Medical Device Daily
Tethys Bioscience (Emeryville, California) a privately held company reported it has closed a $25 million Series D round of financing led by aeris Capital (Zurich, Switzerland) and including Wasatch Advisors (Salt Lake City) as a new investor.
"We're going to use funding for the further development of the PreDx Diabetes Risk Score test," Jay Kerzner, director of communications for Tethys told Medical Device Daily. "This financing tops us out at about $80 million to date."
The PreDx Diabetes Risk Score (DRS) product is a simple-to-administer blood test to help clinicians identify those patients at highest risk of developing Type 2 diabetes within the next five years. The test was launched in 2008.
There are also other plans to develop products that identify cardiometabollic risks and fracture lines," Kerzner told MDD.
All current investors, including MDV-Mohr Davidow Ventures, Kleiner Perkins Caulfield & Byers (both, Menlo Park) and Intel Capital (Santa Clara, California) participated in the round. Tethys also said that it has appointed George Rehm, Managing Partner of aeris Capital, to the Tethys board.
"It's very exciting time for us in that we were able to raise this money without compromising the value of the company ... even in this economy," Kerzner said of the funding the 4-year-old company has garnered. "We've been very fortunate to have a great deal of investor interest."
In other financing activity:
• Eso-Technologies (Middleton, Wisconsin) reported that it raised $1 million from angel investors. The company said it will use the money to develop a heart monitoring device that would replace the one being used now by surgeons.
The current device used for heart monitoring during surgery – a pulmonary artery catheter that is threaded up a large vein in the patient's legs or through their necks – causes up to 45,000 deaths annually, said Joseph Hildebrandt, DaneVest's managing director.
The company expects to be able to put the device in trials in early 2010. The entire project will likely take about three years and $3 million, according to the company.
• RehabCare (St Louis) reported that it has commenced an underwritten public offering of 4.35 million shares of its common stock pursuant to the company's shelf registration statement filed with the SEC.
The company intends to use the net proceeds from the offering, together with borrowings under the company's new senior credit facilities and cash on hand, to pay the consideration of its acquisition of Triumph HealthCare (Houston) and related fees and expenses. Any proceeds from the offering in excess of amounts needed to pay the acquisition consideration and related fees and expenses will be used for general corporate purposes. If the acquisition is not consummated, the company expects to use the net proceeds of the offering for general corporate purposes.
The shares will be issued pursuant to a shelf registration statement that was previously filed with the SEC and was declared effective on Oct. 26.
• BioMed Realty Trust (San Diego) reported that the company has received commitments from lenders to increase the borrowing capacity on its unsecured line of credit by $65 million to an aggregate of $665 million, with no other changes to the terms of the facility.
The weighted-average effective interest rate of the unsecured line of credit was 1.35% as of September 30, 2009. The maturity date remains Aug. 1, 2011, which may be extended to Aug. 1, 2012 after satisfying certain conditions and paying an extension fee.
The increase in borrowing capacity under the company's unsecured line of credit is subject to the execution of definitive agreements and the satisfaction of closing conditions, and the company can offer no assurances that the transaction will close with the commitments as described above, or at all.
Omar Ford, 404-262-5546;