Centogene N.V. (Nasdaq: CNTG), the essential life science partner
for data-driven answers in rare and neurodegenerative diseases,
today announced that it has completed the transaction to form a new
joint venture (JV) with Lifera, a biopharmaceutical company
wholly-owned by the Public Investment Fund (PIF). The JV has been
formed to increase local and regional access as well as rapid
delivery of world-class genomic and multiomic testing to patients
in Saudi Arabia and countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council
(GCC). The new JV will be located in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, and
operate under the name ‘Lifera Omics’.
“Completing this transaction marks a significant milestone on
our mission to deliver data-driven, life-changing answers to
patients and paves a pathway to achieving sustainable growth and
profitability for CENTOGENE,” said Kim Stratton, Chief Executive
Officer at CENTOGENE. “We are now excited to leverage our leading
diagnostics and multiomics expertise to build up Lifera Omics.
This, together with Lifera’s strong local presence and resources,
will establish widespread access to local state-of-the-art genetic
sequencing and multiomic testing tailored to regional needs.”
“The completion of the joint venture with CENTOGENE marks the
beginning of the next phase of Lifera’s mission to grow Saudi
Arabia’s biopharma sector,” commented Dr. Ibrahim Aljufalli,
Chairman of the Lifera Board. “By combining CENTOGENE’s expertise
of rare, metabolic, and neurodegenerative diseases with our deep
understanding of the local healthcare landscape, this marks an
important moment for Saudi Arabia and the GCC – laying the
foundation for our two companies to combine resources and bring
superior healthcare solutions to patients and their families.”
Strong Synergy With Focus on Genetic
Conditions
CENTOGENE is the current market leader in outsourced genetic
testing for patients in Saudi Arabia. Lifera Omics will build on
this strength with an advanced laboratory and bioinformatics
infrastructure, also leveraging the CENTOGENE Biodatabank. This is
the world’s largest real-world integrated multiomic data repository
in rare and neurodegenerative diseases, which has more than 70
million unique variants and over 60,000 Saudi Arabian patient
datasets. Lifera Omics will develop capabilities for genetic and
multiomic testing and interpretation, working collaboratively with
CENTOGENE globally, and serving as a vehicle for large national
screening and genomics programs. As such, patients in Saudi Arabia
and the GCC, a rapidly growing region with over 56 million
inhabitants, will have increased access to the world’s most
advanced and effective diagnostic offerings, which is at the core
of Lifera’s strategic objectives to contribute to improving
national resilience and health outcomes.
Additional Information
Under the terms of the transaction, both Lifera and CENTOGENE
will make an investment into Lifera Omics, and the initial funding
will reflect an ownership structure of an 80%-20% split between
Lifera and CENTOGENE, respectively. CENTOGENE is also eligible for
performance-related milestone payments, including a $10 million
upfront JV milestone payment, as well as revenue-based royalties
until the year 2033. Both parties will be represented on the board
of Lifera Omics, and two Lifera representatives will join
CENTOGENE’s Supervisory Board.
In addition, Lifera made an investment in CENTOGENE in the form
of a mandatorily convertible loan with a total aggregate principal
amount of $30 million. The term of the convertible loan is six
months, automatically converting into common stock no more than six
months from October 26, 2023, while providing CENTOGENE the ability
to trigger earlier conversion.
Moelis LLC acted as a financial advisor to CENTOGENE on the
transaction. Davis Polk & Wardwell London LLP acted as legal
advisor to CENTOGENE on the transaction. Ernst & Young acted as
financial advisor to Lifera on the transaction. Latham &
Watkins acted as legal advisor to Lifera on the transaction.
Additional information regarding this announcement and the
Companies’ Joint Venture can be found in the Current Report on Form
6-K that the Company intends to file today with the U.S. Securities
and Exchange Commission and Form 6-K filed by the Company on Oct
27, 2023.
Upcoming Presentation Details
CENTOGENE and Lifera management will be presenting at the Global
Healthspan Summit at the Four Seasons Hotel in Riyadh on November
30, 2023. To learn more about the event and their presentation on
the impact of collaboration in accelerating precision medicine,
visit: https://link.centogene.com/ghs
About Lifera
Lifera is a new biopharmaceutical company dedicated to advancing
Saudi Arabia’s biopharmaceutical sector and building national
health resilience. By developing local manufacturing capacity for
vaccines, insulin, plasma therapeutics and other biologics, as well
as investing in genetic testing and precision medicine, Lifera aims
to ensure people in Saudi Arabia have access to reliable and
affordable medicines.
Lifera will do this through partnerships and investments with
leading international and Saudi companies to transfer global
expertise and technology to Saudi Arabia. Wholly-owned by the
Public Investment Fund (PIF), Lifera’s differentiated vision and
mission make it an ideal partner to build the biopharmaceutical
sector in Saudi Arabia.
About CENTOGENE
CENTOGENE’s mission is to provide data-driven, life-changing
answers to patients, physicians, and pharma companies for rare and
neurodegenerative diseases. We integrate multiomic technologies
with the CENTOGENE Biodatabank – providing dimensional analysis to
guide the next generation of precision medicine. Our unique
approach enables rapid and reliable diagnosis for patients,
supports a more precise physician understanding of disease states,
and accelerates and de-risks targeted pharma drug discovery,
development, and commercialization.
Since our founding in 2006, CENTOGENE has been offering rapid
and reliable diagnosis – building a network of approximately 30,000
active physicians. Our ISO, CAP, and CLIA certified multiomic
reference laboratories in Germany utilize Phenomic, Genomic,
Transcriptomic, Epigenomic, Proteomic, and Metabolomic datasets.
This data is captured in our CENTOGENE Biodatabank, with over
800,000 patients represented from over 120 highly diverse
countries, over 70% of whom are of non-European descent. To date,
the CENTOGENE Biodatabank has contributed to generating novel
insights for more than 285 peer-reviewed publications.
By translating our data and expertise into tangible insights, we
have supported over 50 collaborations with pharma partners.
Together, we accelerate and de-risk drug discovery, development,
and commercialization in target and drug screening, clinical
development, market access and expansion, as well as offering
CENTOGENE Biodata Licenses and Insight Reports to enable a world
healed of all rare and neurodegenerative diseases.
To discover more about our products, pipeline, and
patient-driven purpose, visit www.centogene.com and follow us
on LinkedIn.
Forward-Looking Statements
This press release contains “forward-looking statements” within
the meaning of the U.S. federal securities laws. Statements
contained herein that are not clearly historical in nature are
forward-looking, and the words “anticipate,” “believe,”
“continues,” “expect,” “estimate,” “intend,” “project,” “plan,” “is
designed to,” “potential,” “predict,” “objective” and similar
expressions and future or conditional verbs such as “will,”
“would,” “should,” “could,” “might,” “can,” and “may,” or the
negative of these are generally intended to identify
forward-looking statements. Such forward-looking statements involve
known and unknown risks, uncertainties, and other important factors
that may cause CENTOGENE’s actual results, performance, or
achievements to be materially different from any future results,
performance, or achievements expressed or implied by the forward-
looking statements. Such risks and uncertainties include, among
others, negative economic and geopolitical conditions and
instability and volatility in the worldwide financial markets,
possible changes in current and proposed legislation, regulations
and governmental policies, pressures from increasing competition
and consolidation in our industry, the expense and uncertainty of
regulatory approval, including from the U.S. Food and Drug
Administration, our reliance on third parties and collaboration
partners, including our ability to manage growth, execute our
business strategy and enter into new client relationships, our
dependency on the rare disease industry, our ability to manage
international expansion, our reliance on key personnel, our
reliance on intellectual property protection, fluctuations of our
operating results due to the effect of exchange rates, our ability
to streamline cash usage, our continued ongoing compliance with
covenants linked to financial instruments, our requirement for
additional financing, and our ability to continue as a going
concern, or other factors. For further information on the risks and
uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ from those
expressed in these forward-looking statements, as well as risks
relating to CENTOGENE’s business in general, see CENTOGENE’s risk
factors set forth in CENTOGENE’s Form 20-F filed on May 16, 2023,
with the Securities and Exchange Commission (the “SEC”) and
subsequent filings with the SEC. Any forward-looking statements
contained in this press release speak only as of the date hereof,
and CENTOGENE specifically disclaims any obligation to update any
forward-looking statement, whether as a result of new information,
future events, or otherwise.
CONTACT
Lifera
Nisreen QaidCommunication Director nqaid@lifera.com.sa
CENTOGENE
Melissa HallCorporate Communications Press@centogene.com
Lennart StreibelInvestor Relations IR@centogene.com
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