WAKEFIELD, MA – Saying the company is “pursuing time-sensitive market opportunities,” Picis, Inc. on July 3 withdrew its 11-month-old request for a proposed initial public offering (IPO) of common stock.
The Wakefield, Mass.-based provider of healthcare information technology solutions for high-acuity areas of the hospital had filed last August with the Securities and Exchange Commission for an IPO. News reports indicated the company planned to raise $86.25 million.
Picis isn’t the first to change plans. Nine healthcare companies have withdrawn IPO proposals this year, according to Dow Jones’ Scott Austin on MarketWatch. And in the first half of 2007, of the 17 healthcare IPOs to make it to market, nine have failed to live up to expectations. The average return on a healthcare IPO in the first half was 5 percent, Austin wrote, compared to 14.8 percent for all 115 IPOs recorded in the first half.