QualTek Services Inc (fka QTEKQ)

[xxrayeyes]

I thought this was pretty funny. John McCamant wants to know why Panamed didn't go the IPO route. I would say to him that there is no need to pay the underwriters huge fees for going the IPO route when it is much easier and less expensive to do a reverse merger. I think everyone still remembers all the corruption and pay offs involved in the last big IPO surge. All the brokers were getting rich and the companies and most especially the individual investors were getting hammered. As far as the rest, it is an early stage venture but if I understand it correctly, clinical trails are to begin next month. But hey, at least someone is looking at it. Now Panamed just has to prove what they are doing and this guy will be the first to jump on the bandwagon. LOL!



Camarillo, Calif.-Based Biotech Company PanaMed Finishes Reverse Merger

THURSDAY , MARCH 07, 2002 10:55 AM

Mar 06, 2002 (Ventura County Star - Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News via COMTEX) -- PanaMed Inc., a privately held Camarillo developer of experimental HIV therapies, has gone public in a reverse merger with a publicly held dot-com in Scottsdale, Ariz. PanaMed and Micron Solutions Inc. (OTCBB: MCSU) said in a statement Tuesday that the agreement first announced last month had been completed.

Under the arrangement, Micron's management resigned following the merger and PanaMed's management took over. Micron's business -- a portal for clients to obtain information on unclaimed securities -- will be spun off into a private company.

The company's new name is PanaMed Corp. The Micron ticker symbol is expected to change within the next 10 days, according a company statement.

PanaMed officials say they have exclusive rights to distribute a proprietary line of therapeutics for the treatment of HIV/AIDS in Third World countries.

Clinical trials are expected to begin next month in Africa, the company said PanaMed was founded as a private company last August. Another Camarillo company, Quintek Technologies Inc. (OTCBB: QTEK) assisted in launching PanaMed and later acquired a 10 percent equity position through a stock swap. Quintek's chief executive officer, Tom Sims, is expected to have at least an advisory role in the new company, according to a spokesman.

PanaMed wants to market an inexpensive, easy-to-administer line of immuno-modulating drugs that would help the body slow and eventually reverse the spread of the virus. Africa was chosen for the first clinical trials, the company said, because it has a large population of AIDS patients who have not been exposed to conventional AIDS treatments.

"We are very much encouraged by the recent announcements made by the World Health Organization and supporting organizations to provide future investments in the treatment of HIV/AIDS," Phil Butler, PanaMed's chief executive officer, said in a statement. "In the past, WHO and most AIDS-related foundations have allocated sizable financial resources for AIDS prevention/education, without providing funding for treating the disease."

That approach appears to be changing, Butler said, and his company eventually hopes to benefit. "With these funds becoming available, large-scale treatment programs can become a reality," he said, hopefully using his company's products.

Reverse mergers can be a shorter, less expensive way to go public than an initial public offering. But at least one biomedical industry expert questions why PanaMed would go public at this time in this manner, especially using a company not on a major stock exchange.

"If you've got a product that's good enough, you can go public on your own," said John McCamant, editor of the Berkeley-based Medical Technology Stock Letter. Even in the current tighter capital markets, he said, young private companies are able raise money from foundations, venture capitalists and partnerships with larger biomedical companies.

McCamant pointed out it can take a decade or more for a biomedical company to get a product to market, especially in a complicated field such as HIV treatments. Biotech giant Genentech spun off its own HIV research division, VaxGen (Nasdaq: VXGN), in part to separate its costs from the parent company, he said.

Potential investors these days are apt to be cautious about a public company whose lead product is still in pre-clinical or early clinical trials. "If I were an investor, I'd say, 'Come back to me when you have human data,' " McCamant said.

PanaMed and Quintek officials could not be reached for comment by deadline Tuesday.

By Deborah Crowe

To see more of the Ventura County Star, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go
to http://www.insidevc.com


(c) 2002, Ventura County Star, Calif. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.


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