I agree. I do think your analysis of a private placement is correct. Punit was directly asked about funding at nedham and he specifically stated that their goal was to fund phase 2b through a partner. Further, when asked about the Merck partnership in his tv interview, he was almost giddy.
I understand jbeam77's perspective and his analysis is usually right for most s-3 filings in biotech. The only way his theory would seem correct is if they were planning to dilute AFTER a partnership was announced and all their current trial data was released. At that point, their pps would be really high and a dilution would make sense.
Either way though, this filing is extremely bullish and us shareholders are in for a very exciting ride coming as quick as Monday morning.