NEW YORK (GenomeWeb News) — Thallion Pharmaceuticals said today it has sold 80 percent of its stake in its Caprion Proteomics business to a company owned by Great Point Partners, while Thallion will retain the remaining 20 percent of the company.
The deal will leave the new company, which will be called Caprion Proteomics, owning “substantially all" of Thallion’s proteomics assets, including the CellCarta platform. It will adopt $22.2 million in Thallion’s long-term debt obligations.
Caprion also will issue $4.1 million in secured subordinated notes to Thallion at an annual interest rate of 9.5 percent.
In a statement, Thallion CEO Lloyd Segal said the deal fits the company’s plan to slash debt and to “focus our resources on the development of our clinical product candidates.”
The deal grants Thallion 100 percent of all royalty payments and 50 percent of all milestone payments coming from proteomics licensing revenue, Thallion said.
Thallion, which specializes in oncology and infectious diseases, also said it collected rights to an undisclosed target candidate derived from CellCarta for preclinical and clinical development, and preferred services involved in biomarker development.
Great Point also is obligated to make an undisclosed “material investment” in Caprion Proteomics for working capital purposes, and Caprion will take on 35 of Thallion’s current proteomics employees.
Caprion Proteomics President Martin LeBlanc will take the helm as CEO of the new company.
Caprion Proteomics is a remnant of a company once called Caprion Pharmaceuticals, which earlier this year merged with Ecopia BioSciences to form Thallion.