Boulder’s Edgewise Therapeutics reveals $176M IPO plan after confidential filing

This story was updated at 2 p.m. Mountain Time with Edgewise’s closing stock price.

BOULDER — Edgewise Therapeutics Inc. (Nasdaq: EWTX) kicked off its initial public offering Friday morning, marking the latest biotechnology company in the Boulder area to go public in recent months.

In a statement, the company said it will offer 11 million shares at $16 per share, with the goal to pull in $176 million in funding before deducting underwriting fees and other charges. Its underwriters have an option to buy $26.4 million in additional stock at their discretion.

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The stock closed at $30 per share on Friday, marking an 87% increase over its starting price.

According to newly available public filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, Edgewise filed its registration statements and S-1 documents confidentially on March 5 and originally planned to raise only a maximum of $100 million. 

Companies are allowed to file to go public in secret with the SEC under a 2012 law if it has less than $1 billion in revenue. Doing so can be a benefit for companies that want to go public but want to avoid revealing internal financial information or taking on the public scrutiny that goes with a traditional IPO.

At the end of 2020, the pre-revenue company had $104.91 million in cash and equivalents on hand and posted a net loss of $17.12 million for the year.

Edgewise is developing genetic treatments for two forms of muscular dystrophy. Its lead candidate for Becker muscular dystrophy is recruiting healthy volunteers for a Phase I safety trial.

The company brought in $145 million in venture capital alone in two rounds in 2020, making it one of the largest-funded private companies last year.

Edgewise is following lung cancer test developer Biodesix Inc. (Nasdaq: BDSX), which raised $72 million out of its $79 million target last November. Meanwhile, Fort Collins-based Cytocom Inc. is in the middle of acquiring Cleveland BioLabs Inc. (Nasdaq: CBLI) in a reverse merger expected to close this spring.

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