Pear Therapeutics assets sold for $6M at auction after bankruptcy

Assets of prescription digital therapeutics maker Pear Therapeutics have been broken up and sold at auction for $6.05 million after the company filed for bankruptcy in April.

According to the court filing, Pear’s assets were split between four bidders: Digital therapeutics company Click Therapeutics, Harvest BIO, sleep tech company Nox Health Group and health technology company Welt. 

The largest bid of the group came from Nox Health, who’ll obtain Pear’s assets related to Somryst, which uses cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia to train the brain and body to sleep. Nox will pay $3.9 million for the assets. 

Harvest Bio was the successful bidder of Pear’s Invention Science Fund (ISF) licenses and patents as well as its assets related to schizophrenia, multiple sclerosis and depression, major depressive disorder and other pipeline assets. Harvest also successfully purchased Pear’s corporate trademarks, PearConnect, reSET and reSET-O assets. Harvest purchased Pear’s assets for an aggregate purchase price of $2.03 million. 

Click Therapeutics bid $70,000 for all Pear’s platform patents, excluding those related to the ISF assets, and Welt agreed to purchase Pear’s migraine-related assets for $50,000. 

THE LARGER TREND 

The company hit the public markets in late 2021 through a merger with a special purpose acquisition company, then a popular method of public exit for digital health firms. But the company’s stock price has generally declined since then. 

In March, Pear announced it was exploring “strategic alternatives,” including a possible company sale, merger or acquisition. 

In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Pear withdrew its revenue and operating guidance for fiscal 2022 and 2023 and announced it wouldn’t hold a fourth quarter and full-year earnings call. 

Last month, Pear filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy and announced it was seeking a sale of its business or assets but would continue its scaled-down operations during Chapter 11 as it sought a sale, and Pear would use its available cash to fund its operations and costs post-petition.

The Boston-based company’s CEO Corey McCann referenced the filing on LinkedIn, stating, “Today is a difficult day for Pear Therapeutics. We announced that Pear voluntarily filed for Chapter 11 and will seek to sell assets through a sales process. We also announced a reduction in force, including me. This is certainly not the outcome I envisioned when I founded Pear in 2013.”