Polarean Imaging to float for late stage clinical trial funding

Medical technology company Polarean Imaging PLC announced on Monday that it intends to launch an £11m float on the AIM market.

The company is seeking to raise £3m via a conditional placing in order to complete late-stage trials of a technology which it has developed to spot the early signs of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, which affects approximately 174m people around the world.

73.4m shares will be issued at a price of 14.00 pence per share in the initial offering, with admission expected on Thursday.

Polarean had previously announced its intention to float on Monday.

Richard Hullihen, chief executive of Polarean, said: "This is an exciting time for the group as we believe we have established a technology that targets a huge unmet medical need to aid the diagnosis of pulmonary diseases and are well positioned to achieve the key milestones we have set out, including for the execution of our Phase III clinical trial in the US."

The group is primarily concerned with the development of equipment that enables MRI systems to achieve an improved level of pulmonary function imaging and specialises in use of hyperpolarised gas as an imaging agent to visualise ventilation and gas exchange regionally in the smallest airways of the lungs.

Proceeds from the fundraising will help with preparations of Food and Drug Administration (FDA) required documentation, a production run of polarisers for FDA clearance to market trials and for clinical trials to gain clearance to market for 129Xe as a contrast agent and the polariser as a device.

"The additional funding from the Fundraise will enable us to continue the implementation of our growth strategy and development pipeline. We look forward to providing our shareholders with further updates as we progress," said Hullihen.

FDA phase III clinical trials are expected to last for approximately 18 months which includes the time required to prepare the new drug application for submission to the FDA.