Health and Healthcare

Aeglea BioTherapeutics Enters the Market Way Below Expected Price Range

Chris Lange

Published: April 7, 2016 12:02 pm

Last Updated: January 13, 2020 11:02 am

Aeglea BioTherapeutics Inc. (NASDAQ: AGLE) entered the market quietly on Thursday morning. The company priced 5 million shares for its initial public offering at $10 per share, with an overallotment option for an additional 750,000. The pricing came in below the expected price range of $16 to $18 per share, valuing the entire offering at $57.5 million.

The underwriters for the offering are UBS Investment Bank, BMO Capital Markets, Wells Fargo and Needham.

This biotechnology company is committed to developing enzyme-based therapeutics in the field of amino acid metabolism that it believes will transform the lives of patients with inborn errors of metabolism (IEM) and cancer. Aeglea’s engineered human enzymes are designed to degrade specific amino acids in the blood. In IEM, a subset of rare genetic metabolic diseases, the company is seeking to reduce toxic levels of amino acids in patients. In oncology, it is seeking to reduce amino acid blood levels below the normal range, where the company believes it will be able to exploit the dependence of certain cancers on specific amino acids.

According to the filing:

The lead product candidate, AEB1102, is engineered to degrade the amino acid arginine and is being developed to treat two extremes of arginine metabolism, including arginine excess in patients with Arginase I deficiency, an IEM, as well as some cancers which have been shown to have a metabolic dependence on arginine. Arginine is an amino acid involved in many biochemical functions in the body. AEB1102 has demonstrated the ability to reduce blood arginine levels in clinical and nonclinical studies, supporting its potential use as a treatment of both Arginase I deficiency and cancer. We have an effective investigational new drug application, or IND, with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, or FDA, for AEB1102 for the treatment of solid tumors.

The company intends to use the net proceeds from the offering to fund the continuing development of AEB1102 and to advance its additional product candidates. The remainder will the used for working capital and general operating expenses.

Shares of Aeglea were last seen up 0.3% at $10.03, with a range of $9.61 to $10.72 for the day thus far.