Biota raises $31m

Melbourne's Biota Holdings (ASX:BTA) has raised approximately $31 million from its share purchase plan (SPP) which closed early on October 12.

Initially scheduled to close on October 26, Biota received applications from more than 6800 shareholders who were offered up to $5000 of new, fully paid ordinary shares at a price of $0.76 per share.

"It's an Australian record," said Biota's company secretary Damian Lismore. "It's puts a lot of confidence in the company and sets us up for the next couple of years."

At the time of writing Biota's shares were trading at $1.82, down $0.06 since the market opened this morning.

Biota's share price has risen steadily from prices of around $0.49 in July this year following announcements that countries such as the USA, France, Hong Kong, Germany and Holland have placed orders for Relenza, the anti-flu drug developed by Biota and commercialised by GlaxoSmithKline (GSK).

Asked about Biota's increased share price, Lismore said that: "I think there's been a lot of market speculation about the bird flu globally. Glaxo has said they're starting to manufacture Relenza again, which obviously has a big impact on us in relation to royalties. So hopefully the market will give us a bit of a re-rating."

The SPP was limited to a maximum of 41 million shares (30 per cent of issued capital) and the company needed to make a small scale-back of all applications. The allotment will increase Biota's issued capital to approximately 178 million shares.

Biota previously announced that the funds raised will be used to move the company's preclinical influenza, common cold and infant bronchiolitis programs into human clinical trials.