VANCOUVER, July 23 /CNW/ - Response Biomedical Corporation (TSX-V: RBM,
OTCBB: RPBIF) today announced that the Company has closed the financing
announced July 9, 2007, raising gross proceeds of $12 million. The financing
was a bought deal private placement, under which the Company issued 12,000,000
common shares at a price of $1.00 for each common share.
Haywood Securities Inc., the sole underwriter for this offering, was paid
a commission of seven percent of the gross proceeds in connection with the
financing. The common shares issued under the private placement will have a
hold period under Canadian law until November 24, 2007.
Net proceeds will be used for general working capital purposes, capital
equipment acquisitions required for the scale-up of the Company's
manufacturing processes and to expedite the commercialization of lead new
product candidates.
"The proceeds of this financing significantly improve the Company's
balance sheet, providing capital to enable the continued execution of our
strategy," said Bill Radvak, President and CEO. "In the near term, we remain
focused on securing a partner for our cardiovascular line of diagnostic tests
and broadening regulatory clearance of our NT-proBNP test for the diagnosis
and treatment of congestive heart failure, while we deliver on our current
partnerships."
This offering was not available to US investors.
About Response Biomedical
Response Biomedical develops, manufactures and markets rapid on-site
diagnostic tests for use with its portable RAMP Platform for clinical and
environmental applications. RAMP represents a new paradigm in diagnostics that
provides high sensitivity and reliable information in minutes. It is ideally
suited to both point-of-care testing and laboratory use. The RAMP system
consists of a portable fluorescent reader and single-use disposable test
cartridges, and has the potential to be adapted to more than 250 medical and
non-medical tests currently performed in laboratories. RAMP clinical tests are
commercially available for the early detection of heart attack and congestive
heart failure.
In late 2006, the Company formed a strategic alliance with 3M Company to
commercialize rapid infectious disease tests. In the non-clinical market, RAMP
Tests are currently provided for the environmental detection of West Nile
Virus, and Biodefense applications including the rapid on-site detection of
anthrax, smallpox, ricin and botulinum toxin. Several other product
applications are under development. The Company has achieved CE Marking and
its Quality Management System is registered to ISO 13485: 2003 and ISO
9001: 2000.
Response Biomedical is a publicly traded company, listed on the TSX
Venture Exchange under the trading symbol "RBM" and quoted on the OTC Bulletin
Board under the symbol "RPBIF". For further information, please visit the
Company's website at www.responsebio.com.
The TSX Venture Exchange has not reviewed and does not accept
responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.
Statements contained in this press release relating to future results,
events or developments, including statements regarding the use of proceeds of
the offering and the Company's partnering efforts, are "forward-looking
statements" or "forward-looking information" under applicable United States
and Canadian securities laws. Forward-looking statements and information can
often be identified by the use of the words "believes," "may," "could",
"plans," "will," "estimate," "continue," "anticipates," "intends," "expects",
"goal" and similar expressions, Forward-looking statements or information are
subject to the related assumptions made by us and involve known and unknown
risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results, events
or developments to be materially different from those expressed or implied by
such statements or information.
Many of such risks, uncertainties and other factors form part of our
underlying assumptions, and include, among other things, financial risks that
would affect our operations such as our available working capital and cash
flows and whether and for how long available funds will be sufficient to fund
our operations and our ability to raise additional capital as and when needed;
our need for substantial additional funding to conduct research and
development and commercialization activities; changing facility costs and
other risks relating to our facilities expansion plans; our ability to
establish, and our dependence upon, relationships with strategic alliance
partners to develop and commercialize products; technological changes that
impact our existing products or our ability to develop and commercialize our
products; our ability to obtain and enforce timely patent and other
intellectual property protection for our technology and products; our ability
to obtain and maintain rights to technology from licensors; liability for
patent, product liability and other claims asserted against us;
commercialization limitations imposed by patents owned or controlled by third
parties; technical risk in research and development; adverse results or
unexpected delays in product development and clinical trials; our ability to
retain, and our reliance upon, third party suppliers, manufacturers,
distributors and alliance partners; our ability to attract and retain
qualified personnel; our ability to effectively and efficiently manage the
planned growth of our operations; our ability to obtain, and the timing of,
necessary regulatory approvals; our ability to profitably sell our products at
prices that would be acceptable to third-party reimbursement programs;
competition including competition from others with significantly more
resources; market acceptance of our products and the size of our markets;
changes in business strategy or development plans; changes in, or the failure
to comply with, governmental regulations; fluctuations in interest rates and
foreign exchange rates; seasonality including government budget cycles;
general economic and business conditions where we operate; and other factors
referenced in our annual report on Form 40-F and other filings with Canadian
and United States securities regulatory authorities.
Given these uncertainties, assumptions and risks, readers are cautioned
not to place undue reliance on such forward-looking statements or information.
We disclaim any obligation to update, or to publicly announce any revisions
to, any such statements or information to reflect future results, events or
developments.
For further information: Bill Wickson, Manager, Investor Relations,
Response Biomedical Corporation, Tel: (604) 456-6073, Email:
bwickson@responsebio.com; Brian Korb, Vice President, The Trout Group LLC,
Tel: (646) 378-2923, Email: bkorb@troutgroup.com