14th Aug 2026 07:00
14 August 2026
Aptamer Group plc
("Aptamer", the "Company" or the "Group")
Director Fee Shares
Grant of Options
Aptamer Group plc (AIM: APTA), the developer of next-generation synthetic Optimer® binders, today announces that it has issued 12,936,511 new ordinary shares as payment for Non-Executive services and, in line with the Company's RNS announcement of 25 March 2026, it has granted options to subscribe for up to 863,785,988 new ordinary shares to Directors.
Director Fee Shares
The Company has issued 9,081,246 new ordinary shares to Pathcelerate Limited for Non-Executive services provided by Adam Hargreaves, at an average price of 0.7708p each. Today's share issue will cover the period 1 July 2025 to 30 June 2026 and the price of the share issue is based on the volume weighted average daily closing share price for the period. Following this transaction, Pathcelerate's total beneficial interest in the Company is 192,793,884 ordinary shares, representing approximately 5.56% of the Company's issued share capital.
Further, the Company has issued 3,855,265 shares to Tim Sykes for Non-Executive services, at an average price of 0.7708p each. Today's share issue will cover the period 1 July 2025 to 30 June 2026 and the price of the share issue is based on the volume weighted average daily closing share price for the period. Following this transaction, Tim Sykes' total beneficial interest in the Company is 16,328,356 ordinary shares, representing approximately 0.47% of the Company's issued share capital.
Share option awards
When the Company announced the Placing, Subscription and Retail Offer (the "Fundraise") on 25 March 2026, it also announced its intention to establish a new share option scheme and to award share options. These options are designed to materially reward, incentivise and retain the current Board of Directors and staff, ensuring continued leadership and skilled staff through a critical growth phase. The Company obtained approval from shareholders for the new award of share options at a general meeting held on 13 April 2026, following completion of the Fundraise which generated gross proceeds of £4.55 million at an issue price of 0.6p per share.
Aptamer has continued to build on its fee-for-service platform over the last three years and the Company now serves 85% of the global top 20 pharma companies. In December 2025, the Company signed its first two licensing deals, with Twist Bioscience and Alphazyme, resulting from successful fee-for-service work and subsequent development of commercialisation-ready assets. These licences are expected to generate recurring royalty and manufacturing supply revenues for the Company in the immediate term. As part of the strategy, Aptamer is focused on developing commercial-ready assets from successful fee-for-service projects and has managed a 3.5x expansion of the Company's asset portfolio over the last 18 months, spanning reagents, diagnostics, cosmetics and therapeutics. The Company intends to continue advancing these assets towards additional licensing agreements to increase the generation of passive revenue. In addition, the Company plans to develop a therapeutic pipeline targeting the oligonucleotide therapeutics space, particularly focused on undeliverable and undruggable opportunities.
The award of new options has been set at a limit of 863,785,988, maintaining dilution at 25% of the share capital as enlarged by the Fundraise and as approved in the general meeting held on 13 April 2026.
Details of the awards and terms
The following awards have been made:
Name | Position | Number of shares subject to awards |
Dr Arron Tolley | Chief Executive Officer | 325,314,441 |
Andrew Rapson | Chief Financial Officer | 137,000,019 |
Dr David Bunka | Chief Scientific Officer | 111,342,428 |
Dr Adam Hargreaves | Non-executive Chairman | 68,717,042 |
Tim Sykes | Non-executive Director | 42,794,202 |
Staff | 156,134,490 | |
Unallocated pool | 22,483,366 | |
Total |
| 863,785,988 |
The new options are split into the following awards and subject to the conditions outlined in the following tables:
· Award 1 - shall vest immediately following date of grant, with an exercise price of 0.1p.
· Award 2 - shall vest in three equal tranches on the first, second and third anniversaries of the award, with an exercise price equal to 0.6p. The share price must have been above 0.65p per share for at least 30 days prior to vesting.
· Award 3 - exercisable at 0.69p and vesting in eight equal tranches on achieving share price growth expressed as multiples of 0.6p of 1.50x, 1.75x, 2.00x, 2.25x, 2.50x, 2.75x, 3.00x and 3.25x.
Options are subject to clawback provisions in line with governance best practices, including for underperformance or material misstatement.
The number of options granted to each Director is set out by award as follows:
Name | Award 1 | Award 2 | Award 3 | Total |
Dr Arron Tolley | 94,394,243 | 106,578,553 | 124,341,645 | 325,314,441 |
Andrew Rapson | 39,330,935 | 44,395,038 | 53,274,046 | 137,000,019 |
Dr David Bunka | 31,464,748 | 35,501,191 | 44,376,489 | 111,342,428 |
Dr Adam Hargreaves | 15,732,374 | 26,492,334 | 26,492,334 | 68,717,042 |
Tim Sykes | 12,585,899 | 14,215,672 | 15,992,631 | 42,794,202 |
Staff and unallocated pool | - | - | 178,617,856 | 178,617,856 |
Total | 193,508,199 | 227,182,788 | 443,095,001 | 863,785,988 |
All in-the-money share options would vest in the event that the Company is acquired (or in the event a person or group shall have acquired or entered into a definitive binding agreement to acquire more than 50% of the issued share capital of the Company or assets of the Company or its subsidiaries representing more than 50% of the consolidated earning power of the Company and its subsidiaries taken as a whole).
The award of these share options is conditional on the surrender of shares options that were issued to eligible Directors and Staff in December 2024. Following the grant of options and the expected surrender of December 2024 options, the Company will have outstanding awards granted over 865,255,641 ordinary shares. The Company's issued share capital is 3,455,143,950 ordinary shares.
Admission and Total Voting Rights
An application will be made for the admission of the Directors' fee shares to trading on AIM, which is expected to become effective on or around 19 August 2026.
Immediately following Admission, the Company will have 3,468,080,461 ordinary shares of £0.001 each in issue. The Company does not hold any shares in treasury, and all of the ordinary shares have equal voting rights. Therefore, the figures above represent the total voting rights in the Company and may be used by shareholders as the denominator for the calculations by which they can determine if they are required to notify their interest in, or change to their interest in the Company under the Rules.
Additional Information
The following disclosures are made in accordance with the requirements of the UK Market Abuse Regulations and provide detail in relation to the purchase of ordinary shares by directors and other PDMRs in the Company.
NOTIFICATIONS AND PUBLIC DISCLOSURE OF TRANSACTIONS BY PERSONS DISCHARGING MANAGERIAL RESPONSIBILITIES AND PERSONS CLOSELY ASSOCIATED WITH THEM
1 | Details of the person discharging managerial responsibilities / person closely associated | |||||||||||||
a)
| Name
| Dr Adam Hargreaves (Pathcelerate Ltd) Tim Sykes | ||||||||||||
2 | Reason for the notification | |||||||||||||
a)
| Position/status
| Non-executive Chairman Non-executive Director | ||||||||||||
b)
| Initial notification /Amendment | Initial notification | ||||||||||||
3
| Details of the issuer, emission allowance market participant, auction platform, auctioneer or auction monitor | |||||||||||||
a) | Name | Aptamer Group plc | ||||||||||||
b) | LEI | 213800Y4XGH3WJNBE686 | ||||||||||||
4
| Details of the transaction(s): section to be repeated for (i) each type of instrument; (ii) each type of transaction; (iii) each date; and (iv) each place where transactions have been conducted | |||||||||||||
a)
| Description of the financial instrument, type of instrument | Ordinary shares of £0.001 each | ||||||||||||
Identification code | GB00BNRRP542 | |||||||||||||
b)
| Nature of the transaction | Grant of share options | ||||||||||||
c) | Price(s) and volume(s) |
|
| |||||||||||
d) | Aggregated information | |||||||||||||
- Aggregated volume | 12,936,511 | |||||||||||||
- Price | 0.7708p | |||||||||||||
e)
| Date of the transaction | 14 August 2026 | ||||||||||||
f)
| Place of the transaction | Off market | ||||||||||||
1 | Details of the person discharging managerial responsibilities / person closely associated | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
a)
| Name
| Dr Arron Tolley Andrew Rapson Dr David Bunka Dr Adam Hargreaves Tim Sykes | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
2 | Reason for the notification | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
a)
| Position/status
| Chief Executive Officer Chief Financial Officer Chief Scientific Officer Non-executive Chairman Non-executive Director | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
b)
| Initial notification /Amendment | Initial notification | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
3 | Details of the issuer, emission allowance market participant, auction platform, auctioneer or auction monitor | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
a) | Name | Aptamer Group plc | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
b) | LEI | 213800Y4XGH3WJNBE686 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
4
| Details of the transaction(s): section to be repeated for (i) each type of instrument; (ii) each type of transaction; (iii) each date; and (iv) each place where transactions have been conducted | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
a)
| Description of the financial instrument, type of instrument | Ordinary shares of £0.001 each | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Identification code | GB00BNRRP542 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
b)
| Nature of the transaction | Grant of share options | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
c) | Price(s) and volume(s) |
|
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
d)
| Aggregated information | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
- Aggregated volume | 193,508,199, 227,182,788 and 264,477,145 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
- Price | 0.1p each, 0.6p each and 0.69p each | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
e)
| Date of the transaction | 14 August 2026 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
f)
| Place of the transaction | Off market | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
- Ends -
For further information, please contact:
Aptamer Group plc Dr Arron Tolley, Chief Executive Officer | +44 (0) 1904 217 404 |
SPARK Advisory Partners Limited - Nominated Adviser Andrew Emmott / Dillon Wall | +44 (0) 20 3368 3550 |
Turner Pope Investments (TPI) Limited - Broker Andrew Thacker / Guy McDougall | +44 (0) 20 3657 0050 |
Northstar Communications Limited - Investor Relations Sarah Hollins | +44 (0) 113 730 3896 |
The information contained within this announcement is deemed to constitute inside information as stipulated under the UK Market Abuse Regulations ("UK MAR"). Upon the publication of this announcement, this inside information is now considered to be in the public domain. For the purposes of UK MAR, the person responsible for arranging for the release of this announcement on behalf of Aptamer is Andrew Rapson, CFO.
About Aptamer Group
Aptamer Group plc (AIM: APTA) develops Optimer® binders, next-generation synthetic alternatives to antibodies that offer high specificity, improved stability, lower cost and access to targets beyond the reach of conventional modalities.
The Group operates a dual-revenue model, generating near-term revenues through fee-for-service discovery programmes while building a portfolio of proprietary therapeutic assets designed to create long-term value through licensing, royalties and supply agreements.
Aptamer is strategically focused on two of the most significant challenges in modern drug development: targeting "undruggable" proteins and enabling delivery of therapeutics to tissues beyond the liver. Its proprietary Optimer® platform, supported by more than 15 years of discovery data and an expanding AI-enabled discovery engine, is designed to accelerate the identification of high-quality binders against challenging biological targets.
The Group's internal pipeline includes targeted delivery vehicles for oligonucleotide therapeutics and radioligand therapy programmes, with upcoming in vivo studies expected to support future partnering and licensing opportunities.
Founded in 2008 and headquartered in York, UK, Aptamer works with many of the world's leading pharmaceutical companies, combining platform expertise, proprietary data and therapeutic innovation to create shareholder value.
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