Exercise of Share Options and Director Dealings

Sareum Holdings PLC

("Sareum" or the "Company")

Exercise of Share Options and Director Dealings 

Cambridge, UK, 20 October 2020 - Sareum Holdings plc (AIM: SAR), the specialist drug development company delivering targeted small molecule therapeutics to improve the treatment of cancer and autoimmune diseases, announces the following share transactions carried out by certain Directors.

On 19 October 2020, Dr Tim Mitchell (Chief Executive Officer) and Dr John Reader (Chief Scientific Officer) each exercised options over 6,153,846 ordinary shares of 0.025 pence each ("New Ordinary Shares") in the Company (the "Options"), at an exercise price of 0.26 pence per share, for an aggregate consideration of £32,000.

The Options were granted on 22 December 2010, under the Sareum Holdings plc Enterprise Management Incentives Option Agreement, as a key part of the Company's long-term incentive scheme to retain key talent in the business. The Options were due to lapse on 21 December 2020.

Following the exercise of the Options, on 19 October 2020, Dr Mitchell and Dr Reader each agreed to sell 3,076,923 of the New Ordinary Shares at a price of 1.141 pence per share (the "Share Sale").

Accordingly, following Admission (as defined below) and completion of the Share Sale, Dr Mitchell and his spouse will hold, in aggregate, 50,476,073 Ordinary Shares, representing 1.54% of the issued share capital of the Company, and Dr Reader and his spouse will hold, in aggregate, 51,625,385 Ordinary Shares, representing 1.58% of the issued share capital of the Company.

The Board, upon the recommendation of the Remuneration Committee, approved a window to trade thus enabling Dr Mitchell and Dr Reader to sell shares. It is intended that Directors can periodically trade at timely intervals without disrupting the market, such is common market practice.

Application has been made to the London Stock Exchange for the 12,307,692 New Ordinary Shares to be admitted to trading on AIM ("Admission") and it is expected that Admission will become effective and trading will commence at 8.00 a.m. on 23 October 2020.

Following Admission, the total number of Ordinary Shares in issue will be 3,267,722,796 and the total number of voting rights will therefore be 3,267,722,796. This figure may be used by shareholders as the denominator for the calculations by which they will determine if they are required to notify their interest in, or a change to their interest in, the share capital of the Company under the FCA's Disclosure and Transparency Rules.

Following the Option exercise and Share Sale, Dr Mitchell's and Dr Reader's resultant interests in the Company will be:

(1) - Included within Tim Mitchell's total holding are 10,000,000 Ordinary Shares held by his spouse.

(2) - Included withing John Reader's total holding are 3,333,791 Ordinary Shares held by his spouse.

The information set out below is provided in accordance with the requirements of Article 19(3) of the EU Market Abuse Regulation No 596/2014.

For further information, please contact: 

Sareum Holdings plc

Tim Mitchell, CEO                                                           01223 497 700

Strand Hanson Limited (Nominated Adviser)

James Dance / Richard Tulloch                                    020 7409 3494

Hybridan LLP (Nominated Broker)

Claire Noyce / John Beresford-Peirse                         020 3764 2341

Citigate Dewe Rogerson (Financial PR)

Mark Swallow/ David Dible                                          020 7638 9571

About Sareum

Sareum is a specialist drug development company delivering targeted small molecule therapeutics to improve the treatment of cancer and autoimmune diseases. The Company aims to generate value through licensing its candidates to international pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies at the preclinical or early clinical trials stage.

Sareum is advancing internal programmes focused on distinct dual tyrosine kinase 2 (TYK2) / Janus kinase 1 (JAK1) inhibitors through preclinical development as therapies for autoimmune diseases, including the "cytokine storm" immune system overreaction to Covid-19 and other viral infections, (SDC-1801) and cancer immunotherapy (SDC-1802).

The Company's preclinical FLT3+Aurora inhibitor programme targeting haematological cancers is licensed to a China-based specialty pharma company.

Sareum also has an economic interest in SRA737, a clinical-stage oral, selective Checkpoint kinase 1 (Chk1) inhibitor that targets cancer cell replication and DNA damage repair mechanisms. Preliminary Phase 2 and comprehensive preclinical data suggest SRA737 may have broad application in combination with other oncology and immune-oncology drugs in genetically defined patients.

SRA737 was discovered and initially developed by scientists at The Institute of Cancer Research in collaboration with Sareum, and with funding from Sareum and Cancer Research UK. SRA737 was licensed by CRT Pioneer Fund (CPF) to Sierra Oncology Inc. Sierra is currently exploring options to obtain the funding or support necessary to advance the future development of SRA737.

Sareum Holdings plc is listed on the AIM market of the London Stock Exchange, trading under the ticker SAR. For further information, please visit the Company's website at www.sareum.com.

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