Vivus announces $65 million offering

Vivus, a US pharmaceutical company, has entered into definitive agreements dated August 5 with a select group of institutional investors to sell 8,365,508 shares of its common stock in a "registered direct" offering. The investors have agreed to purchase the shares at a price of $7.77 each resulting in gross proceeds of around $65.0 million to Vivus before expenses. Trout Capital served as placement agent for the offering.

All the shares are being offered pursuant to an effective Registration Statement on Form S-3 previously filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Several new and existing investors participated in the offering.

Vivus intends to use the proceeds from the financing for general corporate purposes and to fund clinical trials of its product candidates, including the advancement of the clinical program for Qnexa (phentermine-topriamate), which is in Phase III clinical testing for the treatment of obesity and diabetes.