GigCapital5 Inc, a publicly traded special purpose acquisition company and QT Imaging Inc, a medical imaging company that develops novel products for body imaging, announce that they have entered into a definitive business combination agreement that would result in QT Imaging becoming a publicly listed company subject to closing. Upon closing of the transaction, the combined company will be named QT Imaging Holdings, Inc. and will be traded on the NYSE under the new ticker symbol “QTI”. The goal is to complete the business combination in the first half of 2023.
Approximately 39 million women in the United States get mammograms every year (Source: CDC). For every 20 positive findings in mammograms, only one is actually cancer. Such a high callback rate leads to unnecessary, risky, painful, and expensive follow up medical procedures. QT Imaging exists to provide an improved imaging modality to address critical deficiencies in the current breast imaging paradigm. The FDA granted clearance for the QT ultrasound scanner, QTscan, as an adjunct to mammography and the National Institute of Health (NIH) has awarded over $15.5 million in funding for QT Imaging research.
Unlike traditional breast imaging modalities, the company’s QTscan does not require radiation, injection contrast agents, or compression, and is highly accurate and repeatable, allowing earlier and more frequent monitoring for women undergoing non-surgical breast cancer treatments such as adjuvant chemotherapy, radiation therapy, cryotherapy, and hormone or selective hormone receptor modulation treatments. No other ultrasound-based breast imaging modality is cleared by the FDA to quantify fibroglandular volume.
There is a great clinical need for a new body imaging modality that can be used for screening healthy people, infants, children, and pregnant women who are at risk when subjected to conventional whole body imaging systems, such as CT and MRI. There is also a great need for a low cost, comprehensive medical imaging modality that can be deployed in low resource environments. There are billions of people in the world who have no access to comprehensive medical imaging, a key medical tool that could dramatically improve medical care. QT Imaging’s technology offers the imaging modality for screening of healthy people, infants, and children at low costs.
QT Imaging, as a vertically integrated medical software – hardware imaging platform company in the business of designing and manufacturing ultra-low frequency transmitted sound imaging systems for breast and body imaging, is entering a commercial growth phase and plans to use the proceeds of the merger to seek to attain additional FDA approvals and further expand its commercial activities.
“QT Imaging’s core mission is to provide safe, highly accurate and inexpensive imaging systems to women and children,” said John Klock, MD, Founder and CEO of QT Imaging. “Healthcare’s high costs are in large part due to the high cost of medical imaging, and this needs to be addressed with safe, low-cost comprehensive imaging solutions.”
Dr. Avi Katz, Founding Managing Partner of GigCapital Global and Chairman of the board of directors of GigCapital5, commented: “It is a moral mission for the GigCapital5 team to partner with QT Imaging’s team to bring to the public markets their first breakthrough, FDA-cleared for breast imaging scanner, QTscan, as well as to support development and FDA clearances for imaging applications beyond the breast. GigCapital5 is our 5th SPAC and the GigCapital team is committed to working with exceptional teams of late stage, private companies to orchestrate the transition to the public markets and beyond in bettering the lives of the planet’s inhabitants, more so of minority and unprivileged communities. We are thrilled to be part of this exciting opportunity, improving, and extending the human life by reimagining the possibilities of imaging technology, bringing higher quality, safer, and lower cost medical imaging to all, and are humbled by the opportunity to partner with Dr. Klock and his team.”
Transaction Overview
The business combination values QT Imaging at an equity value of $151 million. The combined company will receive approximately $41 million in gross proceeds from GigCapital5’s trust account, assuming no redemptions by GigCapital5’s public stockholders, and up to $26 million in additional financing to be raised prior to the closing of the business combination.
The transaction has been approved unanimously by the boards of directors of both QT Imaging and GigCapital5 and is currently expected to close in the first half of 2023, subject to regulatory and stockholder approvals, and other customary closing conditions.
[Source(s): GigCapital5 Inc and QT Imaging Inc, Business Wire]
