Vital Therapies plots $86M IPO as biotech market boils

October 11, 2013 | By Damian Garde

San Diego's Vital Therapies has filed for an $86.3 million IPO, eyeing a piece of the burgeoning market for biotechs on Wall Street as it advances a novel treatment for liver failure.

Planning to trade on the Nasdaq under "VTL," the company will use its IPO proceeds to bankroll three Phase III studies of Elad, a biologic cellular therapy system for crumbling livers. Elad works by running patients' blood through a bedside unit that uses human liver-derived cancer cells to filter toxins out of the plasma, which is then pumped back into the patient, restoring liver function.

Vital Therapies expects to have pivotal data of Elad's effects on alcohol-induced liver decompensation ready to go by 2015, with Phase III trials on acute alcoholic hepatitis and fulminant hepatic failure wrapping up in 2016 and 2017. The company is also in the midst of preclinical work to see whether Elad can be of use in liver transplants and liver cancer resections.

The Biotech Primer: An insider's guide to the science driving the biotech and pharma industries

This 200-page book takes an in-depth look at the biotech industry and the science that drives it. Although the industry itself is constantly changing, these fundamental concepts upon which it is built will remain important for years to come - and decision-makers who understand these fundamentals will be better able to evaluate and predict new trends. Click here to buy today!

Sign up for our FREE newsletter for more news like this sent to your inbox!

Last year, the company closed an $86 million funding round to get its three studies off the ground, and now, with trials rolling, Vital Therapies believes an IPO cash infusion can get its product to market and give it a crack at treating the more than 30,000 patients affected each year by acute liver failure.

If its public debut works out, the company will join the 39 biotechs that have made successful landings on Wall Street this year, raising a combined total of nearly $3 billion. Including Vital Therapies, there are at least 12 companies with S-1 filings waiting in the wings, poised to heap more than $700 million more onto the total.

- check out the S-1
Special Reports: Foundation Medicine, Ophthotech go gangbusters in 2013 biotech IPO revival | Are medical device companies invited to the biotech IPO party?
Related Articles:
Vital Therapies banks $86M for groundbreaking artificial liver trials
Celladon, Xencor bid for $155M in red-hot IPO market
Heart drug developer Trevena jumps into biotech IPO game with $86M pitch

Read more: FierceBiotech http://www.fiercebiotech.com/story/v...#ixzz2hpi8tTEP
Subscribe at FierceBiotech

http://www.fiercebiotech.com/story/vital-therapies-plots-86m-ipo-biotech-market-boils/2013-10-11