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SoftBank leads $1.15B investment in genetic testing firm Invitae Corp

Date: April 06, 2021 Nandita Bhardwaj Nandita Bhardwaj
SoftBank leads $1.15B investment in genetic testing firm Invitae Corp 
Japanese multinational conglomerate, SoftBank Group Corp., has reportedly led an investment of $1.15 billion in genetic testing firm, Invitae Corp., for helping to expand the usage of its platform.



According to a statement by Invitae, the financing will be provided via convertible debt and the convertible senior notes due in 2028 will have a preliminary conversion rate of $43.18 for every share. This amounts to a premium of 20 per cent to Invitae’s trailing volume-weighted five-day average price as of 1st April 2021.



Shares of San Francisco-based Invitae have tripled in the last 12 months and closed at $39.19 in U.S. trading on Thursday, 1st April 2021. This has pushed the company’s market valuation to a total of $7.7 billion.



It is to be noted that Catherine Wood, an extensively followed investor, is the largest holder of Invitae shares via her Ark Innovation ETF. The exchange-traded fund owns nearly 14 per cent of the shares, as per data from Bloomberg. According to a recent statement by Wood, Invitae is one of the most under-appreciated holdings of the fund.



Coming back to SoftBank, Masayoshi Son, the Founder of SoftBank, has been expanding his investments in publicly traded organizations, comprising Alphabet Inc., Amazon.com Inc., and Facebook Inc., in the recent months. As reported by Bloomberg in February 2021, the Japanese-based company has planned for spending billions of dollars as investments in the healthcare and biotech sector.



The Invitae investment was made via SB Management, the asset management group of SoftBank. Earlier in 2021, SB Management also took a stake of nearly 6 per cent in a DNA-sequencing firm, Pacific Biosciences of California Inc. As of 31st December 2020, SoftBank’s public holdings also comprised AbCellera Biologics Inc., and 4D Molecular Therapeutics Inc.



Expressing his views over the investment, Sean George, the Co-founder and CEO of Invitae, stated that with the support of Invitae’s long-term shareholders, the company is creating the platform for supporting the routine usage of genetics in mainstream medicine for resulting in better healthcare for all.



Source credit: https://www.livemint.com/companies/news/softbank-to-lead-1-2-billion-investment-in-invitae-reports-dow-jones-11617627575358.html

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Nandita Bhardwaj

Nandita holds a management degree with specialization in marketing, and boasts of a short-term experience in the field of recruitment. Following her passion for writing however, she decided to pursue a career in the field of content development. Presently, Nandita pens down news pieces for newsorigins.com, spanning the verticals of business, finance, and technology.