University of Auckland’s Rain Therapeutics has priced shares at $17 each to raise $125m in its initial public offering.
Rain Therapeutics, a US-based precision oncology therapeutics developer based on research at University of Auckland, priced its shares at $17 each today to raise $125m in an initial public offering.
The company issued more than 7.35 million shares and will trade on the Nasdaq Global Select Market using the ticker symbol RAIN.
Founded in 2017, Rain Therapeutics is working on tumour-agnostic precision oncology treatments.
It licensed tarloxotinib from Auckland and previously considered the drug its lead asset. Tarloxotinib was in a phase 2 trial last year and Rain has not announced results from that study, however there is no mention of the product candidate in its prospectus or on its website.
Proceeds from the IPO have been allocated to the company’s new lead asset, Rain-32 (also called milademetan), which aims to reactivate the tumour protein p53 to control cancer growth.
Rain raised $63m in a series B round led by Boxer Capital in September 2020, when Cormorant Asset Management, Samsara BioCapital, Janus Henderson Investors, Logos Capital, BVF Partners, Perceptive Advisors and unnamed investors also took part.
Inventors Fund, a vehicle managed by University of Auckland’s tech transfer office Auckland UniServices, backed an $18.4m series A round in 2018 that was led by BVF and also included Perceptive Advisors and private investors.
BVF is the largest shareholder in Rain (18.2% post-IPO), followed by Boxer Capital (14.5%), Cormorant (12.1%), Perceptive (10.9%) and Samsara (6.4%).
Goldman Sachs, Citigroup, Piper Sandler and Guggenheim Securities are the joint book-running managers for the offering. They have been granted a 30-day option to purchase up to an additional 1.1 million shares.