A Medical Device Daily

MabCure (Hasselt, Belgium) said it has recently completed a private placement of $1 million. The amount is comprised of a $500,000 cash investment and the conversion of a $500,000 bridge loan that was made last September, into equity securities, the company said.

MabCure is a biotechnology company using its technology to create highly specific monoclonal antibodies (MAbs) for the early detection of cancer.

“We are very pleased to close this private placement and to convert our bridge loan into equity securities, particularly during challenging times for raising private equity,“ said Amnon Gonenne, president/CEO of MabCure. “The funds will provide us with the near-term liquidity we need to sustain our clinical trials program and to grow the business.“

MabCure will issue 2 million units to the investors at 50 cents a unit. Each unit consists of: one share of MabCure common stock; one two-year non-transferable common stock purchase warrant exercisable at a price of 60 cents a share; and one two-year non-transferable common stock purchase warrant exercisable at a price of 70 cents a share.

The company said it plans to use the new investment capital to pursue its clinical trials in Europe and Asia. Clinical trials to diagnose ovarian cancer are already underway after MabCure signed a clinical research agreement with the Ramathibodi Hospital, Mahidol University (Bangkok, Thailand), the company noted. The study aims to evaluate MabCure's panel of anti-ovarian MAbs in diagnosing ovarian cancer in the blood and urine of patients suspected of having the disease.

In other financing activity:

• Synovis Life Technologies (St. Paul, Minnesota) said its board has approved a program for the company to repurchase up to 1 million shares of its common stock, in addition to the nearly 66,000 shares remaining to be purchased under an existing share repurchase program the board approved last September. Synovis said the repurchase program does not have an expiration date. As of Jan. 31, the company had $56.5 million in cash, cash equivalents and investments. This represents the third stock buyback Synovis has reported in less than two years, it said.

• Implantable Provider Group (IPG; Atlanta) said it has secured an investment from Sequoia Capital. The funding will enable IPG to invest in future growth initiatives, the company said. The amount of the funding was not disclosed.

IPG streamlines the management and delivery of implantable medical devices through its Implantable Device Management (IDM) solution, ultimately lowering costs for commercial insurance payers, according to the company. By working directly with commercial payers, clinical providers, and medical device manufacturers, the IDM solution eliminates the complexity and the financial risks associated with the billing and reimbursement processes for providers, while maintaining patient access to innovative medical therapies that use life-saving and life-enhancing medical devices, IPG says.