Adelaide, Australia, 24 January 2020 – GPN Vaccines announces that it has changed its status from a Private Company limited by shares to a Public Company limited by shares and changed its name to GPN Vaccines Ltd.
Shareholders at the Company’s Annual General Meeting held on Tuesday 10th December 2019 voted unanimously to change the status of the company from a proprietary limited (private) company to a limited (public unlisted) company, in accordance with Section 162 of the Corporations Act. This decision was taken because of the strong interest from Australian and overseas sophisticated investors to participate in the Company’s Series A2 capital raising round. Section 113 of the
Corporations Act provides that a proprietary limited Company must have no more than 50 non-employee shareholders if it is to remain registered as a proprietary company. In anticipation that the number of non-employee shareholders in the Company was likely to exceed 50 non-employee shareholders upon completion of the Series A2 round, Shareholder approval was sought for the
Company to change its status from a proprietary company limited by shares to a public company limited by shares and approval for the consequential changes to the Company’s name and Constitution.
The Company was incorporated as “GPN Vaccines Pty Ltd” in September 2017. With effect from today’s date the Company’s name will be “GPN Vaccines Ltd”. As a public company, GPN Vaccines will be subject to more onerous regulation pursuant to the Corporations Act, including increased disclosure and reporting obligations. The company will also be subject to the related party provisions of the Corporations Act which require shareholder approval for the provision of a financial benefit to related parties of the company.
GPN Vaccines’ Chairman & CEO, Dr Tim Hirst commented, “This is an important milestone in the corporate development of GPN Vaccines and reflects growing interest and appetite in the Company from both Australian and international investors” He noted that “GPN Vaccines has always upheld the importance of financial reporting and shareholder disclosure and that the changed status of the Company simply enshrines obligations, to which we were already committed.”
About GPN Vaccines
GPN Vaccines is a public (unlisted) biotechnology company developing a vaccine against Streptococcus pneumoniae, which is responsible for causing life-threatening pneumonia, bacteraemia and meningitis, as well as otitis media (middle ear infections). Each year it causes 1-2 million deaths worldwide, killing more children than AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis combined. There are now 98 different serotypes of S. pneumoniae and the best vaccine currently on the market only protects against 13 of them. Gamma-PN – GPN Vaccines’ new S. pneumoniae vaccine is being developed to protect children and adults against all S. pneumoniae strains, regardless of strain serotype.
