A biopharmaceutical startup with Cincinnati roots has gone public with an initial offering that topped $190 million, months after inking a nine-figure fundraise that stands as one of the region’s largest.
CinCor Pharma Inc., a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company developing treatments for hypertension and other cardio-renal diseases, raised $193.6 million with its Nasdaq debut Jan. 7, trading under the symbol “CINC.” The company sold 12.1 million shares with a valuation of around $566.7 million.
The public debut follows a blockbuster 2021 for the company but comes with at least one surprise. It appears the startup has moved its headquarters from Madisonville to Boston over the last few weeks. Boston is listed as the primary address in the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filing and is now the sole city mentioned on the company’s website.
A spokesman for CinCor declined to comment.
An HQ move isn’t entirely unexpected. CinCor hired a new CEO, Marc de Garidel, in July, who is based in Boston, and the company, upon his hire, opened a second office in the Massachusetts capital city.
Pete Blackshaw, CEO of Cintrifuse, an Over-the-Rhine-based startup catalyst group, said it's likely a team will still remain in Cincinnati. CinCor, per its SEC filing, has 10 full-time employees and expects to grow significantly in employees and scope of its operations.
The outlook is optimistic, Blackshaw said, given CinCor’s valuation and its $143 million fundraise in October, the region’s second-largest venture round in history.
“I cannot imagine this not being a net positive for Cincinnati,” he said.
CinCor was founded in 2018 as a subsidiary of CinRx Pharma and spun out as an independent company in May 2019.
The company’s only asset, CIN-107, has great potential for patients who cannot achieve blood pressure goals despite taking multiple anti-hypertensive medications, officials have said.
Based on its research and development plans, CinCor expects that the net proceeds from the offering, together with its existing cash and cash equivalents, will be sufficient to fund operations through 2024. The company reported net loss of $5 million and $22.3 million for 2019 and 2020, respectively, and $16.5 million and $21 million for the nine months that ended Sept. 30, 2020 and 2021, respectively.
As of Sept. 30, 2021, the company said it had an accumulated deficit of $48.4 million.
CinCor plans to use the bulk of the proceeds from the offering to fund the continued development of CIN-107 via multiple clinical trials. It will also use a portion for manufacturing, non-clinical studies and related activities as well as for working capital and general corporate purposes.
Even with the IPO, the company said will require substantial additional funding to finance its operations.
Morgan Stanley, Jefferies and Evercore ISI acted as joint book-running managers for the offering. Oppenheimer & Co. was the offering’s lead manager.
The Greater Cincinnati market has seen a deluge of IPOs in recent months. Paycor and commercial real estate company Phillips Edison completed IPOs in July, and hardware distributor Hillman Group went public when it merged with special purpose acquisition company, or SPAC, Landcadia Holdings III Inc. that month.
An IPO for Blue Water Vaccines, which is developing a universal flu vaccine, is also pending. In a filing in December, Blue Water said it will offer 2.2 million shares of its common stock, priced at $8 to $10 a share.
