Clinical-stage immunology biotech Alumis is eyeing $274 million in net proceeds from its planned initial public offering, the biotech said in a securities document Monday morning.
The South San Francisco drug developer said it plans to sell 17.65 million shares $ALMS between $16 and $18 apiece.
At the midpoint range, its IPO would be the third largest of the year, behind bladder cancer drugmaker CG Oncology’s $380 million debut in January and cell therapy maker Kyverna Therapeutics’ $319 million launch in February. Despite those strong floats, the IPO window never fully opened for the broader biotech market.
If it successfully lands the debut, Alumis’ IPO haul would nearly beat the amount it raised in a private financing earlier this spring. On March 6, Alumis took the wraps off a $259 million Series C from Foresite Capital, Samsara BioCapital and venBio Partners, among others.
Srini Akkaraju“The 10 IPOs last year, they’re all high-quality companies, most of them with really good clinical data. This company, I’m confident it goes public,” Samsara founder Srini Akkaraju told Endpoints News at the time of the Series C. “It’s all a matter of what price it goes public at in today’s market.”
Alumis unveiled its IPO ambitions earlier this month as it gears up for Phase 3 studies in the second half of this year for its lead asset, a next-generation TYK2 inhibitor named ESK-001. Bristol Myers Squibb’s Sotyktu and Takeda’s late-stage TAK-279 have led the field thus far and other biotechs are trying to find their lane as well, including Sudo Biosciences, Biohaven, Atomwise and others.
It’s an expensive arena. Alumis devoted $137 million to R&D in 2023 and $101 million in 2022, according to its S-1 filing.
Combined with its existing resources, Alumis plans to spend about $345 million on the clinical development of ESK-001, including topline data in its Phase 3 in plaque psoriasis and through completion of a Phase 2b in systemic lupus erythematosus. In the late-stage tests, Alumis will compare ESK-001 against placebo and Amgen’s Otezla. Once the first person is dosed in Phase 3, Alumis will owe a $23 million milestone payment to FronThera, the biotech it bought in 2021 to get its hands on ESK-001.
Alumis also plans to spend about $5 million to complete a Phase 1 healthy volunteer study of its second candidate, A-005, which aims to address neuroinflammatory and neurodegenerative diseases. Another $36 million will go toward discovery and preclinical work.