AxioMed Up for Sale

After years of raising capital, reach $70 million, Cleveland, Ohio-based spine company AxioMed Spine Corp. is now up for sale. Gerbsman Partners has been hired to manage the deal.

However, the company is still trying to win approval from the U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) for its primary technology. It has finished enrolling 400 patients in a pivotal U.S. study designed to test its Freedom lumbar disc, according to a letter being sent to potential buyers. If that goes well, the FDA could approve the product in 2016 or 2017, which would make it “the first next generation elastomeric disc approved in the U.S.,” the letter said.

AxioMed was put up for sale by its senior secured lender, Western Technology Investment, a Silicon Valley, Calif.-based firm that provides equity and debt to high-tech companies.

One local private equity firm, Primus of Mayfield Heights, Ohio is listed among AxioMed’s biggest equity investors. Other Ohio-based investors that have backed AxioMed include Early Stage Partners of Cleveland and Reservoir Venture Partners of Columbus.

AxioMed also has received public money. It was awarded two loans worth a total of approximately $1.25 million from the Innovation Ohio Loan Fund. However, the state has a secured lien on some of AxioMed’s fixed assets, the letter states.

AxioMed CEO Patrick McBrayer did not provide comment.

Gerbsman Partners is currently soliciting investors, customers, competitors and other companies that might be interested in buying AxioMed.