QLT-T NR today 91m at 8.64
Globe says QLT mulls missed opportunities
2006-03-27 09:06 ET - In the News
The Globe and Mail reports in its Saturday edition in the months leading up to QLT's big drug approval in 2000, a debate raged in its Vancouver offices about how to spend the revenue windfall from its Visudyne anti-blindness drug. The Globe's Leonard Zehr writes the big question was whether it should stick with the eye care market and expand, or to take the technology and develop new applications outside of eye care. Chief executive officer Julia Levy was reluctant to turn QLT into an integrated eye care business. Through a spokeswoman, Ms. Levy said the strategy was to "acquire, through in-licensing or acquisitions, new technologies that would enhance the QLT pipeline beyond our in-house competencies." But things did not work out. QLT now finds itself reeling from a series of drug-testing disappointments, a court ruling of patent infringement, executive defections, a disastrous acquisition in 2004 and new competition. After reaching a high of $119 in 2000, it now sits in a crater in the $6-$7 range on the Toronto Stock Exchange. The depressed stock price has even led to rumblings that a group of investors is attempting to put together financing for a leveraged buyout of the company.
