Calif. biotech company once worth $476M lays off every remaining employee [View all]

Calif. biotech company once worth $476M lays off every remaining employee
Viracta Therapeutics' shutdown comes after the company halted a trial of its leading drug candidate in December

After a year of dwindling coffers and repeated layoff rounds, the Southern California biotech firm Viracta Therapeutics has finally reached the end of its road. The company is laying off every remaining employee, winding down operations and letting its entire board of directors resign.

Viracta, headquartered in the Encinitas community of Cardiff, announced the shutdown in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday, the day after its stock was delisted from the Nasdaq exchange. In December, Viracta ended the Phase 2 clinical trial for its leading drug candidate, Nana-val, sounding a death knell for the company.

The end of Viracta is rough news for not just its workers and investors but also the patients who might have hoped for the company to break through in treating virus-associated cancers. As recently as last summer, Viracta was touting both positive trial data for its Nana-val drug, which was designed to fight Epstein-Barr virus-positive lymphoma, and a “productive” meeting with the Food and Drug Administration for charting the drug’s regulatory pathway.

But for months, the signs of failure have been evident. The company began 2024 with 40 full-time employees but laid off 23% in August and then 42% in November. In a filing that month, Viracta reported having more liabilities than assets and wrote that, as of the end of September, it had accumulated $295 million in losses since its inception.