Biocryst Pharmaceuticals Announces $65.3 Million Private Placement Financing
BIRMINGHAM, Ala., Aug. 6 -- BioCryst Pharmaceuticals, Inc. today announced that it has signed a definitive agreement to raise $65.3 million in a private placement of approximately 8.3 million shares of its common stock and warrants to purchase an additional approximately 3.2 million shares of common stock. The purchase price for the shares is $7.80 per share, the closing Nasdaq composite bid price for the company's common stock immediately preceding execution of the definitive agreement for the transaction and the exercise price for the warrants is $10.25. Investors in the financing will pay an additional purchase price equal to $0.125 for each share underlying the warrants. The closing of the private placement is subject to certain closing conditions.Participants in the transaction include funds managed by Baker Brothers Investments, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, EHS Holdings, OrbiMed Advisors, Texas Pacific Group Ventures, and Stephens Investment Management.
"We are gratified by the strong support we received from this group of existing shareholders," said Jon P. Stonehouse, Chief Executive Officer of BioCryst. "The completion of the offering is a vote of confidence in the company's future and strengthens our balance sheet allowing us to bolster the company's fundamentals. BioCryst is now in a stronger position to execute on our plans, advancing key development programs through late-stage human trials while also mining our productive discovery engine for new compounds to move into the clinic."
About BioCryst
BioCryst Pharmaceuticals, Inc. is a leader in the use of crystallography and structure-based drug design for the development of novel therapeutics to treat cancer, cardiovascular diseases, autoimmune diseases, and viral infections. The company is advancing multiple internal programs toward potential commercialization including Fodosine(TM) in oncology, BCX-4208 in transplantation and autoimmune diseases and peramivir in seasonal and life- threatening influenza. BioCryst has a worldwide partnership with Roche for the development and commercialization of BCX-4208, and is collaborating with Mundipharma for the development and commercialization of Fodosine(TM) in markets across Europe, Asia, Australia and certain neighboring countries. In January, 2007 the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) awarded a $102.6 million, four-year contract to BioCryst for advanced development of peramivir to treat seasonal and life-threatening influenza. In February 2007 BioCryst established a partnership with Shionogi & Co., to develop and commercialize peramivir in Japan. For more information about BioCryst, please visit the company's web site at http://www.biocryst.com.
Forward-looking statements
This press release contains forward-looking statements, including statements regarding future results, performance or achievements. These statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors which may cause our actual results, performance or achievements to be materially different from any future results, performances or achievements expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements. These statements reflect our current views with respect to future events and are based on assumptions and subject to risks and uncertainties. Given these uncertainties, you should not place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements. Some of the factors that could affect the forward-looking statements contained herein include that the Phase II clinical trials of peramivir may not be successful, that the Phase II trial of BCX-4208 for psoriasis may not be successfully completed, that development and commercialization of Fodosine(TM) in both T-ALL and CTCL may not be successful, that we may not resolve satisfactorily the particulate matter issue with the intravenous formulation of Fodosine(TM), that DHHS could reduce or eliminate funding for peramivir, that we or our licensees may not be able to enroll the required number of subjects in planned clinical trials of our product candidates and that such clinical trials may not be successfully completed, that BioCryst or its licensees may not commence as expected additional human clinical trials with our product candidates, that our product candidates may not receive required regulatory clearances from the FDA, that ongoing and future clinical trials may not have positive results, that we may not be able to complete successfully the Phase IIb trials for Fodosine(TM) that are currently planned to be pivotal, that we may not be able to commence the proposed Phase III trial for peramivir within the time frame we currently expect or at all, that we may not be able to announce preclinical developments for additional compounds by year-end 2007 as currently proposed, that we or our licensees may not be able to continue future development of our current and future development programs, that our development programs may never result in future product, license or royalty payments being received by BioCryst, that BioCryst may not reach favorable agreements with potential pharmaceutical and biotech partners for further development of its product candidates, that BioCryst may not have sufficient cash to continue funding the development, manufacturing, marketing or distribution of its products, the conditions to closing the private placement may not be satisfied, and that additional funding, if necessary, may not be available at all or on terms acceptable to BioCryst. Please refer to the documents BioCryst files periodically with the Securities and Exchange Commission, specifically BioCryst's most recent Annual Report on Form 10-K, Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q, current reports on Form 8-K which identify important factors that could cause the actual results to differ materially from those contained in the projections or forward-looking statements.