Diaceutics is rapidly becoming a pivotal player in the global precision medicine ecosystem. Being on AIM is raising its profile and capabilities still further.

The rise of precision medicine

Advances in genetic analysis are revolutionising healthcare. Belfast-based Diaceutics is at the forefront of data collection and analysis in this revolution, enabling medical decisions, treatments, practices and products to be tailored to each individual patient.

“The future of precision medicine lies in its consumerisation, giving patients control of their own healthcare,” says Peter Keeling, CEO of Diaceutics, “and the world is moving much faster to that position than the ordinary citizen appreciates.”

The company, which was founded in 2005 and floated on AIM in 2019, has built up a wealth of data containing aggregated testing events and anonymised patient data for over 227 million patients covering approximately 300 diseases. This provides the real world evidence that informs the decision making of more than 35 global pharmaceutical companies across hundreds of precision medicine projects.

It also works with diagnostic testing laboratories to improve their processes. “Our data helps pharmaceutical companies know where the gaps are, and it helps laboratories to know how to close those gaps,” says Keeling.

"Diaceutics’ data contains aggregated testing events and anonymised patient data for over 227 million patients covering approximately 300 diseases."

Peter Keeling

CEO, Diaceutics

A strong equity story

Having financed the company’s early growth through debt funding, and having been profitable from day one, Keeling and his CFO Philip White began to look at raising fresh capital in 2017. Initially, they considered private equity and attracted several interested investors, but in mid-2018 they decided to focus on an IPO.

“We are fast learners and we learned from our conversations with private equity that our equity story was a strong one,” says White. “Furthermore, the market opportunity is huge and in order to fulfil our clients’ global needs we could see that the business would require more than one capital raise.”

Another factor was their customer base was principally composed of publically traded companies; becoming a public company itself would enhance Diaceutics’ status as a trusted global partner.

Despite taking place during the uncertain period around the initial Brexit deadline in March 2019, the IPO was 2.5 times oversubscribed. Diaceutics also kept firmly focused on its day-to-day business. In its financial year in which the IPO took place, revenues increased nearly 30% and customers by 19%.

More than one year later and Keeling and White are clear that the decision was the right one. “Do our clients appreciate our transparency? Absolutely,” says Keeling. “Do we see a path through investor confidence to additional capital raising in the future? Absolutely.”

Philip White
CFO, Diaceutics
"The IPO has fuelled confidence throughout the company – from the youngest accountant to our senior executives."

Employee engagement

The IPO has fuelled confidence throughout the company, adds White, “from the youngest accountant to our senior executives.” Diaceutics enabled its employees to buy into the shares through a convertible loan note. “That really lifted the business,” he recalls. Eighty per cent of the company’s employees subscribed more than £500,000. “I was blown away by that.”

That employee bounce continues to reverberate among the 120-strong workforce across 17 countries. Diaceutics has launched a comprehensive long term incentive plan to provide every employee with access to shares in the business.

80%

Company’s employees subscribed more than £500,000.

Scaling, financing, timing

The company’s ability to access fresh capital provides a cornerstone for its ambitious growth strategy. The overall market for precision medicines is expected to double in size from 2018 to 2026. “Our challenge is not just to build a global service, but to scale the organisation to manage the wave of therapies that are coming to the market,” says Keeling.

Part of the proceeds of the IPO were to complete the last mile of an ambitious software platform to connect Diaceutics’ data with 2,800 laboratories and 35 pharmaceutical companies.

The company’s geographic footprint is expanding. It has established operations hubs in Singapore and Guangzhou and continues grow its North American business – and Keeling is keen to add US investors to the shareholder register.

Knowing when to accelerate is the single biggest decision that a growth technology company can make, says Keeling. Timing is everything. “Being a public company provides greater certainty around timing and this has really helped our discussions around the executive table. We know with confidence that the finance will be there – and that means the team has been able to lift its horizons further and faster.”

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