BioWorld International Correspondent
PARIS - GenOway SA received the green light from French stock market authorities to launch an initial public offering on the Alternext market of the Euronext stock exchange in Paris, in which it hopes to raise several million euros.
The Lyon, France-based company specializes in the creation of customized, genetically modified mice and rats that are specifically designed to meet the gene validation, drug screening and preclinical development requirements of its customers in the biopharmaceutical industry and the research community. It claims to be the largest company in its field in Europe, having developed more than 300 mouse lines.
It plans to use the money raised to expand its activities generally, especially in North America, and to give it the means to finance possible acquisitions.
Founded in 1999, GenOway has raised a total of €8.8 million (US$11.97 million) in five funding rounds since then. Its principal shareholders are four French venture capital funds, namely: Dassault Développement, of Paris (26.6 percent); the CDC Entreprises Innovation, of Paris (25.6 percent); Siparex Ventures, of Lyon (16 percent); and Qualis SA, of Paris (15 percent).
GenOway generated revenues of €4.4 million in 2006, up from €1.6 million two years earlier, and posted a net loss of €2.4 million last year. It currently does 82 percent of its business in Europe, 15 percent in the U.S. and 3 percent in Asia.
The company's technology platform comprises the technologies generally used in trangenesis, such as pronuclear microinjection, gene knockout, knock-in and knock-down, and conditional and inducible systems, as well as other proprietary techniques.
At the end of 2002, GenOway announced the creation of the world's first genetically modified rat, maintaining that rats yielded better models of disease in humans than mice. The following September, moreover, it unveiled its first cloned rats, which it had created using its nuclear transferred-based cloning technology. GenOway said this technology can be used to generate targeted mutations in rats, whereas in the genetically modified rats it had produced up to then, genetic mutations were random, not targeted.
Altogether, the company has developed 11 technologies for generating semi-standard mouse and rat models whose genetic makeup can be modified at the customer's request. It also offers standardized models in different therapeutic fields, such as cancer, hypertension, metabolic disorders, central nervous system disorders, lung diseases, arthritis and atherosclerosis.
The services provided by GenOway include the generation of targeted embryonic stem cell clones, chimeras and ES cell germ transmission. It guarantees to create knock-in models utilizing its Quick Knock-In technology in nine months, or shRNA transgenic animal models in four months. Its customers retain all intellectual property rights over the model, since GenOway makes no claim on either the model or the results generated using the line.
GenOway has contracts with dozens of companies, universities and research establishments around the world, and its customers include some of the biggest names in the pharmaceutical industry. All its animal-related services are subcontracted to the world's leading animal breeder, Charles River Laboratories, of Boston, which has a facility near Lyon.