The $300-plus million club is looking a little rarer this autumn in the biopharma arena, but LianBio looks to be one in less than a dozen to haul in at least that much in its Nasdaq debut Monday.
Initial public offerings of late in the biotech world have been mostly below $180 million, but the Shanghai biotech has a short yet solid history of reeling in large amounts. LianBio hit the ground running with a major $310 million series A last October, and, now, the company is raising $325 million in its Wall Street entrance at $16 per share.
LianBio looks to lean on partners for the development and commercialization of treatments in China and other markets on the continent.
And it needs that cash as some of those assets are already close to the regulatory finish line with phase 3 trials in obstructive hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, in which the heart has difficulty pumping blood, first- and second-line Cholangiocarcinoma, a cancer in the bile ducts, and Demodex blepharitis, in which mites cause inflammation in the eyelids and severe dry eye.
The company emerged in August 2020 with $60 million in upfront payments to MyoKardia, now part of Bristol Myers Squibb, and BridgeBio companies QED Therapeutics and Navire for a trio of assets. LianBio also snagged first dibs on 20 programs already in BridgeBio’s pipeline.
The biotech has also paid Lyra Therapeutics $12 million upfront for the exclusive license to develop and sell a treatment for chronic rhinosinusitis, in which the sinuses inflame and swell for 12 or more weeks. That deal, for rights in China and other countries in Asia, could balloon another $135 million with biobucks.
Further yet, Landos Biopharma is another collaborator that received $18 million upfront, and $200 million on the line, to jointly develop and market two ulcerative colitis and Crohn’s disease treatments in Asia.
And don’t forget a head and neck cancer and solid tumor partnership with Nanobiotix and a respiratory syncytial virus collaboration with ReViral.
The company is helmed by former Eli Lilly anti-COVID therapy leader Yizhe Wang, Ph.D., who joined back in May.