Avacta Group Regulatory News (AVCT)

Avacta Group plc

("Avacta" or the "Group")

Proposed Share Consolidation

Avacta Group plc (AIM: AVCT), the developer of Affimer® biotherapeutics and research reagents, is undertaking a share consolidation of 1 new ordinary share of 10p each for every 100 existing ordinary shares of 0.1p each (the "Share Consolidation").

The Share Consolidation is conditional upon shareholder approval at the Company's Annual General Meeting which is to be held on Monday 25 January 2016 at 2.00pm GMT at the offices of Walker Morris, Kings Court, 12 King Street, Leeds, LS1 2HL.

Following the Share Consolidation, Avacta's shareholders will still hold the same proportion of the Company's ordinary share capital as before the Share Consolidation (save in respect of fractional entitlements and subject to any further issue of shares). The new ordinary shares will carry the same rights under Avacta's Articles of Association as the existing ordinary shares.

Any fractional shares that arise as a result of the Share Consolidation will be sold, and the aggregate proceeds of such sale (net of expenses) will be retained for the benefit of the Company.

The resolution to approve the Share Consolidation (the "Resolution") is set out in the Company's Notice of Annual General Meeting, which was posted to shareholders on 30 December 2015 and is available to view on the Company's website www.avacta.com.

Application has been made to the London Stock Exchange for the new ordinary shares arising out of the Share Consolidation to be admitted to trading on AIM ("Admission"). On the assumption that, inter alia, the Resolution is passed at the Annual General Meeting, it is expected that Admission will become effective at 8.00am on 26 January 2016.

As at 20 January 2016, the Company had 6,746,295,954 existing ordinary shares in issue. If the number of issued ordinary shares remains unchanged in the period prior to the Share Consolidation (and ignoring the effects of fractional entitlements), immediately following Admission, the Company would have 67,462,959 new ordinary shares in issue, with each share carrying the right to one vote. No shares are held in treasury. Therefore, the total number of voting rights in the Company would be 67,462,959. 

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Avacta Group plc (www.avacta.com)

Avacta's principal focus is on its proprietary Affimer® technology which is a novel engineered alternative to antibodies that has wide application in Life Sciences for diagnostics, therapeutics and general research and development.

Antibodies dominate markets worth in excess of $50bn despite their shortcomings. The Affimer technology has been designed to address many of these negative performance issues, principally: the time taken to generate new antibodies, the reliance on an animal's immune response, poor specificity in many cases, and batch to batch variability. The Affimer technology is based on a small protein that can be quickly generated to bind with high specificity and affinity to a wide range of protein targets.

Avacta has a pre-clinical biotech development programme with an in-house focus on oncology and bleeding disorders as well as several partnered development programmes. Avacta is commercialising Affimer reagents through custom Affimer services to provide bespoke solutions to customers and via a growing on-line catalogue of Affimer reagents.