aibioMaze Therapeutics files for IPO of common stock, seeks Nasdaq listing as MAZE
Tickers MAZE
Maze's IPO filing names four underwriters and leaves the share count and price range blank. The nine months to September 30, 2024 include $167,500 thousand of license revenue.
Key facts
- Company
- Maze Therapeutics, Inc. (NASDAQ: MAZE)
- News type
- Financings
- Primary source
- Maze Therapeutics, Inc. S-1 (2025-01-07)
Maze Therapeutics, Inc. filed a registration statement on Form S-1 with the SEC on January 7, 2025 for an initial public offering of its common stock. The preliminary prospectus, dated the same day, leaves the share count and price range blank. Maze has applied to list the shares on the Nasdaq Global Market under the symbol MAZE, and says approval of the listing is a condition to closing.
Underwriters, counsel and use of proceeds
The cover names J.P. Morgan, TD Cowen, Leerink Partners and Guggenheim Securities as underwriters. The underwriters have an option, exercisable for 30 days after the prospectus date, to buy additional shares from Maze at the offering price less underwriting discounts and commissions.
The cover lists Fenwick & West LLP, with Effie Toshav, Amanda Rose, Ryan Mitteness and Chelsea Anderson, and Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP, with Alan Denenberg and Emily Roberts, under "Copies to." The filing does not say which firm represents the company and which represents the underwriters.
Maze intends to use the net proceeds, with its existing cash and cash equivalents, to fund clinical development of MZE829, MZE782 and its other discovery and preclinical programs, to conduct research, to broaden its pipeline, to develop its Compass platform, and for working capital.
The lead programs
Maze calls itself a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company that uses human genetics to develop small molecule precision medicines for renal, cardiovascular and related metabolic diseases, including obesity. Its most advanced lead program, MZE829, is an oral small molecule inhibitor of apolipoprotein L1, or APOL1, for APOL1 kidney disease, which the filing says affects over one million patients in the United States alone. Maze says it identified a protective variant of the APOL1 gene, N264K.
In the Phase 1 trial of MZE829, Maze enrolled 111 healthy patients who received single or multiple ascending doses of 20 mg to 480 mg daily. The filing says treatment was well tolerated with no severe or serious adverse events reported at single doses up to 480 mg or multiple doses up to 350 mg daily for seven days. Maze started a Phase 2 trial in November 2024 and expects to dose its first patient in the first quarter of 2025, with proof of concept data in the first quarter of 2026. The Phase 1 study enrolled healthy patients, so it does not test efficacy in kidney disease.
MZE782 is an oral small molecule inhibitor of the solute transporter SLC6A19, a chronic kidney disease target. Maze says it could address about five million chronic kidney disease patients in the United States with inadequate responses to current therapies. The Phase 1 trial of MZE782 started in September 2024, and Maze expects initial data in the second half of 2025.
Maze's third clinical program, MZE001 for Pompe disease, is partnered. In March 2024, after completing its Phase 1 trial, Maze exclusively licensed MZE001 to Shionogi & Co., Ltd. for an upfront payment of $150 million, plus possible milestones and royalties, including a Phase 2 milestone. Its ATXN2 and UNC13A programs are licensed to Neurocrine Biosciences, Inc. and Trace Neuroscience, Inc. respectively. It formed a spin-out, Broadwing, for ANGPTL7 in ophthalmic diseases. As of September 30, 2024, Maze owned about 48% of Broadwing, and it expects that stake to be significantly diluted when Broadwing's convertible notes convert.
The financial record
The statements of operations show a net loss of $114,940 thousand in 2022 and $100,415 thousand in 2023. The accumulated deficit was $395,686 thousand at December 31, 2023, up from $295,271 thousand a year earlier. Total stockholders' deficit was $373,848 thousand at that date.
Cash, cash equivalents and restricted cash totaled $30,246 thousand at December 31, 2023, down from $101,129 thousand a year earlier.
For the nine months ended September 30, 2024, the company reported license revenue of $167,500 thousand and net income of $81,810 thousand. For the same nine months of 2023, it reported a net loss of $73,838 thousand. The nine-month 2024 income therefore rests on license revenue.
Maze had 23,526,903 common shares outstanding as of September 30, 2024, before the offering and before the automatic conversion of its redeemable convertible preferred stock.