Pegbio Nets $122m in Pre-IPO Round

Pegbio, a Suzhou-based biopharmaceutical company that specialises in innovative drugs for diabetes and obesity, announced on Tuesday that it has secured around 800 million yuan ($122 million) in a pre-IPO round co-led by Jack Ma’s YF Capital, private equity firm Yingke PE, and life sciences-focussed investment firm TF Capital.

The pre-IPO round was joined by three new investors: Qianhai FoF, a 28.5 billion yuan ($5.8 billion) state-backed fund of funds, Zhongxin Huihai Investment Fund Management (Beijing), and Yuanfeng Capital.

Existing investor YuanBio Venture Capital also re-upped in the round, Pegbio said on WeChat. In 2014, the early- and growth-stage healthcare-focused VC YuanBio had made an undivulged equity financing investment in Pegbio.

With the fresh funding, Pegbio will continue to support its pipeline of clinical research globally, facilitate proprietary drugs development, and introduce in-licensed drugs from overseas. In addition, Pegbio is readying to launch its initial public offering (IPO) in Shanghai’s Nasdaq-style STAR Market.

Pegbio, founded by Dr. Xumin Guan in 2008, has been engaged in the research and development of macro-molecular drugs to fight diabetes, fatty liver, constipation, cardiovascular, gout, and other chronic diseases.

Its flagship pipeline candidate, PB-119, can help diabetes patients. According to a press release on November 7, it has been successfully tested in humans in a phase-III clinical trial.

In partnership with American global pharmaceutical giant Pfizer, Pegbio has developed new generation drugs to combat diabetes.

“Huge market exists in metabolism and digestive diseases as the treatments are less developed than Europe and US,” said Dr. Xiaohuang, the CEO at YF Capital, in the statement.

Before the latest round, Pegbio had closed other six rounds of funding from Lenovo Group’s Legend Star, Oriza Holdings subsidiary Oriza Seed, drug maker player Tasly Holdings, TMT, and healthcare-focused Co-win Ventures, among others.