Kiniksa Pharmaceuticals Ltd. (NASDAQ:KNSA) raised $152.6 million through the sale of 8.5 million shares at $18 in an upsized IPO underwritten by Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan, JMP Securities and Wedbush.
Kiniksa priced the offering at the midpoint of its proposed range. The price valued the company at $871.9 million.
Last week, Kiniksa proposed to sell 7 million shares at $17-$19. A sale of that many shares at $18 would have raised $126 million and valued the company at $845.3 million.
The company is developing therapies in-licensed from other companies to treat autoinflammatory and autoimmune conditions. It holds certain rights to rilonacept from Regeneron Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ:REGN); that company markets the therapy as Arcalyst to treat cryopyrin-associated periodic syndromes (CAPS). Kiniksa expects data this year from a Phase II trial of the therapy to treat recurrent pericarditis, and hopes to begin a Phase III trial this year. Rilonacept is a recombinant protein with the heterodimeric IL-1 receptor linked to the Fc portion of human IgG.
Kiniksa also plans to begin a Phase II study this year of mavrilimumab to treat giant cell arteritis (GCA). It has exclusive, worldwide rights to that therapy from the MedImmune LLC unit of AstraZeneca plc (LSE:AZN; NYSE:AZN). Mavrilimumab is a human mAb targeting the alpha receptor of GM-CSF.
Kiniksa Chairman and CEO Sanj Patel, President and COO Stephen Mahoney, CFO Chris Heberlig and Chief Legal Officer Thomas Beetham were all executives at Synageva BioPharma Corp., which Alexion Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ:ALXN) acquired in 2015 for about $9 billion (see BioCentury, May 18, 2015).