Addleshaw Goddard has advised on a £7m placing and £1m Broker Option by life sciences company genedrive, a substantial part of which will fund the development of two Covid-19 tests. The first such test has just received CE marking and is available for sale.

Genedrive, an AIM-listed near molecular diagnostics company, has received commitments to raise £7 million through the issue of 8,750,000 new ordinary share in a Placing and commitments to raise a further £1m through the issue of 1,250,000 new ordinary shares via a Broker Option by Peel Hunt and finnCap. Genedrive announced in March that it had refocused a significant part of its core resources towards development of two SARS-CoV-2 tests to detect people with active COVID-19 infections. This fundraise will support the rapid development of the Genedrive® SARS-CoV-2 assays, a one step "ready to go" test that can be used on multiple third party platforms, perform 96 tests in under 2 hours and is available as of today. The second test is for use on the Genedrive® diagnostic platform, will be able to be transported globally without the need for refrigeration, can be used in a variety of environments and settings and is expected to be available by the end of the year.

Genedrive has seen its share price rise substantially over the last few weeks, reflecting increased investor interest in companies with potential diagnostic and therapeutic solutions to the COVID-19 crisis. There has been great interest from existing and new investors, with both the Placing and Broker Option being oversubscribed. 

Anna Brown, a corporate Partner at Addleshaw Goddard and who lead the team acting for genedrive said: "It is critical to the fight against coronavirus that we have high volumes of reliable tests, and so it is no surprise that investors are looking to back companies that are able to develop these. genedrive's point of care device for the diagnosis of infectious diseases, its expertise and its ability to react quickly to meet a worldwide need in the fight against COVID-19 could be a key part of the strategy, not just to control the virus but also to get businesses and the UK economy out of lockdown. We were delighted to be part of the team, to also be able to react quickly to changing market demand and use our expertise to enable genedrive to close a successful fundraise."