Zenas BioPharma filed for an initial public offering on Thursday, marking a rare move for biotech startups this summer.
The late-stage autoimmune biotech follows only a few other drug developers to make the Nasdaq leap in recent months, including fellow immunology-focused companies Artiva Biotherapeutics and Alumis. CNS disorder biotech Rapport Therapeutics also made the move in early June.
The Waltham, MA-based biotech seeks to list as ZBIO just a few months after disclosing a $200 million Series C led by SR One. The company did not disclose the size of the proposed IPO. It penciled in a standard $100 million maximum offering price, but that usually fluctuates during a roadshow.
Zenas confidentially filed for its IPO the same week CG Oncology and ArriVent Biopharma went public in late January, perhaps in a sign that it hoped to ride the momentum of those companies and the optimism with which investors and board members seemed to come out of the JP Morgan Healthcare Conference earlier that month.
The startup checks some of the boxes that public biotech investors have favored amid a long-running dry spell for IPOs: It’s in the clinic (Phase 3) and is in one of the industry’s hottest R&D areas (autoimmune diseases).
Most of the company’s efforts are focused on obexelimab, a bifunctional monoclonal antibody in Phase 3 for immunoglobulin G4-related disease. It’s also initiating Phase 2 tests of the experimental medicine in multiple sclerosis and systemic lupus erythematosus, and is in the Phase 2 open label portion of a Phase 2/3 in warm autoimmune hemolytic anemia.
Zenas also has partnerships with Viridian Therapeutics in thyroid eye disease and Dianthus Therapeutics in certain autoimmune diseases.
In the first six months of the year, the company spent $56.4 million on research and development, almost the same amount it spent in all of 2023 at $60 million, according to the S-1 filing. The company had $183 million in cash at the end of June, according to the document.
Investors that own 5% or more of the company include Xencor, Enavate Sciences, SR One, Longitude Capital, Tellus BioVentures, Fairmount Funds Management, New Enterprise Associates, Norwest Venture Partners and Bristol Myers Squibb. Specific breakdowns were not disclosed.
Xencor originally drove the development of obexelimab but sold it in 2021 after it flopped in a mid-stage lupus test.
Leading the biotech is founder, chair and CEO Lonnie Moulder, who previously co-founded and sold Tesaro to GSK. He’s also a managing member of investor Tellus BioVentures.
Moulder told Endpoints News earlier this summer that Zenas expects to bring obexelimab to market in the US and Europe while outlicensing it in other areas, including Asia. BMS has rights in Japan, South Korea and Australia, among other Asia-Pacific countries.