Abzena announces private placement to raise £20m for acquisition

Abzena plc, a life sciences company from UCL School of Pharmacy, providing services and technologies enabling the development and manufacture of biopharmaceutical products, has conditionally raised £20 million (net of expenses) by way of a placing of 35,004,972 new Ordinary Shares at 60 pence each with certain existing and new shareholders, and has agreed to acquire The Chemistry Research Solution LLC (“TCRS”), subject to certain closing conditions including completion of the placing. The Placing Price represents a 7.7 per cent discount to the closing mid-market price of an existing ordinary share on 23 November 2015, being the last business day prior to this announcement.

TCRS is a specialist contract chemistry and bioconjugation company based near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA, with expertise in producing and analysing antibody drug conjugates (ADCs). Abzena will pay $15 million (£10 million) to acquire the entire ownership interests in TCRS. The consideration will be paid as $8.8 million in cash (subject to adjustment for net current assets and retained indebtedness of TCRS at completion of the Acquisition), the issue of 3,609,978 Ordinary Shares and $0.9 million in restricted stock units over 901,697 Ordinary Shares and assumed long term debt of $1.5 million.

To find out more visit the Abzena website.

Enquiries:
Abzena plc
John Burt, Chief Executive Officer
Julian Smith, Chief Financial Officer
+44 1223 903498

Cenkos Securities (Nominated Adviser and Broker)
Christopher Golden / Ivonne Cantu
+44 20 7397 8900

N+1 Singer (Joint Broker)
Aubrey Powell / Liz Yong
+44 20 7496 3000
Instinctif Partners
Melanie-Toyne Sewell / Rozi Morris
+44 20 7457 2020
abzena@instinctif.com

About Abzena
Abzena provides proprietary technologies and complementary services in the UK and USA to enable the development and manufacture of biopharmaceutical products. The development of biopharmaceuticals is a growing area and requires specialist technology.

The Group comprises Antitope, PacificGMP and PolyTherics, which between them have built a global customer base including the majority of the top 20 biopharmaceutical companies as well as large and small biotech companies and academic groups.

Antitope provides immunogenicity assessment, protein engineering to create humanized antibodies and deimmunised therapeutic proteins, and cell line development for manufacture.

PacificGMP provides contract process development and manufacture of biopharmaceuticals, including monoclonal antibodies, recombinant proteins, vaccines, and gene therapy and cell therapy products, for preclinical and clinical studies.

PolyTherics specializes in proprietary site-specific conjugation technologies for antibody drug conjugate development and solutions for optimizing the therapeutic properties of biopharmaceuticals.

Abzena (AIM: ABZA) has its main operations in Cambridge, UK and in San Diego, CA, USA. For more information, please see www.abzena.com.

Note: The term “Abzena inside” is applied to cover products that have been created using or incorporate Abzena’s proprietary technologies, and include Composite Human Antibodies™ and ThioBridge™ antibody drug conjugates. These products are being developed by Abzena’s partners and Abzena has the potential to earn future licence fees, milestone payments and/or royalties.

About UCL Business PLC
UCL Business PLC (UCLB) is a leading technology transfer company that supports and commercialises research and innovations arising from UCL, one of the UK’s top research-led universities.  UCLB has a successful track record and a strong reputation for identifying and protecting promising new technologies and innovations from UCL academics. UCLB has a strong track record in commercialising medical technologies and provides technology transfer services to UCL’s associated hospitals; University College London Hospitals, Moorfields Eye Hospital, Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children and the Royal Free London Hospital.  It invests directly in development projects to maximise the potential of the research and manages the commercialisation process of technologies from laboratory to market.

For further information, please visit: www.uclb.com