Urigen Pharmaceuticals, which is developing formulations of approved drugs for urinary bladder pain, withdrew its plans for an initial public offering on Monday.
It originally filed to raise $25 million in February.
The company was founded as Megabios in 1997 and in 1999 merged with GeneMedicine, changing its name to Valentis. In 2007, it merged with Urigen and was quoted on the OTCBB under the symbol URGP.OB until 2010, when trading was suspended and its stock moved to the OTC Pink Sheets (URGP.PK). In 2012, the SEC suspended its trading on the Pink Sheets.
Urigen's lead candidate is a proprietary combination therapy of lidocaine and heparin used to treat Interstitial Cystitis/Bladder Pain Syndrome, which affects about 10 million people in the US. It entered into a license agreement for its lead candidate with Imprimis Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: IMMY) in October 2014.
The biotech lists a number of competitors that have developed or are developing similar treatments, including Ortho-McNeil, BioNiche, Plethora Solutions, Stellar Pharmaceuticals, Trillium Therapeutics, Janssen Pharmaceuticals and Actavis.
The North Brunswick, NJ-based company was founded in 1997 and booked $1 million in revenue for the 12 months ended September 30, 2014. It had planned to list on the NASDSAQ but had not selected a ticker. The company had also not selected bookrunners.
