REG - Premaitha Health PLC - Secured loan facility agreement with Thermo Fisher <Origin Href="QuoteRef">NIPT.L</Origin>

Yourgene HealthAnnouncement

22/01/2018 07:05

RNS Number : 4646C
Premaitha Health PLC
22 January 2018
Premaitha Health Plc
("Premaitha" or the "Company")
Secured loan facility agreement with Thermo Fisher
Manchester, UK - 22 January 2018 - Premaitha Health PLC (AIM: NIPT), a leading international molecular diagnostics group focused on prenatal testing, announces that it has entered into a secured loan facility agreement ("Facility") with Thermo Fisher Scientific ("Thermo Fisher").
The Facility from Thermo Fisher provides up to 2.1m to fund costs related to the ongoing Illumina litigation against Premaitha as notified by the Company on 21 November 2017. Thermo Fisher is not a party to the litigation. The Facility is provided on a commercial basis consistent with previous loans and is secured on the shares of the Company's Taiwanese subsidiary undertaking - Yourgene Bioscience Co., Ltd ("Yourgene"). There are no share warrants attached to the loan facility. If the Facility is not utilised, then the funds will be returned to the lender with no residual liabilities or charges.
A Form of Order hearing is scheduled to take place early this week and the Company will update investors further once it has concluded, and on an ongoing basis as the Facility is utilised.
The information communicated in this announcement is inside information for the purposes of Article 7 of Regulation 596/2014 and has been arranged for release by Barry Hextall, Chief Financial Officer of the Company.
-Ends-
For more information, please contact:

Premaitha Health PLC
Dr Stephen Little, Chief Executive Officer
Barry Hextall, Chief Financial Officer
Joanne Cross, Head of Marketing
investors@premaitha.com
Tel: +44 (0)161 667 1053

Cairn Financial Advisers LLP (NOMAD)
Liam Murray / James Caithie
Tel: +44 (0)20 7213 0880
finnCap (Broker)
Adrian Hargrave / Scott Mathieson (Corporate Finance)
Andrew Burdis / Abigail Wayne (Corporate Broking)
Tel: +44 (0)20 7220 0500
Vigo Communications
Ben Simons / Fiona Henson / Antonia Pollock
premaitha@vigocomms.com
Tel: +44 (0)20 7830 9700
 
About Premaitha 
Premaitha is an international molecular diagnostics group which uses the latest advances in DNA analysis technology to develop safer, faster and regulatory approved genetic screening tests. The Group's primary focus is on non-invasive prenatal tests (NIPT) for pregnant women - an emerging, multi-billion dollar global market.
Premaitha's IONA test was launched in 2015 as the first CE-IVD NIPT test in Europe. It enables laboratories and healthcare practitioners to offer a complete CE-marked NIPT system in-house. The IONA test is performed on a maternal blood sample - which contains traces of fetal DNA - and estimates the risk of a fetus being affected with Down's syndrome or other genetic conditions. 
Unlike existing prenatal screening methods, due to its high level of accuracy, the IONA test can significantly reduce the number of women subjected to unnecessaryinvasive follow up diagnostic procedures, such as amniocentesis, which are costly, resource intensive and carry a risk of miscarriage. 
In March 2017, Premaitha acquired Yourgene Bioscience, a specialist next generation sequencing and bioinformatics company based in Taiwan, with its own NIPT screening test that operates on the same Thermo Fisher next-generation sequencing platform as Premaitha's IONA test. Yourgene brings significant benefits to the Group through expanded market access in Asia - the world's fastest growing NIPT market - as well as opportunities for cross-selling and the ability to jointly develop expanded test content both within NIPT and beyond. 
Premaitha is headquartered in Manchester, England, with Yourgene offices in Taipei and Singapore. Its shares trade on the AIM market of the London Stock Exchange (AIM: NIPT). For further information, please visit www.premaitha.com. Follow us on twitter @PremaithaHealth. 

This information is provided by RNS
The company news service from the London Stock Exchange
  END
AGRBTMMTMBTTMMP