Vancouver Chapter Upcoming Events

Creative Licensing and Creative Investment – A Case Study by Vijay Sondhi, Xenon Pharmaceuticals Inc.

The Vancouver chapter of the LICENSING EXECUTIVES SOCIETY invites all LES members and friends to a case study on creative licensing and creative investment by Vijay Sondhi, CFO and COO of Xenon Pharmaceuticals Inc.

The situation was challenging to say the least. At the end of 2005, Xenon had roughly 12 months of cash remaining. In the biotech business it is often stated that 12 months of cash is really 6 months of cash as it is tough to raise funds with your back against the wall. Something had to be done quickly to raise the capital to fund the company’s development and launch into human trials of clinical candidates that were in IND enabling studies.

Being a pre-clinical company at the time, the IPO market was firmly shut for Xenon. Although there was significant venture capital interest in the company in Canada, California and the US East Coast, the valuations were at “cram down round” levels. Compounding the problem was that Xenon had executed major licensing deals with Pfizer in 2001 and Novartis in 2004 accompanied by equity issuance at extremely high valuations.

Management was faced with a major dilemma. How should licensing and equity based fund raising be pursued to maximize future value to shareholders? Vijay will take you through a real-life case study of strategy development and execution. He will also tell you how it all turned out with Xenon in a strong position by using creative licensing and creative investment to secure its future.

DATE:
Monday, November 26, 2007.

TIME:
12:00 to 1:30 - Lunch, presentation, questions and networking.

PLACE: 
Bull, Housser & Tupper LLP, Main Boardroom
3000 - 1055 West Georgia Street
Vancouver

SUBJECT: 
Creative Licensing and Creative Investment – A Case Study

SPEAKER: 
Vijay Sondhi, Xenon Pharmaceuticals Inc.

Vijay is CFO & COO of Xenon Pharmaceuticals Inc., a Bio Pharmaceutical company creating innovative therapeutics for improving patient care in cardiovascular, neurological and metabolic diseases.  He has been involved in executing over $120M worth of licensing transactions with major US, European and Japanese pharmaceutical companies and raising close to $50M in equity for Xenon since joining the company in 2004.  
Click here for speaker bio

COST:     
$20 for LES members, $30 for non members.
$15 for full-time students at a post-secondary institution

Please make cheques payable to the LES Vancouver Chapter, and  (if possible) send send payment in advance to Lorraine Duke at the address below.

PLEASE RSVP (with payment) no later than Wednesday, November 21, 2007 to:

Lorraine Duke, Assistant to Hilton W.C. Sue
Oyen Wiggs Green & Mutala LLP
Suite 480 - The Station
601 West Cordova St.
Vancouver, BC V6B 1G1
Tel: 604-669-3432 ext. 8960
Fax: 604-681-4081
Email: lduke@patentable.com

WHO SHOULD ATTEND:
Professionals with an interest in high technology licensing, technology transfer, and intellectual property administration. 

THE LICENSING EXECUTIVES SOCIETY:
The LES membership includes a wide range of professionals, including business executives, lawyers, licensing consultants, engineers, academicians, scientists and government officials.  The Vancouver Chapter of LES (U.S.A. and Canada) strives to provide professional development opportunities for members of our local technology transfer community.  For more information about the LES (U.S.A. and Canada), see www.usa-canada.les.org.

THE LES VANCOUVER CHAPTER:
For more information about the LES Vancouver Chapter, see our local website at www.lesvan.com.

BEST CHAPTER AWARD:
At this year’s LES annual meeting in Vancouver Oct. 14-17, 2007, the LES Vancouver Chapter was once again awarded an Outstanding Local Chapter award.  Thank you to everyone who has come to our meetings/events and otherwise been supportive of our Chapter.  It has been a privilege to serve as Chair of this outstanding Chapter.

Brad Wheeler of UBC-UILO and Herb Regehr of Bull Housser & Tupper LLP are the new co-chairs of the Vancouver Chapter (I’m sending this email on their behalf both because I’m desperately clinging to power despite outstaying my welcome, and because they may need to be whitelisted on your email systems).  Assuming you wish to continue receiving notices of upcoming LES Vancouver Chapter meetings, please adjust your email servers and spam filters, as necessary, to accept emails from brad.wheeler@uilo.ubc.ca or hbr@bht.com.  Brad and Herb promise you drama and excitement in their future notices, which should be a refreshing change after nearly four years of putting up with bland notices from me.