CancerRop, a molecular diagnostics company, said it would raise capital by issuing new shares worth 20 billion won ($17.1 million) to Hanmi Science through a third-party allotment.
With the new shares, Hanmi Science CEO Lim Jong-yoon will become the largest stakeholder of CancerRop. Hanmi Science recently vowed to become a global vaccine hub in the Asia-Pacific region by participating in a World Health Organization project.
In a pubic filing on Friday, CancerRop said it decided to issue new shares worth 20 billion won to Hanmi’s Lim through a third-party allotment.
Lim will invest 277,778 common shares of Hanmi Science in CancerRop, and in return, CancerRop will issue 5,614,823 common shares. The issuing price of CanceRop’s new shares will be 3,562 won, the median value between 3,339 won and 3,830 won evaluated by Grant Thornton Daejoo, an external rating agency, as of June 30, 2020. The company plans to issue the new shares on Oct. 15.
“The latest decision aims to strengthen and maintain the strategic business purpose of management between CancerRop and Hanmi Science CEO Lim Jong-yoon,” CancerRop said.
The 5,613,823 new shares that Lim will acquire are equivalent to 19.57 percent of CancerRop’s stock after the capital increase. Upon completing the payment for the investment, CancerRop’s largest shareholder will change from Myongji Hospital Chairman Lee Wang-jun to Hanmi Science CEO Lim Jong-yoon.
CancerRop is led by Chairman and Co-CEO Lee Wang-jun and Co-CEO Hwang Do-soon. Even though the largest shareholder will change to Lim, the company will maintain the current management system for business stability.
CancerRop plans to use the fund raised through the new share issuance to enhance cooperation with Oxford Vacmedix, a U.K.-based biopharmaceutical company of the University of Oxford. CancerRop is the largest stakeholder of Oxford Vacmedix, having a 43 percent stake in the biopharma firm.
“We raised the fund to cooperate with Oxford Vacmedix, which has a technology in cancer vaccine,” an official at CancerRop said. “The collaboration between Oxford Vacmedix and CancerRop, which has pioneering molecular and genomic analysis capabilities and experience in immune cell research, will serve as an important step for vaccine-related clinical trials in Europe in the future.”
Last week, Hanmi Science said it would participate in the WHO’s project to become an mRNA vaccine hub in the Asia-Pacific region.
“We formed a consortium with Myongji Medical Foundation, GeneOne Lifescience, Inno Bio, and GS Neotek starting from May. We will establish ourselves as an mRNA technology leader to push for a global vaccine hub strategy,” a Hanmi Science official said.