iBio stock nearly tripled on Wednesday: here’s why

Shares of iBio Inc (NYSEAMERICAN: IBIO) close to tripled on Wednesday after the biotechnology company announced a collaboration with AstralBio Inc.

iBio stock is still down sharply versus a year ago

The $12 million company based out of Texas, United States will work with its peer on AI-enabled discovery and development of novel antibodies for obesity and cardiometabolic disorders.  

A day earlier, $IBIO announced a $15 million financing from a consortium of investors – part of which, it said, will be used to support new partnerships.

On Wednesday, Martin Brenner – the chief executive of iBio Inc expressed confidence in his company’s artificial intelligence enabled technology that positions it exceptionally well to “develop antibodies against challenging targets in cardiometabolic space”.

Note that iBio stock is still trading only at a fraction of a price at which it did a year ago.

iBio and Astral could double down on their collaboration

The press release on Wednesday also talked of the possibility of adding additional targets to expand the collaboration at a later stage. According to CEO Brenner of iBio Inc:

The collaboration’s lead programme targeting the TGFb superfamily is designed to achieve a best-in-class profile.

It is worth mentioning here that $IBIO – an AI-enabled developer of next-generation biopharmaceuticals is yet to generate full-year revenue. In its last fiscal year, it had $65 million of loss.

iBio shares public offering in December of 2023 had brought in roughly $4.5 million in gross proceeds. Before that in November, the biotech firm executed a 20-to-1 reverse stock split.