Alector has filed its S-1 form with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for its initial public offering (IPO). No pricing details were given in the filing, although the offering is valued up to $150 million. The company intends to list its shares on the Nasdaq under the symbol ALEC.
The underwriters for the offering are Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch, Cowen and Barclays.
This is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company pioneering immuno-neurology, a novel therapeutic approach for the treatment of neurodegeneration. This firm is developing therapies designed to simultaneously counteract degenerative brain disorders by restoring healthy immune function to the brain.
The firm’s Discovery Platform enables it to advance a broad portfolio of product candidates, validated by human genetics, which management believes will improve the probability of technical success over shorter development timelines. As a result, in the past five years, the firm has identified over 40 immune system targets, progressed more than 10 programs into preclinical research and advanced two product candidates, AL001 and AL002, into clinical development.
In the second half of 2018, AL001, initially aimed at treating a genetic subset of patients with frontotemporal dementia (FTD) carrying a progranulin (PGRN) loss of function mutation (FTD-GRN), was dosed in 42 healthy subjects in a single ascending dose Phase 1 study. There were no serious adverse events or dose-limiting adverse events reported in the study, achieving the primary endpoint. More importantly, statistically significant increases in plasma and cerebrospinal fluid PGRN levels relative to baseline were also observed, successfully demonstrating proof-of-mechanism for AL001 in the central nervous systems of healthy volunteers.
The firm plans to advance AL001 into a Phase 1b study with proof-of-mechanism data in FTD-GRN patients expected in the first half of 2019 and into a Phase 2 study with proof-of-concept data in FTD-GRN patients expected in the first half of 2020.
Alector intends to use the net proceeds from this offering to further develop its pipeline, as well as for working capital and general corporate purposes.
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