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Moderna Therapeutics CEO Stephane Bancel
- Moderna Therapeutics, a buzzy startup with a $7.5 billion private valuation, filed paperwork in November to go public.
- According to an updated filing, Moderna plans to sell shares for as much as $24 each, raising $600 million.
- Here's who stands to gain the most on what's heading to be the biggest IPO in biotech history.
One of the highest-valued private companies in biotech is finally going public, and when it does, there are a number of investors and individuals who stand to benefit.
Moderna Therapeutics, a company developing treatments based on messenger RNA, has racked up a private valuation of $7.5 billion. In early November, it filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission to go public.
In a filing released on November 28, Moderna unveiled new details about its plans. The company said it plans to sell 25 million shares for as much as $24 each, raising $600 million. Those figures could still changes before the company goes public.
The filing also includes new information about how much stock top executives and investors in Moderna own.
Here are the biggest potential winners from that IPO, based on that new information:
- Noubar B. Afeyan, 56, is Moderna's chairman. He controls 19.5% or 58.9 million of Moderna's shares. Afeyan is the founder and CEO of Flagship Pioneering, the venture firm that founded Moderna. Afeyan owns 42,201 shares directly, and the rest are owned by Flagship-related funds.
- Stéphane Bancel, 46, is Moderna's chief executive officer. He controls 10% or 30.9 million of the company's shares ahead of Moderna's plan to go public. Like Afeyan, Bancel doesn't hold that entire stake directly. Bancel's direct ownership is 6.7 million shares.
- AstraZeneca is a giant pharmaceutical company that invested in Moderna in 2016. Prior to the IPO, AstraZeneca controls 8.4% of Moderna's shares, or roughly 25.5 million.
- Timothy Springer, a professor at Harvard Medical School and a founding investor in Moderna, controls 5.7% or 17.3 million of Moderna's shares.
- Viking Global Investors, a hedge fund that initially invested in Moderna in 2015 controls 5.5% or 16.6 million shares.
- Bob Langer, 70, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, controls 3.9% or 11.7 million of the company's shares. He's a member of the company's board and one of its academic co-founders.
- Stephen Hoge, 42, is Moderna's president. Hoge joined Moderna in 2013 and became president in 2015. He controls 1.3% or roughly 4 million of the company's shares.