الأنتباه : الشركه أفلست وهذا الخبر
Tuesday, July 21, 2009, 9:53am EDT | Modified: Tuesday, July 21, 2009, 3:42pm
Epix Pharmaceuticals to shut down
Boston Business Journal - by Julie M. Donnelly
Epix Pharmaceuticals, Inc. has announced it will quietly wind down operations after a hard fought battle to keep the company afloat.
The Lexington, Mass.-based company’s officials said Epix was unable to raise enough money or enter into a partnership in time to remain a going concern. It has since filed paperwork to provide for an orderly liquidation of its assets.
As of Dec. 31, the company had 91 full time employees. However, in March it oversaw an unspecified number of job cuts to reduce its overhead. A more recent employee figure was not immediately available.
Elkan Gamzu, president and chief executive officer of Epix, stated, “It is with great disappointment that the company must proceed with this decision. Over the past several months we had taken several actions in an effort to improve the financial health of Epix ... Despite this and the efforts of our financial advisors who approached numerous third-parties over the past several months, we were unable to obtain additional funding to continue our operations or consummate a strategic transaction.”
In April, Epix announced the sale of the U.S., Australian and Canadian rights of its vascular imaging agent Vasovist to Lantheus Medical Imaging for $28 million. The biotechnology company targeted $10.5 million of the proceeds to pay off debts to a former partner, Germany-based Bayer Schering Pharma. That same day, Epix also announced a deal to wipe out $100 million of debt by offering bondholders shares of the company and cash payments.
But these moves were not enough to prevent the company from being delisted by the Nasdaq Stock Market on May 14th. The delisting followed repeated warning letters that the company failed to meet the minimum requirements of the stock exchange, including failure to maintain a $35 million market capitalization for 10 consecutive trading days.
Signs of the company’s troubles were evident at the end of 2008, when Epix had $24.6 million in cash on hand. Epix burned through $36.45 million last year.
The company received a going-concern letter — a red flag that a company may not survive another full year — from its auditor Ernst & Young, as part of its year end earnings statement.
The company has named Joseph F. Finn Jr. of Finn, Warnke & Gayton in Wellesley Hills as the assignee designated to dispose of the company’s assets . After paying off the company’s creditors, Epix does not expect that there will be any proceeds for distribution to the Company’s stockholders.
Epix has laid off all of its employees. CEO Elkan Gamzu, will stay on for a short period of time to assist in the liquidation.