AtCor Medical to list on ASX in November

Sydney-based devices company AtCor Medical has lodged its prospectus for an initial public offering (IPO) to raise AUD$15 million for expanding the US marketing and sales of its cardiovascular diagnostic device, SphygmoCor.

SphygmoCor non-invasively measures central pressure pulse waveforms to determine and analyse arterial stiffness parameters and central cardiovascular function, including the load on the pumping heart, coronary artery perfusion pressure during the diastole period, and the cardiac reserve capacity versus the actual physiological demand.

A desk-top device, SphygmoCor records the blood pressure waveform at the radial artery in the patient's wrist with a pressure sensor placed on the skin. Using patented mathematical models developed by AtCor's co-founder Prof Michael O'Rourke, SphygmoCor then derives the blood pressure waveform at the heart from the reading at the wrist.

"This non-invasive way gives you the same information as putting a catheter in the ascending aorta," said AtCor CEO Ross Harricks.

The device received FDA approval in the USA in 2002, CE Mark approval in Europe in 2002 and has TGA approval in Australia following the successful completion of clinical trials where patients were simultaneously measured directly and using the noninvasive method. SphygmoCor is protected by patents in Australia, Europe, Japan and the USA.

SphygmoCor is not intended to replace commonly used cardiovascular devices such as ECG, cuff blood pressure or echocardiogram but to complement them as the device provides doctors with additional cardiovascular information that would usually require invasive methods.

"Nobody else can give you the central parameters that we do, the central blood pressures, or those coronary perfusion pressures, and the data you derive from that profile at the heart," said Harricks.

Proceeds from the IPO, after costs, will be approximately $13.7 million and will predominantly be used for expanding marketing, education, clinical studies and distribution of SphygmoCor into the US cardiovascular specialist market.

"We are already in America, we're already in major research institutions, the focus has been very much on the research and teaching hospital market," said AtCor CFO Peter Manley. "What this is about is accelerating the expansion into the specialist clinical practice market."

"We've sold over 750 of these units, typically about AUD$20,000 each, in about 40 different countries with cumulative sales now of over $14 million," said Harricks. "In the USA there's about 180 systems in key institutions such as John Hopkins, Columbia, Cornell and The Mayo Clinic."

AtCor's IPO is due to open on October 19 with 30 million shares being offered at an issue price of $0.50. Trading is expected to commence on November 21 with a proposed symbol of ACG.

Manley said that the response to the IPO from the professional investment market has so far been "positive".

"We've been well supported by private equity money since 1998, and all of those investors have agreed to a voluntary 24 months escrow," said Manley. "And those investors include the likes of Colonial First State private equity."

Based on the offer price, the company's market capitalisation on listing will be $50 million.

The offer is fully underwritten by the lead manager, Blackwood Capital.