Irvine-based PeproMene Bio Inc., a biotechnology company with a blood cancer treatment that has deep ties to Duarte’s City of Hope National Medical Center, is looking to become Orange County’s next big healthcare company to go public.
Don’t expect to see the creator of novel immune-oncology therapies listed on the New York Stock Exchange or Nasdaq, though.
The company, estimated to employ about a dozen or so people in its Irvine Spectrum-area headquarters, has designs on listing its stock on South Korea’s Kosdaq stock market as soon as next year, and said last week it is looking to raise nearly $100 million.
It’s one of a handful of U.S.-based biotech firms that are now seeking a public listing in South Korea, “tempted by the promise of strong valuations amid a welcoming base of investors,” noted a recent report in Bloomberg.
There’s currently less than two dozen overseas firms listed in South Korea.
Firms going public in South Korea over the past year have seen their shares jump 26.4% over the past year, compared to 22% gains for new issues in the U.S., according to recent Bloomberg data.
Biotech-focused stocks have driven the recent Kosdaq gains.
OC Connection
Other biotech firms in the U.S. now seeking a similar listing in Korea also have OC connections.
Menlo Park’s Avellino Labs, a genetic testing company specializing in ophthalmologic disorders, will go public on the Kosdaq this year, officials confirmed to the Business Journal last week.
Avellino originated in South Korea and subsequently migrated to Silicon Valley; its board of directors include Jim Mazzo, one of Orange County’s best-known executive in the ophthalmology industry, who now serves as global president for Carl Zeiss Meditec’s strategic business unit ophthalmic devices, and is based out of Newport Beach.
Mazzo, the former chief executive of Advanced Medical Optics when it was in Santa Ana, joined the Avellino board in April.
Deep Hope Ties
PeproMene launched in 2016; its chief executive is Bryan Hong Woo Kim, a company co-founder who previously started Houston’s ImmunoMet Therapeutics.
In 2017, the company licensed from City of Hope a preclincal blood cancer immunotherapy, and the treatment continues to be studied at the cancer-fighting hospital’s main campus, the company said.
It uses a chimeric antigen receptor T-cell, or CAR-T, therapy to treat non-Hodgkin lymphomas that was developed by Dr. Larry Kwak, director of the Toni Stephenson Lymphoma Center at City of Hope.
Kwak is also chair of PeproMene’s scientific advisory board; the board includes several influential doctors with ties to City of Hope, which is in the midst of expanding its OC presence and plans a new campus in Irvine.
Kwak’s former lab at the National Cancer Institute pioneered a cancer vaccine for B-cell malignancies. In 2010, Time magazine named Kwak among the world’s 100 most influential people.
Also on PeproMene’s scientific board: Dr. Steven Rosen; he is provost and chief scientific officer for City of Hope.
Others on the startup company’s scientific board are Dr. Hong Qin, a principal researcher in immune-oncology who works with Kwak at City of Hope’s lymphoma center, as well as Dr. Bruce Alan Beutler, who received the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2011.
Prior Funding
PeproMene’s last reported funding deal was struck a year ago. It raised $40.2 million from 17 investors—including some in Korea—in a Series B round, according to Securities and Exchange Commission filings.
That funding included “Kosdaq listed companies, private companies, and various public and private funds,” the company said in a subsequent statement.
The fund is being used in the company’s “research in preclinical program, development in further clinical trials, and for general corporate purposes,” it said last year.
Early-stage biotech firms get a better reception from the markets in Korea compared to those in the U.S. and Europe, according to other domestic companies looking to list on the Kosdaq.
“I feel Korean investors have stronger trust in biotech firms than those in other countries, and that’s the only reason why I decided to list my company despite so many factors that discount Korea markets,” Gene Lee, chairman of Avellino said during a recent interview in Seoul.
Other factors boosting Korea’s presence in the biotech world: more relaxed listing rules, lower listing expenses, and the Korean government’s support for startups.
OC’s two largest healthcare-related IPOs of the past year were Irvine’s Axonics Modulation Technologies, a maker of devices to treat overactive bladder issues, and Urovant Sciences Ltd., an Irvine-based drug company also focused on urologic conditions; each raised about $140 million.
Kosdaq-listed firms have a combined market value in the $200 billion range.
