Follow-on public offerings (FOPOs) have become increasingly difficult to execute in the current financial market climate with public biopharmaceutical company valuations plummeting, so many drug developers have turned to alternative measures for raising fresh capital, including debt agreements and royalty sales in addition to pursuing private placements and registered direct offerings (RDOs) instead of a typical FOPO.
Finance Watch: Syndax Has A Standout Post-ASH Offering As Peers Scramble For Cash
Others Are Less Lucky, Opting To Cut Programs, Jobs
Public Company Edition: Syndax grossed $230m in a follow-on public offering based on positive results for its menin inhibitor in leukemia, but the FOPO was an outlier relative to other companies, which relied on private placements, debt and other options to raise cash in a tough market.

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CEO Kris Elverum told Scrip about the start-up’s platform for editing RNA to correct genetic variants that cause harm and to reproduce healthy variants as a means of treating disease.
The four-year-old firm said it plans to advance programs toward the clinic from the funding round, which comes just over a year after signing two major pharma partnerships.
Private Company Edition: The latest group of drug developers to announce venture capital financings is remarkable for its geographic diversity, from Character Biosciences’ $93m series B round in the US to Augustine’s $85m series B in Belgium to a $29.2m series C for Aculys in Japan.
Kyoto-based venture moves HQ to California to expand R&D and business outreach for its regulatory T-cell technology, as it raises around $46m in public and private funding.
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The firm has lofty ambitions for the aldosterone synthase inhibitor to treat hypertension and kidney disease.
Supply chain disruption fears at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic caused drug over-ordering. Imminent tariffs on drugs may have had a similar effect on pharma sales in Q1 earnings season.
Stock prices plummeted, particularly for vaccine makers and cell and gene therapy developers, after the US FDA’s top biologics overseer resigned over vaccine misinformation concerns.