Adherium opens on ASX

Digital health company Adherium (ASX:ADR) has listed on the Australian Securities Exchange for the first time, opening yesterday at $0.55 per share.

The company held an IPO in the lead-up to the listing, which raised the maximum subscription $35 million through the issue of 70 million shares at $0.50 per share. The IPO received strong institutional and retail investor backing, no doubt encouraged by Adherium’s recent long-term supply and development agreement with biopharmaceutical company AstraZeneca.

Funds from the IPO will enable Adherium to supply commercial quantities of Smartinhalers to its key commercial customers, as well as expand international sales and marketing. Targeting the issue of medication non-adherence, the Smartinhaler platform comprises a range of medical devices that attach to prescription inhalers and record usage data.

Adherium’s objective is to sell the Smartinhaler platform directly to pharmaceutical companies, which then provide the device and supporting applications to end users via their own distribution channels. The company also supplies the platform to disease management organisations and organisations conducting clinical trials.

“Our objective is to develop and deliver technologies that improve the quality of life of people with chronic disease, especially people with asthma and COPD [chronic obstructive pulmonary disease],” said Adherium Group CEO Garth Sutherland. “Improving medication adherence means better outcomes for patients, for pharmaceutical customers and for governments and payers, and ultimately great outcomes for our shareholders as we grow.”

The company’s closing share price of $0.60 — a 20% premium to the $0.50 issue price — gave Adherium a first-day market capitalisation of $84 million based on its 140,000,000 shares on issue.