Health and Healthcare

Achillion Pharmaceuticals Gears Up for Secondary Offering

Chris Lange

Published: November 16, 2017 10:35 am

Last Updated: January 12, 2020 6:14 am

Shares of Achillion Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ: ACHN) saw a handy gain on Thursday after the company announced a secondary offering. While the offering is set to close on November 20, the company will not receive any proceeds. Instead, the selling shareholders will.

The 18.367 million shares in the offering are being sold by Johnson & Johnson (NYSE: JNJ) at $2.75 apiece. The entire offering is valued up to $50.51 million.

The underwriters for the offering are Goldman Sachs and Leerink Partners.

Achillion is a science-driven, patient-focused biopharmaceutical company seeking to leverage its strengths across the continuum from discovery through commercialization by discovering and developing small molecule therapeutics to meet the needs of patients with complement-mediated diseases.

Its current focus is on its complement inhibitor platform, directed at advancing small molecule compounds that have the potential to be used in the treatment of immune-related diseases associated with the alternative pathway of the complement system. The complement system is a part of the human innate immune system and is believed to comprise three pathways: the alternative pathway, the lectin pathway and the classical pathway.

Recently, the company said:

On November 14, 2017, we reported preliminary proof-of-concept results from the first patient group in our on-going phase II, open-label, 14-day study of ACH-4471 for patients with C3G or IC-MPGN. Interim data from the first patient group, consisting of two sentinel patients, demonstrated that ACH-4471 achieved complement alternative pathway inhibition resulting in a greater than 50% reduction in proteinuria, as measured by albumin to creatinine ratio over the 14-day treatment period, and demonstrated a favorable tolerability profile.

Keep in mind that the stock is down about 26% year to date, excluding Thursday’s move.

Shares of Achillion were last seen up about 10% at $3.35, with a consensus analyst price target of $5.92 and a 52-week trading range of $2.95 to $5.66.

Johnson & Johnson traded at $139.23. The stock has a 52-week range of $109.32 to $144.35 and a consensus price target of $145.33.