$heff's $tation of $tocks & $olid DD

[$heff]

NAVB..$3.38 Excellent article. Thx for posting. Had not reviewed it before.

"Make Friends with Companion Diagnostics to Bolster Your Biotech Portfolio: by Stephen Brozak" from The Life Sciences Report.
http://bit.ly/KuJnVC

SB: We are telling them to be countercyclical. Our performance is typically accentuated most when the markets are in trouble. We can go out there and pick out those companies where everything is solid. It is a function of taking advantage of the right buying opportunity. I’ll give you an example. We sat down with Navidea Biopharmaceuticals Inc. (NAVB:NYSE)(formerly Neoprobe Corp.) and got an investor to fund the company fully through a phase 2/phase 3 study. Navidea currently has a Prescription Drug User Fee Act (PDUFA) date of Sept. 10, 2012. The company’s market cap was $15 million (M), and we had to figure out a way for an investor to inject $16M into it. It was such an important science, and we had the data there. We just had to figure it out. It took us 18 months to actually craft the transaction, and it worked out for advancement of the company, its science and the investor.

TLSR: Navidea has a quite nice market cap compared to $15M that it had.

SB: We had to stage the entry of the funding so that it would not overwhelm the company and change the capitalization structure.
TLSR: What is the technology there?

SB: It is simple, but it’s elegant. Technetium Tc 99m is a short-lived radioactive isotope used in a suspension system called Lymphoseek (tilmanocept). It is being developed as a diagnostic tracing agent to be used in gamma detection devices in a surgical procedure known as intraoperative lymphatic mapping. You want to be able to track the lymphatic system to make sure you have picked up a cancer if it has metastasized out of the primary site. The sulfur colloid that has been used off-label for the same purpose has two problems: First, because of its pH, it is very painful; and second, the molecular weight is so large you can only use it in certain types of cancers. Also, there is no standardization. Lymphoseek has a much smaller molecular weight, and it works for every solid tumor. This next-generation product already has a distribution partner in Cardinal Health Inc. (CAH:NYSE), and we should see quick distribution take place. The idea is to expand the universe to the entire world and obtain better outcomes for solid tumor treatment throughout the body.

TLSR: The purpose is to detect disseminated disease?
SB: Right.

TLSR: What’s your target price on Navidea?

SB: It’s at $9.00.

TLSR: That’s almost 200% upside potential.

SB: I think that’s a fair target price. We’ll see what happens with the PDUFA date.