On December 12, Willkie client Clovis Oncology, Inc., a biopharmaceutical company focused on acquiring, developing, and commercializing innovative anti-cancer agents in the U.S., Europe, and additional international markets, announced that it and certain of its subsidiaries voluntarily initiated a chapter 11 proceeding in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware and will seek to sell their assets through a court-supervised sales process.

Clovis has received a commitment of up to $75 million in debtor-in-possession financing for the company to operate in the normal course and meet obligations to its employees, vendors and customers throughout the chapter 11 proceeding while executing on the sales process.

Prior to the chapter 11 filing, Clovis entered into a stalking horse purchase and assignment agreement with Novartis Innovative Therapies AG to acquire substantially all of the rights of the company to its pipeline clinical candidate, FAP-2286, as a therapeutic agent for an upfront payment of $50 million and up to an additional $333.75 million upon the successful achievement of specified development and regulatory milestones and $297 million in later sales milestones.

Clovis is also actively engaged in discussions with a number of interested parties with respect to a potential sale of one or more of its other assets.

The Willkie team is led by partners Rachel Strickland, Thomas Mark and Andrew Mordkoff and includes partners Erin Kinney and Daniel Durschlag.