Durata Therapeutics Files For IPO (DRTX)

A company called Durata Therapeutics, Inc. has filed to come public via an initial public offering.  While no terms have been set, the paperwork filed at the Securities and Exchange Commission is for up to $86.25 million to be sold in common stock.  Durata expects that its shares will trade on the NASDAQ Global Market under the symbol “DRTX.”

The company’s initial filing shows that BofA Merrill Lynch and Credit Suisse are the book-running managers; co-managers are listed as RBC Capital Markets and also Wedbush PacGrow Life Sciences.

The company noted, “We are a pharmaceutical company focused on the development and commercialization of novel therapeutics for patients with infectious diseases and acute illnesses. We are currently enrolling and dosing patients in two global Phase 3 clinical trials with our lead product candidate, dalbavancin, for the treatment of patients with acute bacterial skin and skin structure infections, or abSSSI. Dalbavancin is an intravenous antibiotic product candidate designed for once-weekly dosing, which we believe will facilitate the treatment of patients with abSSSI in both the in-patient and out-patient settings by reducing the length of a patient’s hospital stay or avoiding hospital admission altogether and, ultimately, lowering the overall cost of care for these patients.”

Here are the company’s plans: “We expect to complete these Phase 3 clinical trials and have initial, top-line data available in the beginning of 2013. If our ongoing Phase 3 clinical trials are successful, we plan to submit a New Drug Application, or NDA, to the FDA in the first half of 2013 and a marketing authorization application, or MAA, to the EMA in the second half of 2013. If approved, we intend to directly commercialize dalbavancin in the United States and Western Europe with a targeted hospital sales force and to utilize a variety of types of collaboration arrangements for commercialization in other markets.”

JON C. OGG