Health and Healthcare

Voyager Therapeutics Sets Terms for IPO

Chris Lange

Published: October 30, 2015 10:10 am

Last Updated: January 13, 2020 5:44 pm

Voyager Therapeutics has filed an S-1 form with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for its initial public offering (IPO). Roughly 4.69 million shares are expected, within the range of $15 to $17, with an overallotment option for an additional 703,125 shares. At the maximum price, the entire offering is valued up to $91.64 million. The company intends to list on the Nasdaq Global Market under the symbol VYGR.

The underwriters for the offering are Cowen, Piper Jaffray, Nomura and Wedbush PacGrow.

This clinical-stage gene therapy company is focused on developing life-changing treatments for patients suffering from severe diseases of the central nervous system (CNS). The company focuses on CNS diseases where it believes that an adeno-associated virus (AAV) gene therapy approach that either increases or decreases the production of a specific protein can slow or reduce the symptoms experienced by patients and therefore have a clinically meaningful impact.

The company has created a product engine that enables it to engineer, optimize, manufacture and deliver its AAV-based gene therapies that have the potential to provide durable efficacy following a single administration directly to the CNS. The product engine has rapidly generated programs for five CNS indications, including advanced Parkinson’s disease; a monogenic form of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or a form of the disease caused by a single gene mutation; Friedreich’s ataxia; Huntington’s disease; and spinal muscular atrophy.

Voyager’s most advanced clinical candidate, VY-AADC01, is being evaluated for the treatment of advanced Parkinson’s disease in an open-label, Phase 1b clinical trial with the goal of generating human proof-of-concept data in the second half of 2016.

The founders and members of the management team have extensive experience in drug discovery and development and have pioneered significant advances within the fields of AAV gene therapy and neuroscience.

Voyager intends to use the net proceeds from this offering to fund the costs of future clinical development and to fund the costs of additional preclinical development, manufacturing and clinical development, including Phase 1 and later-stage clinical trials. The remainder of the proceeds will be used to fund working capital and other general corporate purposes.

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