Companion Diagnostic Specialist AltheaDx Withdraws IPO

San Diego’s AltheaDx, which offers a series of molecular diagnostic tests that enable doctors to identify the optimal drugs for treating patients, yesterday withdrew its plans for an initial public offering, according to a regulatory filing.

The company first revealed its plans for an IPO a few days before Christmas. In its withdrawal notice, AltheaDx said the IPO would have amounted to discretionary financing, and “terms currently obtainable in the public marketplace are not sufficiently attractive” to proceed with the offering.

AltheaDx is an example of the emerging field of “precision medicine,” which enables healthcare providers to treat patients by correlating treatment regimens with each patient’s genetic makeup. The company introduced its IDgenetix tests in late 2013, and currently offers 13 tests in cardiovascular disease, neuropsychiatric disorders, and pain. The company performed tests on more than 13,500 patient samples through the first nine months of 2014, generating about $13.6 million in revenue.

In an amended filing in January, AltheaDx planned to offer slightly more than 4.6 million shares priced between $12 and $14 a share, which would raise about $60 million in gross proceeds at the midpoint of the range.

The company said it might pursue a private offering. Telegraph Hill Partners currently holds a nearly 44 percent ownership stake in the company, and Alma Life Sciences has about 24.5 percent.

Author: Bruce V. Bigelow

In Memoriam: Our dear friend Bruce V. Bigelow passed away on June 29, 2018. He was the editor of Xconomy San Diego from 2008 to 2018. Read more about his life and work here. Bruce Bigelow joined Xconomy from the business desk of the San Diego Union-Tribune. He was a member of the team of reporters who were awarded the 2006 Pulitzer Prize in National Reporting for uncovering bribes paid to San Diego Republican Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham in exchange for special legislation earmarks. He also shared a 2006 award for enterprise reporting from the Society of Business Editors and Writers for “In Harm’s Way,” an article about the extraordinary casualty rate among employees working in Iraq for San Diego’s Titan Corp. He has written extensively about the 2002 corporate accounting scandal at software goliath Peregrine Systems. He also was a Gerald Loeb Award finalist and National Headline Award winner for “The Toymaker,” a 14-part chronicle of a San Diego start-up company. He takes special satisfaction, though, that the series was included in the library for nonfiction narrative journalism at the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University. Bigelow graduated from U.C. Berkeley in 1977 with a degree in English Literature and from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in 1979. Before joining the Union-Tribune in 1990, he worked for the Associated Press in Los Angeles and The Kansas City Times.