Ignyta Caps off a Successful Week With $160M Fund
San Diego-based Ignyta has now raised $160 million through the sale of 10 million shares at $16 in a bumped-up follow-on underwritten by JPMorgan, Jefferies, Cantor Fitzgerald, Ladenburg Thalmann and SunTrust Robinson Humphrey.
The price is a 2% discount to its close of $16.25 on Wednesday, when it proposed the follow-on after trading hours.
The firm had earlier this week, enjoyed a huge surge in its share price when it announced promising results from its new lung cancer treatment entrectinib.
The drug is a selective tyrosine kinase inhibitor being developed for non-small cell lung cancer patients whose tumours carry NTRK fusions or ROS1 fusions.
Pfizer’s Xalkori is already approved to treat patients with ROS1 mutations (alongside its use in ALK+ patients), but Ignyta’s drug looks likely to be superior, thanks in part to its ability to pass through the blood brain barrier and possibly prevent brain metastases.
“Based on these data, we believe that entrectinib has the potential to be a best-in-class therapeutic option as a first-line targeted therapy for patients with ROS1-positive NSCLC,” said Jonathan Lim, M.D., chairman and CEO of Ignyta.
The drug also showed a 78% (confirmed by investigator) overall response rate and a 69
% confirmed ORR (by Blinded Independent Central Review) in 0NSCLC).The drug was also granted a fast-track Priority Medicines (PRIME) designation in Europe this week, adding to its FDA Breakthrough status granted in May this year.
Jonathan Lim commented: “The extended duration of response and progression free survival times observed in these interim data are particularly compelling, and we believe may be driven by entrectinib’s CNS activity. Entrectinib was designed to cross the blood-brain barrier, allowing it to both address pre-existing CNS lesions and have the potential to prevent or delay the onset of metastases to the brain, a common site of progression, particularly in NSCLC.”
