After taking a writedown on goodwill, Angiotech Pharmaceuticals reported a fourth quarter loss that swelled to $77 million--up from $27.9 million from the year before. The Canadian biotech also reported that its royalty revenue from Boston Scientific, which uses Angiotech's coating process for its drug-eluting stents, could slide. And any erosion in royalty revenue at this point could well trigger a reorganization of the company.
Scrambling for cash in a tough market environment, Angiotech says that it has no assurances that it can raise new money on favorable terms--or get any new funds at all. And a revenue crunch could force the company to slash spending, which in turn may seriously disrupt its R&D and marketing plans.
"These and other uncertainties may adversely affect our liquidity and capital resources to a significant extent and may force us to further reduce our expenditures on research and development or on our various new product and sales and marketing initiatives in order for us to continue to service our debt obligations," the company said in a statement. "Such further reductions in our budgeted expenditures may have an adverse effect on our new product development and sales growth initiatives and reduce our ability to achieve the revenue growth targets, product launch or new product development timelines in our current operating plan."
Angiotech announced last fall that it would start to look for new ways to raise capital and cut costs after an expected $300 million financing failed to materialize. At that point Angiotech--a pharma and medical device company-said it would shutter research and manufacturing facilities in Rochester, NY, as well as other laboratory space, cut staff and delay the launch of a central venous catheter.
- read the Angiotech release