On March 2, 2021 MannKind Corporation (Nasdaq: MNKD) reported the pricing of $200.0 million aggregate principal amount of 2.50% Convertible Senior Notes due 2026 (the "notes") in a private placement (the "offering") to qualified institutional buyers pursuant to Rule 144A under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the "Securities Act") (Press release, Mannkind, MAR 2, 2021, View Source [SID1234575901]). MannKind also granted the initial purchasers of the notes an option to purchase, within a 13-day period beginning on, and including, the date on which the notes are first issued, up to an additional $30.0 million aggregate principal amount of notes. The sale of the notes is expected to close on March 4, 2021, subject to customary closing conditions.

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The notes will be general unsecured obligations of MannKind and will accrue interest at a rate of 2.50% per annum, payable semiannually in arrears on March 1 and September 1 of each year, beginning on September 1, 2021. The notes will mature on March 1, 2026, unless earlier converted, redeemed or repurchased.

Before December 1, 2025, holders will have the right to convert their notes only upon the occurrence of certain events. From and after December 1, 2025, until the close of business on the business day immediately preceding the maturity date, holders will have the right to convert all or any portion of their notes at their election. Upon conversion, MannKind will pay or deliver, as the case may be, cash, shares of MannKind’s common stock or a combination of cash and shares of MannKind’s common stock, at its election. The initial conversion rate is 191.8281 shares of common stock per $1,000 principal amount of notes, which represents an initial conversion price of approximately $5.21 per share of common stock. The initial conversion price represents a premium of approximately 30% over the last reported sale of $4.01 per share of MannKind’s common stock on March 1, 2021. The conversion rate and conversion price will be subject to adjustment upon the occurrence of certain events.

MannKind may not redeem the notes prior to March 6, 2024. MannKind may redeem for cash all or any portion of the notes (subject to certain limitations), at its option, on or after March 6, 2024 and prior to the 36th scheduled trading day immediately preceding the maturity date, if the last reported sale price of MannKind’s common stock has been at least 130% of the conversion price then in effect for at least 20 trading days (whether or not consecutive) during any 30 consecutive trading day period (including the last trading day of such period) ending on, and including, the trading day immediately preceding the date on which MannKind provides notice of redemption at a redemption price equal to 100% of the principal amount of the notes to be redeemed, plus accrued and unpaid interest to, but excluding, the redemption date.

If a "fundamental change" (as defined in the indenture for the notes) occurs, then, subject to limited exceptions, holders may require MannKind to repurchase their notes for cash. The repurchase price would be equal to the principal amount of the notes to be repurchased, plus accrued and unpaid interest, if any, to, but excluding, the applicable repurchase date.

MannKind estimates that the net proceeds from the offering will be approximately $193.8 million (or approximately $222.9 million if the initial purchasers fully exercise their option to purchase additional notes), after deducting the initial purchasers’ discounts and commissions and estimated offering expenses. MannKind intends to use the net proceeds from this offering for working capital and other general corporate purposes, including a Phase 3 clinical trial of Afrezza in pediatric subjects and further development of product candidates in MannKind’s pipeline. MannKind may also use a portion of the proceeds from this offering to pay down a portion of existing debt or for acquisitions or strategic investments in complementary businesses or technologies, although MannKind does not currently have any plans for any such debt repayment, acquisitions or investments.

The notes and any shares of MannKind’s common stock issuable upon conversion of the notes have not been and will not be registered under the Securities Act, any state securities laws or the securities laws of any other jurisdiction, and unless so registered, may not be offered or sold in the United States absent registration or an applicable exemption from, or in a transaction not subject to, the registration requirements of the Securities Act and other applicable securities laws.

This press release is neither an offer to sell nor a solicitation of an offer to buy any of these securities nor shall there be any sale of these securities in any state or jurisdiction in which such an offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful prior to the registration or qualification thereof under the securities laws of any such state or jurisdiction.

On March 2, 2021 Vincerx Pharma, Inc. (Nasdaq: VINC), a biopharmaceutical company aspiring to address the unmet medical needs of patients with cancer through paradigm-shifting therapeutics, reported the addition of three new executives to the company’s management team (Press release, Vincerx Pharma, MAR 2, 2021, View Source [SID1234575899]). Hermes Garbán, M.D., Ph.D. has been appointed as Chief Medical Officer, Hans-Georg Lerchen, Ph.D. has been appointed as Chief Scientific Officer, and Tom Thomas, has been appointed as General Counsel and Chief Legal Officer of Vincerx.

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"The addition of Hermes, Hans-Georg, and Tom to the Vincerx team provides important expertise and experience to our accomplished management team as we enter the next stage of our development," said Ahmed Hamdy M.D., Chief Executive Officer of Vincerx. "The past months have been transformative at Vincerx, marked by our launch as a public company, and this groups’ combined decades of medical, scientific and legal acumen across biotech will be key as we work towards advancing our pipeline of targeted oncology therapeutics. We look forward to leveraging this strengthened team as we work towards important milestones through 2021 including the initiation of our Phase 1b studies evaluating VIP52, our highly selective and potent CDK9 inihitor, in Myc-driven hematologic malignancies and solid tumors, as well as relapsed/refractory chronic lymphocytic leukemia."

Hermes Garbán, M.D., Ph.D.
Hermes Garbán, M.D., Ph.D. is the Chief Medical Officer of Vincerx Pharma, Inc. Before joining Vincerx, Dr. Garbán served as Head, Therapeutics Discovery and Development at ImmunityBio, Inc., a registration stage immuno-oncology and infectious disease company responsible for conducting Phase 1 through Phase 3 clinical trials focusing on solid tumors and immunotherapies development, from March 2019 to February 2021. Before that, Dr. Garbán served as Head, Therapeutics Discovery and Development at NantBioscience, Inc., a biopharmaceutical company focused on the discovery of innovative cancer and infectious diseases, therapeutics and their clinical applications, from June 2017 to March 2019, and as Head, Therapeutic Antibody Discovery from September 2014 to June 2017. During his tenure at NantBioscience, Dr. Garbán also served as Deputy Vice President, Global Cell Manufacturing supporting operations at Nantkwest, Inc, an innovative clinical-stage immunotherapy company, from June 2017 to October 2018. Dr. Garbán served as Principal Investigator at the California NanoSystems Institute (CnSI) and Professor of Medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) from 2009 to 2014. Prior to that, Dr. Garbán served as Assistant Professor of Surgery in the Division of Surgical Oncology at UCLA from 2005 to 2009. Dr. Garbán is a physician-scientist who earned his M.D. from the Central University of Venezuela (UCV), where his medical practice focused on underserved and indigenous communities. He earned his Ph.D. in Microbiology, Immunology and Molecular Genetics at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Dr. Garbán trained as postdoctoral fellow in Molecular and Medical Pharmacology at UCLA under the mentorship of Dr. Louis Ignarro (1998 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine).

Hans-Georg Lerchen, Ph.D.
Hans-Georg Lerchen, Ph.D. is the Chief Scientific Officer of Vincerx. Before joining Vincerx, Dr. Lerchen was a Distinguished Fellow in the Bayer Science Fellow Network of the Pharmaceuticals R&D organization of Bayer AG. With 33 years background in medicinal chemistry, he is author or coauthor of 81 patents/patent applications and 27 peer reviewed publications. Dr. Lerchen contributed to 5 INDs and to the identification of numerous preclinical candidates and lead structures. With his research focus on prodrugs and drug delivery modalities, he was the medicinal chemistry lead and key driver of diverse bioconjugate programs, including the development of ADCs with the novel KSPi toxophore and legumain linker platform, which Vincerx acquired from Bayer. Dr. Lerchen received his Ph.D. in organic chemistry from the University of Mainz with Professor Horst Kunz. After a year of research as a Max Planck postdoctoral scholarship holder at the MPI for Biochemistry in Munich, he started his industrial career at Bayer AG Leverkusen in the Central Research Department. After 14 years with responsibilities for different basic research programs he moved to the Medicinal Chemistry unit of the Pharmaceuticals Division of Bayer in Wuppertal. As a renowned scientist in the ADC field, Dr. Lerchen is an invited speaker on various international conferences. He serves as a board member of the biochemistry subgroup of the German Chemical Society (GDCh).

Tom Thomas, J.D.
Tom Thomas will be joining as General Counsel and Chief Legal Officer of Vincerx on March 15. Mr. Thomas is a partner at Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP, a leading international law firm with offices in major metropolitan centers around the world. He has over 30 years of experience representing life science and technology companies at all stages of development, from start-up and emerging companies, to pre-IPO companies, to large public and private companies. His practice has focused on corporate and securities matters, including corporate governance, debt and equity financings, public and private acquisitions and dispositions, venture capital financings and investments, SPAC transactions, PIPE offerings, joint ventures and strategic alliances, SEC compliance and reporting, executive compensation, and technology transactions. Mr. Thomas received his B.B.A. in Accounting from the University of Iowa, where he graduated summa cum laude, and his J.D. from the University of Minnesota Law School, where he graduated magna cum laude.

On March 2, 2021 Argobio SAS, a newly-created start-up studio dedicated to life sciences, reported its launch with 50 M€ of committed capital (Press release, Evotec, MAR 2, 2021, View Source;announcements/press-releases/p/argobio-announces-its-launch-with-50-meur-to-create-and-develop-pioneering-biotech-spinouts-with-the-support-of-bpifrance-kurma-partners-angelini-pharma-evotec-and-the-institut-pasteur-6030 [SID1234575898]). Argobio was initiated by Kurma Partners, a leading Paris and Munich-based healthcare venture capital firm, and Bpifrance, the French national investment bank. Kurma and Bpifrance were joined by complementary strategic investors, Angelini Pharma, a private international pharmaceutical company, Evotec, a drug discovery alliance and development partnership company, and the Institut Pasteur, internationally renowned center for biomedical research.

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Argobio will create and launch at least five ambitious biotech companies over the next five years sourcing innovative early-stage projects from renowned European academic research institutions. Argobio will focus on selected therapeutic areas, including rare diseases, neurological disorders, oncology, and immunology. It will also look to develop promising platform technologies for therapeutic products. The investors will have the opportunity to invest in the biotech companies created by Argobio.

Argobio will identify, select, and incubate these projects up to company creation, providing broad expertise in the discovery and development of innovative therapeutic products from its team of highly experienced biotech entrepreneurs. The team will be led by Yves Ribeill, Neill Mackenzie and Rémi Soula. Thierry Laugel, Managing Partner at Kurma Partners will be appointed President of Argobio, and Laurent Arthaud, Director of the Biotech and Ecotech investment of Bpifrance, will be appointed Chairman of the Supervisory Board.

"Building on our BRIDGE strategy and partnerships, we continue to be dedicated to making Evotec’s all-modality technology platforms available to validate and accelerate therapeutic concepts from toptier academic institutions globally. As an investor into Argobio, we are delighted to work with a group of distinguished partners and entrepreneurs to build companies committed to the maturation of first-in-class therapeutics towards drugs that which will change patients’ lives and cure diseases with some of the highest medical needs," said Dr. Werner Lanthaler, Chief Executive Officer of Evotec SE.

On March 2, 2021 CMAB Biopharma (Suzhou) Inc’s ("CMAB") partner QureBio Ltd ("QureBio") reported its innovative drug Q-1802 received United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) clearance for an Investigational New Drug (IND) application (Press release, CMAB Biopharma, MAR 2, 2021, View Source [SID1234575875]). This application is the first clinical research in the U.S. by QureBio.

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Q-1802 is the lead candidate in QureBio’s pipeline and is the first bispecific antibody against PD-L1 and Claudin18.2 to be studied in a U.S. clinical trial. As part of the collaboration, CMAB provided integrated CDMO services for the Q-1802 program, utilizing its antibody production platform. Services included CMC development activities and successful production of drug substance and drug product batches in only 9 months.

"We are very glad to collaborate with CMAB. During the Q-1802 program, the two groups worked together and completed the CMC development and production of clinical samples efficiently and rapidly." said Dr. Xiangdong Qu, Founder and CEO of QureBio. "The first-class technology and GMP level, as well as thoughtful services of CMAB team impressed us a lot during our collaboration. We are looking forward to continuing work with CMAB, and we are also striving to bring better innovative dual anti-drugs to patients as soon as possible."

Dr. Yongzhong Wang, CEO of CMAB said, "We appreciate the trust of Dr.Qu and QureBio, and congratulation them on having Q-1802 become the world’s first bispecific antibody against PD-L1 and Claudin18.2 approved for a clinical trial in the US. There are unique development challenges when dealing with a bispecific antibody and we are very proud of our team who utilized our antibody platform in order to achieve, industry-leading speed to get a US IND approved successfully. It is also a testament to the excellent cooperation between CMAB and QureBio. CMAB will continue to accelerate the process of Q-1802 from QureBio, and look forward to reaching the next milestone early."

On March 2, 2021 Oscotec Inc. (039200: KOSDAQ), the Korean drug development company, and Beactica Therapeutics AB, the Swedish drug discovery company, reported a new research development and licensing agreement (Press release, Oscotec, MAR 2, 2021, View Source [SID1234575874]). Oscotec and Beactica will initially jointly collaborate concerning research and early preclinical development of novel anti-cancer drug candidates arising out of Beactica’s LSD1 programme. Oscotec may thereafter opt to take full responsibility for clinical development and commercialization.

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Under the terms of the agreement, Oscotec is entitled to gain exclusive global rights for further development and commercialization of Beactica’s programme. Beactica is eligible to receive up to EUR 149 million in potential preclinical, clinical and regulatory milestones, including an upfront and equity payment from Oscotec upon signing of the agreement. Furthermore, Beactica is eligible to receive double-digit royalties on commercial sales of the products resulting from the partnership. Beactica is also entitled to revenue shares from any related future licensing activities by Oscotec. Full financial details remain undisclosed.

"We are thrilled about the opportunity to work with Beactica on the LSD1 allosteric inhibitor programme that we hope opens up very unique and exciting possibilities," said Dr Taeyoung Yoon, CEO/CSO of Oscotec. "Not only could this opportunity fill our need of balancing the preclinical pipeline in the short term, we are convinced that the partnership will also bring to us added value of collaborative science where the two companies complement each other extremely well.""This is a landmark agreement for Beactica, and we are delighted to be working with Oscotec." said Dr Per Källblad, CEO of Beactica Therapeutics. "Their commitment to building a strong clinical pipeline of targeted therapeutics in immunology and oncology makes Oscotec an ideal partner for our programme."