Welcome to Evogene's Third Quarter Results Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] All participants are present in listen only mode. Following management's formal presentation, we will open the question-and-answer session. [Operator Instructions] As a reminder, this conference is being recorded November 21, 2024. This presentation contains forward-looking statements relating to future events and Evogene LTD may, from time to time, make other statements regarding our outlook or expectations of future financial or operating results and/or other matters regarding or affecting us that are considered forward-looking statements as defined in the US Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 and other securities laws as amended. Statements that are not statements of historical fact may be deemed to be forward-looking statements. Such forward-looking statements may be identified by the use of such words as believe, expect, anticipate, should planned, estimated, intend and potential or words of similar meaning. We are using forward-looking statements in this presentation when we discuss Evogene's strategy and vision. Evogene's value proposition and ability to identify and optimize candidates enhance the likelihood of achieving breakthrough products within competitive time lines and in a cost-effective way, Evogene's partnerships and Evogene's ability to harness value and leverage ChemPass AI, the expected timing of and ability of Casterra to supply purchase orders, the expected timing of Lavie Bio sale, AgPlenus Pipeline by Biomica’s BMC128 future activity and Evogene's projected cash usage for 2024 and Evogene anticipated continued revenue growth in for 2024. Such statements are based on current expectations estimates, projections and assumptions described opinions about future events, involve certain risks and uncertainties which are difficult to predict, and are not guarantees of future performance. Readers are cautioned that certain important factors may affect the company's actual results and could cause such results to differ materially from any forward-looking statements that may be…

Good day, everyone. In today's conference call, I will begin with a review of the financial and business highlights for the third quarter, followed by an overview of Evogene's activities. I will then conclude with recent achievements by our subsidiaries since the last analyst call. After my remarks, Yaron Eldad Evogene's CFO, will provide a financial update on Q3 activities. We will then open a Q&A session. Let us begin with the financial and business highlights. In the first nine months of 2024, total revenues reached approximately $6.9 million compared to approximately $5.1 million in the first nine months of 2023. In Q3 2024, total revenues reached approximately $1.8 million compared to approximately $3.8 million in Q3 2023. The revenues in Q3 2024 are mainly based on the Casterra's seeds sales. The revenues in Q3 2023 included a license fee payment of $2.5 million received by Lavie Bio. For the full year 2024 Evogene anticipates continued revenue growth compared to the previous year, mainly due to Casterra supply of existing seed orders. G&A expenses in Q3 2024 included expenses of approximately $1.4 million resulting from Evogene's fundraising and an allowance for doubtful debt from one of Casterra's seed suppliers. The remaining G&A expenses in Q3 2024 amounted to approximately $1.5 million, unchanged compared to Q3 2023. In the first nine months of 2024, operating loss was approximately $17.6 million, which included the G&A expenses of approximately of $1.5 million due to average and fundraising and allowance for doubtful debt mentioned above and other expenses of approximately $0.5 million compared to approximately $18.9 million in the first nine months of 2023. In the first nine months of 2024, financing expenses net were approximately $0.38 million compared to financing income of $2.3 million in the first nine months of 2023. The financing…

Thank you, Ofer. As of September 30, 2024, Evogene had held consolidated cash, cash equivalents and short-term bank deposits of approximately $20 million. This amount does not include approximately $1.4 million of payments due from customers regarding deliveries made in September 2024. The consolidated cash usage during the third quarter of 2024 was approximately $5.7 million, excluding Lavie Bio and Biomica, Evogene and its other subsidiaries used approximately $3.1 million in cash during the third quarter of 2024. The projected cash usage for 2024, excluding Lavie Bio and Biomica is expected to be around $8 million to $10 million, marking a notable 20% to 36% decrease from approximately $12.5 million in 2023. Revenues for the first nine months of 2024 were approximately $6.9 million, an increase from approximately $5.1 million in the same period the previous year. This growth was primarily driven by revenues recognized from AgPlenus new collaboration with Bayer and increased Casterra revenues from the supply of castor seeds during the period. Revenues for the third quarter of 2024 were approximately $1.8 million compared to approximately $3.8 million in the same period in the previous year. The decrease was mainly attributable to revenue of $2.5 million recognized in Lavie Bio in the third quarter of 2023 by the licensing agreement with Corteva partially offset by the increased revenues recognized in Casterra and AgPlenus during the third quarter of 2024. Evogene anticipates continued growth in the fourth quarter of 2024 compared to the previous year, mainly based on Casterra's forecast for seed order supply. Research and development expenses, net of non-refundable grants, for the nine months of 2024 were approximately $13.2 million. A significant decrease from approximately $15.2 million in the first nine months of 2023. The decrease in expenses is mainly due to the cessation of Canonic’s activities…

Ladies and gentlemen, at this time we will begin the question-and-answer session. [Operator Instructions] The first question from Ben Klieve of Lake Street Capital Markets. On the second quarter call, you said you expected a material update on a follow-on order for 2025 deliveries at Casterra by today's call. This did not happen. Why did this not materialize?

Hi. This is Ofer speaking thank you, Ben, for joining to this call. Yes, in previous earnings call, we were expected to receive orders from our partners. But to our server, we still didn't receive it. Not because there is a complication. It's mainly because they are still in their internal discussion based on the performance that they are receiving, in their bills. So since we didn't receive the final decision, which we hope that it will receive it, almost every day for now. So this is the reason that we couldn't give such an update for today meetings. But it's not because there is any specific complication in the discussion or the ongoing relationship with our partners.

Another question from Ben Klieve. Have Casterra continued delayed deliveries. Of the initial order placed in mid-2023 compromised its ability to secure a follow on order?

With respect to this question. I'm just returning from probably past three days in Kenya. Where we visit our seed production site, together with Yoash, the CEO of Casterra, we published, we reached to a stage that I think that we solved the seed production issue for in Africa. Our partners are quite happy about it. Actually, we are planning to bring some of them to our side, so they can see and impress from what we achieved there. And I believe that we are -- we will continue to stay an important seed suppliers to our, partners in Africa. As we disclosed, there was some delays in the harvesting season because of the extension of the rain in Kenya. But now, we are moving very fast. Probably, we'll put some nice pictures and short movies from our visit in Kenya, which my opinion, are quite impressive. And we are reaching to the stage that we can generate tens and even close to hundreds of tons of seeds on every month. So I think that there we are in a good position, with the future seed supplies to our partners. So, yes, there were some delays, and, yes some seed producer that we engaged in 2023, disappoint us from their performance. But the thing that now we are beyond this complication, and we are looking forward to a much, and better performance futures, with respective seed production.

Another question from Ben Klieve. Is Evogene contributing any cash to the collaborations announced with Google and Ben-Gurion University? If so, how much?

So with respect to the Ben-Gurion University, collaboration actually, we are covering through the grant, all of our expenses. So, there is no additional cost for Evogene in participating in this collaboration. With respect to Google, so each side is covering its own expenses. From our perspective, this is part from our ongoing product development process, so it's already part of the budget. And Google were very, excited to join forces with us, and they are contribute to this collaboration, a significant amount of resources and the employee to help us to build this amazing, fundamental, model, that can accelerate our progress. So as I said -- it don't have an effect on our budget compared to what we plan, while actually, the end-product, is worth much more than what we contribute due to the Google involvement in this project.

The next question, how much cash at parent company level as of the 30th September 2024, what is the remaining cash usage for the balance of 2024? Why do you carve out Biomica and Lavie Bio in saying what your cash usage will be if you deliver the seeds. How long does cost -- how long does the customer have to pay? Could you give us more detail on what additional opportunities to inject funds are available?

Yaron, can you take this answer?

Yeah. Sure. So Hi Ben. Thanks for the question. And Evogene and the only one subsidiaries had $8 million in cash as of as of September 30. We had another $2 million of seeds that were delivered during -- the end of September beginning of October. A part of the spending is already in, and the rest should arrive shortly. In addition to that, we expect to deliver by the end of the current quarter seeds in amounts of $2 million. So I, feel comfortable to say that we have enough cash going forward for a year and more.

And with respect to the second part of the question, so first, I hope that you get the answer to your question. So, in a way, we have close to $10 million just for Evogene, and we are expecting to receive additional fund in the next few months. So I think that we are in quite a stable financial position. And, I think it's from probably from here and onwards, we start to put more information, on how much money we have, for Evogene and for Biomica and Castera – sorry, Lavie Bio, please remember that part of the money that this two company holds, they're paying -- it's let it be it's going to be used in the future to pay for Evogene for the use of our technology and for receiving different type of services. So apart from the money that you see which belong to Lavie and Biomica, Evogene is going to use to cover its own expenses. And, usually, when we deliver sales, the amount of money that we receive, you asked -- it's around, from the time we receive we send the seed, till we receive the money. It's 30 -- up to 45 days. So it's not that we need to wait for too long, and even though that they were talking about the big numbers. And, what additional opportunity to generate revenue for the company. So, I think I mentioned in the past that -- one of the option is a fundraising for our subsidiary level. This is something that we are working on it now and much more intensively. And in addition, we also exploring an opportunity to sell part from our holding in our subsidiaries or even maybe to sell, and completely one of our subsidiaries to potentially strategic partners or companies that, show interest in what those companies are doing. So, I think that there is few avenues that we can bring additional cash to strength our financial position. And if this event will happen, so then I think that, this would be a really nice addition, to our cash balance and to the stability of the company. So I hope that they address these questions.

The next question from Brett Reiss of Janney Montgomery Scott, where do you think the sales level for Yalos can be in two years? What is your base case target? I'm not looking for quarters guidance, but what is realistic sales run rate a few years out?

Amit, the CEO of, Lavie BIO will take this answer, please. Question, please.

Yeah. Thanks, Brett, for the question. What makes us optimistic about Yalos sales are two factors that happened this year. One is even though we're still in penetration mode, we received very good feedback from the farmers using the product, which came back and are planning to expand next year. And this is one of the biggest KPIs we put to ourselves as returning customers that are actually growing. And the second is the proof that we did that Yalos works on soybean. Soybean is a much more prime crop, for bio-stimulants. 100% also a 100% of soybeans of soybean seeds are treated, and the acres are 4 times the acres of what we do currently in terms of wheat. So soybean is a very, very big win for us and a very big potential, and that's we anticipate that in two years, sales will start being significant, and you'll see them as material in Evogene's revenues that will be reported.

The next question from Scott Henry of AGP. How has the early feedback been on the Yalos launch? How should we think about peak annual revenues for Yalos? Thanks.

So as I said, the feedback has been good. Wheat is a more challenging crop. Soybean is a much more relevant, crop. But also in the wheat growers, we see very good results and the very satisfied growers that are planning to expand their use of the product. So this is in terms of the feedback. In terms of sales, as I said, in the next two years, it's it will already start to be significant. In the peak sales, we're looking at significant double digit, not in the millions of dollars of sales for Yalos.

A further question from Scott Henry of AGP. How should we think about Casterra revenues in 2025? Any color relative to 2024? Thanks.

So as I mentioned earlier, we can’t disclose much information about the forecast for 2025 because we are still discussing these matters with our partners. In addition, there is some significant opportunity that we are evaluating that, the materialized can have a relatively significant effect on Casterra revenue for next year. So I believe that, next year looks better than this year. And the fact that we solved the issue of seed production, in seed production capacity in Kenya, and we also showed a very nice performance in Brazil, with respect to seed production this year. I think it's a very important, method. Think about it [quantity] (ph). We are the only, seed producer, of Castor in Africa. This has put us in a very strong competitive position compared to other companies that are located in other place. There are not many, by the way. There are there are only few, and they are located outside of Africa. So shipping and delivery time is a major issue while we focus, challenge by locating our seed production facility in the heart of Africa and Kenya.

The next question is from Stefano Dora Razio, an investor. Could you provide insight into the current level of insider ownership in the company and how management is aligned with shareholders' interests.

Thank you, Stefano, for joining to this, analyst call. I don't have here the information in front of me with respect to insider ownership. We can, deliver this information, after this analyst call. You can contact me directly. But with respect to management, significant portion from Evogene Management compensation is based on equity, through an option. This is the same things also, with the Evogene Group CEOs in our subsidiary. And the average salary is in our group is lower than what you might expect for companies in our size, and in where we are. And we compensate on this through, an equity holding in the company in an option mechanism. So for us, there is a very and -- I think that this mechanism is really create a strong link between management interest and shareholder interest. And we put a lot of -- thinking how we can generate value to our shareholders because at the end of the day, we -- in a personal level, will benefit as well.

There are no further questions at this time. Mr. Haviv, would you like to make your concluding statement?

Yes. Thank you. I would like to thank everybody for joining to this analyst call, and, we're looking forward to continue to update you on the progress of Evogene subsidiaries. I believe that, next year is going to be a very promising year for Evogene, and we're looking forward to achieve our targets. Thank you very much.

Thank you. This concludes Evogene's Q3 2024 quarterly results conference call. Thank you for your participation. You may go ahead and disconnect.