Inventiva, a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company focused on the development of oral small molecule therapies for the treatment of patients with non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) and other diseases with significant unmet medical needs, today announced the signing of a €50 million bullet credit facility agreement with the European Investment Bank (“EIB”).
The Company plans to use the facility toward its preclinical and clinical pipeline, including to help fund a portion of its Phase III clinical trial of lanifibranor in patients with NASH.
The facility is divided into two tranches of €25 million each. The disbursement of the first tranche (“Tranche A”) is subject to the completion of certain conditions precedent specified in the credit facility agreement. The second tranche (“Tranche B”) is subject to the full drawdown of Tranche A in addition to the achievement of certain conditions precedents. The maturity date of any borrowings under the facility is four years after disbursement of Tranche A and three years after disbursement of Tranche B. It is therefore expected that the reimbursement of the interests and capital of this credit facility will happen after the publication of the headline results of the part 1 of the Phase III clinical trial of lanifibranor in patients with NASH, which are expected in the second half of 2024.
Jean Volatier, Chief Financial Officer of Inventiva, stated:
We are very pleased with this credit facility, one of the largest granted by the EIB to a biotech. We expect to use any borrowings under the facility to support further development of our pipeline, especially the clinical development of lanifibranor to seek accelerated approval in the US and conditional approval in the EU.
In addition to capitalized interest of 8% for Tranche A and 7% for Tranche B, Inventiva will issue warrants to the benefit of the EIB in varied amounts according to the relevant tranche, the amount of equity raised or the amount of cash received in the context of a partnership or other transaction and the average price per share paid by investors in the context of the equity raise1 .
The strike price of each warrant will be equal to 95% of the volume weighted average of the trading price of Inventiva’s ordinary shares over a number of trading days preceding the day the issue price is set. The warrants will have a term of 12 years and become exercisable upon the maturity of Tranche A or upon the occurrence of certain events (e.g., change of control, event of default repayment demand), thus avoiding dilution for existing shareholders in the near term.
At the maturity of Tranche A or upon the occurrence of certain events, the EIB will be granted an option to sell its warrants to Inventiva for an amount equal to the difference between the fair market value and the exercise price of the warrants2, as an alternative to the exercise of the warrants.
