Sana Biotechnology boosts IPO vary, seems to elevate $517 million

 

Sana Biotechnology — the Seattle upstart which is searching to handle a assortment of ailments by means of gene treatment and mobile engineering — is generating  buzz on Wall Avenue.

Sana boosted the amount of shares it strategies to sell in an initial public giving this 7 days, and now expects to sell 22 million shares at $23 to $24 for every share. That would web the biotechnology enterprise $517 million if it marketed at the midpoint of that range.  It initially prepared to raise up to $150 million by using the IPO, but boosted that expectation final week to $323 million.

The Sana IPO, envisioned this 7 days, would be the 1st by a Seattle place company in 2021.

Led by former executives from Juno Therapeutics, Sana beforehand elevated extra than $700 million in enterprise capital, earning it one of the most closely-funded startups to arise in the Seattle location in a long time.

It is also unique in that the IPO is coming fewer than a few a long time right after it was launched — a milestone that on ordinary typically occurs much more than eight several years immediately after original enterprise capital funding. In that arena, Juno Therapeutics was even speedier to IPO, considering that it filed to go community in 2014 16 months after its founding.  Juno was bought to Celgene for $9 billion in 2018.

In the quick phrase, Sana is planning to take care of several cancers, with a prepare to file new drug purposes next calendar year. But its ambitions are in fact greater.

“Our lengthy-time period aspirations are to be in a position to command or modify any gene in the body, to replace any mobile that is damaged or missing, and to markedly strengthen obtain to cellular and gene-based mostly medications,” the corporation wrote in its IPO prospectus.

At the GeekWire Summit previous October, Sana CEO Steve Harr explained how they are effectively turning the body into its own “bioreactor,” which can fend off disorder.

“You produce the resources to help your system to make its individual medicine,” Harr explained at the time.

Even devoid of the IPO, Sana is sitting on a substantial funds pile. At the shut of 2020, the corporation reported hard cash, money equivalents and marketable securities of $412 million. But like quite a few emerging biotech businesses it is getting rid of money. It has posted a internet decline each quarter, and its accrued deficit since founding stood at $316 million as of September 30, 2020.

Harr will maintain 4.9% of Sana following the IPO, while the biggest shareholder will be Arch Venture Associates at 24.2%. Flagship Pioneer Resources will hold 18.8%.

Sana plans to trade on Nasdaq underneath the ticker SANA.