Cancer Drug Maker Antengene Seeks $420 Million in Hong Kong IPO

What’s new: A three-year-old Shanghai cancer drug maker founded by a former Celgene Corp. research chief plans to raise as much as HK$2.78 billion ($420 million) in an initial public offering (IPO) of 154 million shares in Hong Kong.

Antengene, the latest Chinese mainland biopharmaceutical company to seek a Hong Kong IPO, will price its offering Thursday and expects to list shares on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange Nov. 20.

The company attracted 10 cornerstone investors, which subscribed for $179 million of its shares. Among them, existing investors Fidelity Investments pledged $70 million, and the Singapore sovereign wealth fund subscribed for $20 million of shares.

Antengene previously completed three rounds of financing, raising $238 million. The last round of financing in July led by Fidelity valued the company at $726 million.

The background: Antengene was founded in 2016 by Mei Jianming, who was the former executive director of Celgene’s clinical development for nearly nine years. He participated in the research work on Celgene’s best-selling cancer drug Revlimid. Celgene, a Summit, N.J.-based unit of Bristol Myers Squibb, is also an early investor in Antengene.

Antengene has 12 cancer drug candidates in its portfolio. Two of them have are in late-stage clinical trials. Although none of the drugs has generated any sales, its core product, ATG-010, has shown commercial potential for treatment of lymphocytic carcinoma, multiple myeloma, endometrial carcinoma and advanced liposarcoma, according to the prospectus. The drug has been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and is expected to sell in China in a year or two.

In the first half of 2020, the company reported a net loss of 538 million yuan ($81 million).

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Contact reporter Denise Jia (huijuanjia@caixin.com) and editor Bob Simison (bobsimison@caixin.com).

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