(News Bulletin 247) – Listed in Brussels and Amsterdam since 2021, Onward Medical will take its first steps on the Paris Stock Exchange this Tuesday. This company develops therapies aimed at restoring movement, function and independence in people with spinal cord injuries.

Never two without three. Medtech company Onward Medical will make its debut on the Paris Stock Exchange this Tuesday, four years after an initial dual listing in Brussels and Amsterdam.

The company is developing several therapies to restore movement, function and independence in people with spinal cord injuries. It is expanding its presence in Europe by focusing on a new base in France.

The medtech justifies this choice of a third listing in France, a country in which it says it has “a special link”, by its desire to facilitate “exchanges of [ses] titles by making them available on Euronext Paris”.

“This listing provides greater access to French investors, supporting our efforts to address the significant unmet needs of people with spinal cord injuries in France and around the world,” said Onward Medical, which added that this listing “does not result in the creation of new shares and therefore has no dilutive effect for current shareholders.”

Neuromodulation in progress

The company is developing three devices aimed at improving or restoring limb function after spinal cord injury.

The first, called ARC-EX, is the most advanced. This non-invasive system aims to restore upper limb function after a spinal cord injury (an injury to the spinal cord or its nerve roots), by targeted and programmed electrical stimulation, transcutaneously to the spinal cord.

Onward Medical filed an application for approval with the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in April and hopes to launch the product in the United States by the end of this year. This would be the first product to be marketed by Onward Medical, which has no revenue to date. The company also plans to file an application for approval in Europe.

This product is likely to target nearly 200,000 people in Europe and the United States who suffer from incomplete impairment of upper limb function following spinal cord injury.

The company is also developing ARC-IM, an electrical spinal cord stimulation system designed to treat blood pressure instability and other symptoms in people with spinal cord injury.

The company says it wants to explore other indications that include improving sexual function and bowel control, as well as mobility and gait in people with Parkinson’s disease.

Onward Medical is also developing ARC-BCI, an investigational system that combines ARC-IM therapy with a brain-computer interface (BCI) to restore thought-guided upper and lower limb movements.

In 2021, Onward Medical reported that it had “successfully” implanted an experimental BCI in a human to augment ARC-IM therapy with thought-guided leg movement after paralysis. Then two years later, another patient was implanted with the combination therapy.

Last week, Onward Medical announced that the newest study participant had been implanted with the ARC-BCI system to restore mobility after spinal cord injury (SCI). The system was implanted on September 12, 2024 by Dr. Jocelyne Bloch, head of the functional neurosurgery department at the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Vaudois (CHUV) in Lausanne, Switzerland.

These multiple communications have enabled Onward Medical to progress by 56% in 2024. But since its first steps on the stock market, the file has lost another 61% compared to its price of 12.75 euros set for its IPO in October 2021.