Specialist healthcare group Ark Therapeutics Group (LON:AKT) has shelved plans to sell the company and instead opted to begin pursuing partnership deals in order to speed up the development of its drug pipeline. At the same time, Ark’s chief executive Nigel Parker is stepping down and will be replaced by current CFO, Martyn Williams.

The shake-up follows a review of the company’s assets and operations which has been underway since March and which aimed to assess the value of Ark’s portfolio and ways to optimise shareholder value. Since then, Ark is understood to have received a number of expressions of interest for all or parts of the business, but none that matched its own valuation of its assets.

Ark said its review had confirmed that there was “significant value” that could be created for shareholders and that it would change its strategy to one of selective partnering of programmes together with a plan to monetise certain assets. It noted that a number of events to validate the value of the company were expected to be concluded in the next 12 months.

Looking ahead, Ark is set to continue discussions with those parties that have expressed an interest in parts of the business because it believes those approaches have the potential to create “superior near-term value” for shareholders as part of the new strategy. The new plan should also extend the cash runway beyond the second half of 2011 and provide Ark with more time to realise the value of its pipeline.

Specifically, the company will look for a partner to complete the clinical development for Cerepro now that all other aspects including the adenoviral platform are cleared for approval and will also minimise expenditure on Trinam by modifying the existing trial to a Phase IIb and then seeking a partner for a final Phase III trial.

Andrew Christie, the chairman of Ark, said: “Ark has a very valuable portfolio of assets, manufacturing capabilities and world leading science. Our priority in the short term is to extract value from these assets by seeking partners or acquirers for individual parts of the business whilst progressing development of key programmes.”

Last December Ark’s share price crashed from 37p to 12.75p in a matter of day after the European Medicines Agency rejected its marketing authorisation application for its…

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