Waksal's back, raising $50M for new biotech venture

Here's a scoop: TheStreet's Adam Feuerstein reports that the disgraced former ImClone CEO Sam Waksal has hatched a plan to raise $50 million for a new biotech company that would acquire, develop or in-license new drugs for cancer and infectious diseases. TheStreet obtained a confidential fundraising prospectus for Kadmon I LLC, which is in talks to acquire an unnamed drug company that could function as a base for the new operation.

Waksal is listed as the managing member of Kadmon, which hopes to raise $50 million from investors in exchange for half of the company. And that offering could be expanded to $175 million if the demand is there. "His basic idea is to pick up interesting drug compounds for development that other companies have orphaned," a source tells Feuerstein.

ImClone successfully developed the cancer drug Erbitux, but only after an insider trading scandal left Waksal and Martha Stewart--whom he had tipped off to an FDA delay on the drug--in prison. Feuerstein adds that Waksal tried unsuccessfully to keep a low profile at the recent JP Morgan gathering in San Francisco, with members of his entourage shooing reporters away.

- here's the story from TheStreet