Can this unicorn keep its horn?

Next in the parade of biotech unicorns headed for the public markets is Orchard Therapeutics, a 3-year-old gene therapy company promising to find success where GlaxoSmithKline sputtered.

Orchard, slated to go public next week, has a pipeline of one-time treatments for serious diseases and ambitions to file three of them for approval within the next three years. What’s interesting is that Orchard’s clinical pipeline focuses on a group of ultra-rare diseases, affecting around 2,000 patients combined, and thus creates a math problem that makes it difficult to build a sustainable business.

That didn’t stop Orchard from convincing private investors to value it at more than $1 billion. Now we’ll see whether the public agrees.

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