AIM-listed HealthTech Advanced Oncotherapy, a developer of proton therapy systems for cancer treatment, has secured an equity fundraise of £7.7m before expenses.
The fundraise has been effected through a direct subscription with the company for a total of 25,735,000 new ordinary shares by certain clients of SI Capital and other investors at a price of 30 pence per ordinary share.
The funds raised will be used to “further strengthen the company’s balance sheet” and contribute to the funding toward a fully operational version of its cancer treating ‘LIGHT system’ by next year.
The firm’s proton therapy technology has been developed to reduce the cost of tradition proton therapy centres, which have been historically expensive to develop due size and weight, and the footprint dedicated to shielding.
The firm states on its website that its LIGHT system has been designed to reduce the construction cost of the facility required to house it and makes proton therapy “more accessible to local, smaller hospitals.”
Protontherapy is a type of radiotherapy. The first human being was treated with proton beams at the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory in 1954. In 1962, specialised radiosurgical proton treatments commenced at the Harvard Cyclotron Laboratory, followed in the mid-1970s by treatments for ocular cancers and larger tumours
The London headquartered firm has an assembly site in Warrington, a research and development site in Switzerland and a US office in New York.
Nicolas Serandour, CEO of Advanced Oncotherapy, commented: “We are pleased to announce this additional fundraising, which brings the total we have raised this year to £22.6 million, and we thank our new and existing shareholders for their support of the company. As we highlighted at our recent investor day, despite the delays caused by the Covid-19 pandemic we have made strong progress with construction in Daresbury and remain on track to have a fully operational LIGHT system with a 230MeV beam, which is required to treat patients, in 2021.”