Admedus lifts stake in vaccines unit to 66%

Admedus (ASX:AHZ) has increased its stake in its vaccine development subsidiary past 66%, and has revealed it increased its sales for the June quarter to $7.8 million.

Over the last 12 months, Admedus has increased its holdings in Admedus Vaccines from 50.1 to 66.3%, the company said.

Admedus Vaccines is led by Professor Ian Frazer and is working on vaccines for herpes simplex virus 2 (HSV-2) and HPV.

The HSV-2 vaccine was recently tested in a successful phase I trial, and Admedus expects to report additional data from the trial this quarter, once confirmatory assays have been completed.

A phase II trial is due to commence by the end of the year. Admedus Vaccines is also continuing preclinical work on the HPV vaccines.

Admedus first invested in the vaccine company - then known as Coridon - in 2009, and has been progressively increasing its stake as Frazer’s team makes progress with its projects.

Admedus separately revealed that its overall sales for the June quarter reached $7.8 million, up $7.4 million from a year earlier. The growth came in part due to the first sales of the company’s CardioCel heart patch in the US. The US FDA approved the patch in February.

Overall income was $10.4 million, including $1.9 million in grant funding from Commercialisation Australia. The company ended the quarter with a cash balance of $19.5 million.

Admedus (ASX:AHZ) shares were trading unchanged at $0.13 as of around 1 pm on Wednesday.