Inovio's shares boosted on positive H1N1 trials

After a year of trading below $1, shares of Inovio Biomedical soared to $3.18 yesterday. The revival was sparked by the San Diego based company's announcement of positive results from animal studies of the company's H1N1 vaccine, SynCon. The DNA-based vaccine protected 100 percent of the test subjects against the newest strain of H1N1 for which developers are racing to create a vaccine. But the vaccine was designed to protect against a different strain--a result the company says demonstrates its potential as a universal vaccine.

The vaccine will not make it to the market for a few years but that didn't deter investors, who also boosted the shares of Vical and Novavax on the news. "It's not any kind of immediate solution to the potential crisis this fall," CEO Dhillon said in an interview. "But it is a longer-term solution that could have some very big applications."

Inovio hopes to begin testing the vaccine in humans. Capitalizing on the peak in interest, the company announced this morning plans to raise $30 million through a registered direct offering.

- read the release on the RDO
- here's the release on the study results
- more on the vaccine at Forbes

Related Article:
Inovio touts results of preclinical swine flu vax test
Inovio merging with VGX to work on DNA vaccines
Inovio licenses DNA vaccine tech to Wyeth (2006)