The board at Canada's QLT has decided to put itself up for sale after concluding that its business plan won't work. The announcement comes after sales of Visudyne, an eye therapy developed by QLTs, plunged 43 percent in the third quarter. Competition for that market already forced QLT to cut 80 employees last year. QLT has a mid-stage trial going on for a combination therapy of Lucentis and Visudyne.
"The board of directors believes that the net value of the assets of the company exceeds the value represented by the stock price," said Chairman Boyd Clarke. "We had hoped to address that disconnect through the deployment of our current strategic plan. However, as the gap continues to widen we have decided that, other than as contractually required, making significant additional investments in all of our current products and technologies would be inconsistent with our objective of maximizing shareholder value."
- see QLT's release
- read the report from Thomson Financial
Related Articles:
QLT gains drug delivery tech in $42M buyout. Report
Canadian biotech stocks suffer as bad news mounts. Report
QLT delays clinical program on Atrigel. Report
QLT says therapy fails Phase II trial. Report
QLT slashes spending as competition looms. Report