Drug development company raising £11m through share issues

North West drug development company Evgen Pharma is raising £11m through the issue of new shares.

The proceeds will be used to fund further progress on cancer treatments and two key senior hires, being a chief business officer and a chief scientific and medical officer.

It is expected the proceeds will fund the group’s operations through to mid-2023.

Evgen, which has bases in Wilmslow and Liverpool, has raised £10m through a heavily oversubscribed placing of 125,000,000 new ordinary shares of 0.25p each with existing and new investors at an issue price of 8p per share.

In addition to the placing, to provide an opportunity to all qualifying shareholders to participate in the fundraising at the issue price, a further £1m will be raised through an open offer.

Admission of the placing and open offer shares is expected to take place on March 4.

Among its trials Evgen is developing sulforaphane-based medicines, known as SFX-01, for the treatment of breast cancer and multiple other diseases.

Huw Jones, Evgen Pharma chief executive, said: “This heavily oversubscribed fundraising is transformative for us and allows us to accelerate both our future clinical and current pre-clinical work dramatically, together with expanding our senior management team to support our growth.

“We are very pleased with recent progress of our work on SFX-01 and are most grateful for the support shown in this placing by existing shareholders.

“The placing also brings a number of new, high quality shareholders to our register and we offer a warm welcome to them as we accelerate our progress in a range of cancers and acute respiratory distress.”