Stephen O’Hara, CEO of OptiBiotix PLC LON:OPTI, commented: “The rapid developments in the understanding of the microbiome have been matched by Optibiotix’s own progress in a number of key but diverse areas. I believe that OptiBiotix’s diversity of both IP and Commercial relationships offers shareholders multiple opportunities where future value to shareholders may be best realised by spinning out domain specific opportunities where we as a Board believe the individual parts may be properly resourced and valued. In its own right it is not a new idea but one that has previously worked well for a number of companies.”
OptiBiotix Health plc (AIM: OPTI), a life sciences business developing compounds to tackle obesity, high cholesterol, diabetes and skin care, has given DirectorsTalk a strategy update.
In late 2015, OptiBiotix identified that the potential opportunities presented by the microbiome were greater than it first anticipated. To capitalise on these opportunities, OptiBiotix raised GBP1.5m in November 2015 and a further GBP1m in February 2016. These funds are being used to accelerate development and identify new opportunities leading to the company: –
— Acquiring the exclusive rights to intellectual property developed by The University of Manchester in skin health, creating a majority owned joint venture called SkinBiotix Limited
— Broadening its intellectual property portfolio which now covers 45 patents across 14 families, 8 strain registrations, and 7 trademarks. This is a substantive increase from the 5 patents at listing
— Developing its OptiBiotix sugar technology platform into multiple platforms creating new application areas and product opportunities including: –
i. Microbiome modulators: general microbiome modulators which alter the short chain fatty acids in the gut to prevent, manage, and treat diseases
ii. OptiBiotics(R) : sugars which enhance the growth rate of specific microbiome species allowing a targeted approach to microbiome modulation
iii. SweetBiotix(R) : non-digestible (no calories), sweet, healthy sugars
— Forming six commercial partnerships across all its platforms. These help fund product development and create a route to global markets with royalty streams on product sales
OptiBiotix believes its Optiscreen(R) , OptiBiotix(R) , SlimBiome(R) and SkinBiotix(R) technology platforms are now reaching a stage of development where it is advantageous to form separate divisions, each containing its own technology platform, IP portfolio and partner agreements. These divisions could in due course become separate legal entities with the potential for a separate public listing. The directors believe that shareholder value could be maximised by adopting such a strategy whereby existing shareholders could, in the event of a successful flotation, ultimately hold shares directly in OptiBiotix and one or more of its underlying divisions.
