featured investment and financial services group Fidelity Management & Research (FMR), TopSpin Partners, OrbiMed, Casdin Capital, The Column Group (TCG), EcoR1 Capital, City Hill Ventures, Foresite Capital and Kravis Investment Partners.
Taiho Ventures, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, FMR, Trinitas Capital, NS Investment and existing backers TCG, Topspin Fund, OrbiMed, EcoR1, Kravis Investment Partners and Foresite Capital had provided $50m in series C funding for Oric in early 2018.
None of the corporates own 5% or more of Oric, whose largest shareholders are TCG (22.4%), Topspin Fund (15.6%), OrbiMed (11.7%) and EcoR1 (5.8%).
JP Morgan Securities, Citigroup Global Markets and Jefferies LLC are joint book-running managers for the IPO, which is set to take place on the Nasdaq Global Select Market. Guggenheim Securities is the other underwriter.