Benzinga | Aug 10, 2021 07:34AM EDT

Harmony Biosciences, Blackstone Enter Strategic Financing Collaboration For Up To $330M

Harmony Biosciences Holdings, Inc. ("Harmony") (NASDAQ:HRMY), a pharmaceutical company dedicated to developing and commercializing innovative therapies for patients with rare neurological diseases, and Blackstone (NYSE:BX) today announced that they have entered into a strategic financing collaboration where funds managed by Blackstone have agreed to provide Harmony with up to $330 million of financing and growth capital.



"We are pleased to partner with Blackstone, one of the world's leading investment firms with strong transactional experience in life sciences and healthcare," said John C. Jacobs, President and Chief Executive Officer of Harmony Biosciences. "This financing provides us with further flexibility to grow our business by providing us with access to capital to expand our portfolio of assets in rare, neurological diseases while also reducing our annual interest expense."

Commenting on the arrangement, Craig Shepherd, Senior Managing Director with Blackstone Life Sciences, and Brad Marshall, Senior Managing Director with Blackstone Credit, said, "This transaction demonstrates our unique ability to combine deep domain expertise and flexible scale capital in the life sciences, helping to grow companies like Harmony as they optimize their capital structure and fund initiatives that develop important treatments for patients. We are strongly motivated by the Harmony team's track record of success in developing and commercializing its important medicine WAKIX(r) (pitolisant)."

The strategic financing collaboration with Blackstone includes up to $300 million in debt capital and a $30 million equity investment in Harmony common stock. The $300 million of debt capital includes a senior secured term loan facility in aggregate original principal amount of $200 million, and a $100 million senior secured delayed draw term loan facility that is available to be drawn within 12 months of closing, subject to the terms of the facility. Substantially all of the proceeds from the initial $200 million term loan and the related sale of Harmony's common stock were used to pay off Harmony's existing debt facility, together with the payment of fees and expenses, resulting in a significantly lower cost of capital.

Paragon Health Capital, Cantor Fitzgerald & Co., Oppenheimer & Co. Inc., and Raymond James served as financial advisors to Harmony. Hogan Lovells US LLP served as legal advisor to Harmony and Ropes & Gray LLP served as legal advisor to Blackstone.