Viking Global Investors and Perceptive Advisors stand to benefit from the planned initial public offering of BridgeBio Pharma, a drug company in Palo, Alto California that was founded in 2015.
Hedge fund firm Viking Global Investors and KKR & Co. each own at least five percent of its shares, according to a preliminary IPO prospectus that BridgeBio filed May 24 with regulators. Hedge fund firm Perceptive Advisors is also an early investor in the company, but its stake apparently is less than 5 percent, as BridgeBio did not list the firm among its principal stockholders.
BridgeBio develops medicines that treat patients suffering from diseases resulting from “defects in a single gene, and cancers with clear genetic drivers,” according to the prospectus. Viking made its first investment in BridgeBio in September 2017, when the firm, along with existing investor KKR, led a $135 million financing for the company, according to an announcement at the time.
Like many biopharma companies that have filed plans to go public, BridgeBio has no revenues.
The company says in the prospectus that its pipeline of medicines includes more than 15 development programs for “product candidates” ranging from early discovery to late stage. “Several of our programs target indications that we believe present the potential for our product candidates, if approved, to target portions of market opportunities of at least $1 billion in annual sales,” the company said in the IPO document.
BridgeBio did not disclose the percentage of shares Viking currently owns. The company does say that in November 2018 Viking Global Opportunities Illiquid Investments Sub-Master LP and a KKR fund each shelled out $100 million to buy 50,446,451 series D Preferred Units for $1.9823 per unit as part of a $299.2 million round of financing.
Over the years, Perceptive Advisors has participated in at least three BridgeBio financings.
The hedge fund firm participated in the $299.2 million D financing, according to a BridgeBio statement in January. Perceptive also participated in the $135 million financing in 2017, the biopharma company said at the time, noting in the announcement that the hedge fund firm had been an earlier investor.
BridgeBio’s “principal stockholders and certain members of our management own a significant percentage of our stock and will be able to exert significant control over matters subject to stockholder approval,” the company said in its IPO prospectus. “This may prevent or discourage unsolicited acquisition proposals or offers for our common stock that you may believe are in your best interest as one of our stockholders.”