Earnings Labs

Imunon, Inc. (IMNN)

Q3 2015 Earnings Call· Sat, Nov 7, 2015

$2.70

-1.82%

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good morning. My name is Vicky and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to Celsion’s Third Quarter 2015 Earnings Conference Call. This call is being recorded . All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speakers’ remarks, there will be a question-and-answer session. [Operator instructions]. I would now like to turn the call over to Mr. Jeffrey Church, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of Celsion. Please proceed.

Jeffrey Church

Analyst

Thank you. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today to discuss our third quarter 2015 financial results, which we announced this morning before the market opened. Today’s call will be archived. The replay will be available beginning tomorrow and will remain available by phone until November 19, 2015, and it will also be on Celsion’s website for 30 days. Before we begin the call, we wish to inform participants that forward-looking statements are made pursuant to the Safe Harbor Provision of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. You are cautioned that such forward-looking statements involve risk and uncertainties including, without limitation, the risk of clinical failures, delays or increased costs, unforeseen changes in the cost for our research and development activities, possible acquisition of other technologies, assets or businesses and possible adverse action by customers, suppliers, competitors, regulatory authorities and other risks detailed from time-to-time in the company’s periodic reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Following our formal remarks today, we will open the call for questions. I’d like to turn the call over now to Mr. Michael Tardugno, Chairman, President and CEO of Celsion. Mike?

Michael Tardugno

Analyst · Griffin Securities

Thank you, Jeff. Good morning. I’d like to start by thanking all of you for taking the time to join us for today’s call. I am here with Dr. Nicholas Borys, Celsion’s Chief Medical Officer and Jeff Church from whom you’ve just heard, our Chief Financial Officer. As always we are delighted to have this opportunity to update you on our progress. We’ve got a lot to cover today, so I'm going to get started quickly here by highlighting two recent and important ones, both of which you will find a link to on our website. The first is a video link to this past September's ILCA conference, in a Symposium sponsored by Celsion. The video includes three discussions by world renowned physicians, specifically addressing the potential of ThermoDox plus confidently administered RFA to treat patients with intermediate stage HCC. The presenters came from Asia, Europe and North America representing all of the medical specialties involved with liver cancer research including medical, interventional and surgical oncology, which -- as well as hepatology. During this session we hear for the first time from Professor Lencioni, from the Pisa University School of Medicine, with ThermoDox, in fact representing treatment with curative intent. From Ghassan Abou-Alfa from Memorial Sloan Kettering, that there is no question that ThermoDox works in HCC. However variability in RFA application maybe an issue. And from Professor Ronnie Poon, that ThermoDox represents an effective alternative to surgery, Professor Poon of course, you may even have heard from us many times before is an Honorary Professor of Surgery at the University of Hong Kong Queen Mary Hospital and a Member of the Governing Board of the International Liver Cancer Association. From a surgeon, an interventionalist and medical oncologist from Asia, Europe and USA all endorsing ThermoDox’s global potential in our…

Jeffrey Church

Analyst

Thank you, Mike. Starting with cash, we ended the third quarter of 2015 with over $24 million in total cash and investments. For the quarter ended September 30, 2015, we reported a net loss of $4.3 million or $0.19 per share compared to a net loss of $6.9 million or $0.40 per share in the same period of last year. Cash used for operations in the third quarter of this year was $5.3 million, compared to $5.8 million in the same period last year. Cash used for operations in the first nine months of this year were $16.9 million, compared to $14.8 million in the same period last year. In September, we reported that we implemented a reorganization following the full integration of our EGEN operations. We evaluated our current organizational structure and have aligned our resources both personnel and clinical development programs with our near-term development objectives. As a result of this action, we expect to realize a 15% to 20% reduction in personnel and related annual operational costs going forward into the fourth quarter and into the subsequent years 2016 and 2017. We estimate that our average cash usage for operating activities will be approximately $1.4 million per month and that reflects the full implementation of the OPTIMA Study and our plans for the GEN-1 and TheraSilence programs. Our projections include modest revenues in the EAP program as well as lower personnel and operating costs resulting from the full integration of the EGEN acquisition and realignment of functions as discussed above and in Mike’s earlier comments. We continue to monitor our cash expenditures to ensure the most efficient use of cash to create shareholder value and project that our cash flow support operations into early 2017 passed many of the milestones outlined earlier. R&D costs were $2.8 million in the third quarter of 2015 compared to $4.6 million in the same period last year. R&D costs were $11 million in the nine months ended September 30, 2015, compare to a similar number of $10.7 million in the comparable nine months period last year. The increase in R&D costs in 2015, is primarily due to expenses associated with the operations of EGEN, costs associated with starting up and initiating the Phase III OPTIMA Study as well as production of clinical supply this year for the anticipated GEN-1 Phase I clinical studies. General and administrative expenses were $1.5 million in the third quarter of this year compared to $2 million in the same period in 2014. And they were $5.3 million in the nine months ended September 30, 2015 compared to $6.8 million in 2014. These 20% to 22% decreases in G&A expenses were primarily the result of lower personnel and operating costs, as well as lower insurance premiums and these lower operating costs were the result of reorganization and staff reductions announced in September. I’ll now turn the call back over to Mike.

Michael Tardugno

Analyst · Griffin Securities

Thanks, Jeff. A few concluding remarks. We remain fully committed to our investigation and product development programs and to the therapies that address unmet needs of patients with cancers worldwide. Our [biology] remains strong. We believe will allow us to execute on many of the upcoming milestones that I just spoke of including the initiation of two clinical trials in the next year with our GEN-1 and our ThermoDox programs both of which we believe are some of the most exciting programs in product development today. As you can see the products we've made over the last 12 months, deciding the stage for what we believe will be a strong ending to 2015 and will position us for what should be a very successful 2016. Now with that, it's always an great opportunity for us to answer your questions. So operator we would like to open the line to questioners and we would ask the questioners to limit them to two in order for everyone to have a chance to ask us a question. Operator?

Operator

Operator

Thank you. [Operator Instructions] We will go to our first question from Keith Markey with Griffin Securities.

Keith Markey

Analyst · Griffin Securities

Good morning Mike and Jeff. Thanks for taking my questions. Two questions; one, I was wondering if you might be planning to establish an office in Europe possibly to at least help in the training of doctors involved with the trials over there and the use of the your drug with the EAP program?

Michael Tardugno

Analyst · Griffin Securities

Keith exactly that's -- the answer to your question that's exactly what we are doing. We are establishing our office in Switzerland, potentially that is central to what we believe are the major countries for the EAP and it's a country where Edwin resides. From that office, I mean actually we have our subsidiary, call it our Celsion GmbH. From our office in Switzerland what we plan to do is provide technical and clinical support to the myTomorrows team to assist the physicians who we believe are qualified, the six physicians with understanding our product and positioning it's application and ensuring the proper training before any product is made available to those physicians.

Keith Markey

Analyst · Griffin Securities

Great, thank you. And then I was wondering, based upon with these progressions that you started in the overall HEAT Study how soon might the Chinese cohort of the HEAT Study saw a significant benefit?

Michael Tardugno

Analyst · Griffin Securities

Nic can you answer that. So the question is of the Chinese cohort what percentage of significant benefit.

Keith Markey

Analyst · Griffin Securities

Yes. How soon would we see it?

Michael Tardugno

Analyst · Griffin Securities

How soon we see benefit from the Chinese cohort.

Keith Markey

Analyst · Griffin Securities

Yes.

Nicholas Borys

Analyst · Griffin Securities

That's an interesting question Keith and I'm very pleased to say that the Chinese cohort was very consistent with the overall population. So patients that are treated with ThermoDox, whether they are Asian or Caucasian, we believe will have very similar responses. And I think your question is coming from the fact that the Chinese cohort were the last ones to be enrolled into the HEAT study and their data was the last one that we were able to review of a wide suite and we saw results that are very consistent with the overall population. So for us that was very good news.

Operator

Operator

Will go next to Mark Breidenbach with H C. Wainwright.

Mark Breidenbach

Analyst

Hey, guys thanks for taking the questions. We saw some very nice proof-of-concept data for the TheraSilence platform presented at your R&D Day in preclinical model of pulmonary arterial hypertension. Should we be viewing this as sort of foreshadowing for each of your clinical program or should we really be expecting the first clinical application of the technology to be more closely linked to Celsion's core focus in oncology?

Michael Tardugno

Analyst · Griffin Securities

Yes, it's a very good question. So we don't want to confuse any investors or anyone interested in the company. Our focus is on oncology. What the PAH model demonstrates first is the utility of this platform, we are delivering therapeutic RNA with one specificity to treat lung specific disease. So we have an interest however in making sure that if this technology has potential then it is developed. And so if it's of interest to a partner or collaborator to continue development beyond the initial feasibility we will make sure that the -- this therapeutic is available to that. Now we’ve been looking, we’ve been discussing with various potential partners the potential for our continued development by another [party].

Mark Breidenbach

Analyst

That’s helpful. And second question really I guess is directed at Jeff, are we still expecting to see first revenues from the ThermoDox Early Access Program start-up during the fourth quarter? And then can you offer any guidance on what to expect from those revenues?

Jeffrey Church

Analyst

As Mike indicated, this is a process that we’re very much involved in. We haven’t given any guidance. We do as I mentioned in my notes, just the modest revenue moving forward which is a bit new in some of our projections. We do anticipate first in the fourth quarter and with headwinds, expertise and experience in these type of programs and with presence in Europe, we’re hopeful that this will move forward in a way that we had anticipated when we first signed up myTomorrows.

Michael Tardugno

Analyst · Griffin Securities

Yes, I think I’d like to add to that also, as I don’t want to mislead anyone. The EAP is not going to be a major revenue generator by any means. If it is, then we will be delighted but surprised. The revenue that will be generated from the EAP is secondary to our interest. Our initial interest is making sure that a drug that we know can be administered safely. It has shown great potential to treat two indications successfully and in the proper hands can be -- and with proper training can be used to treat patients in Europe before the drug is approved, that’s our major interest. On revenue, secondary and every little bit of revenue always helps, but more importantly the experience that we gain in clinical practice, the improved outcomes in treating patients that we expect, the endorsement from the medical community you have experienced outside of our clinical programs is our major objective.

Operator

Operator

We’ll go next to Jason Kolbert with Maxim Group.

Jason Kolbert

Analyst

It's actually two analysts here, you have Jason Kolbert and Dr. Jason McCarthy, so we have four questions. My question really has to do with the velocity of enrollment, given the fact that you have 50 sites open now and another 20 coming in China in OPTIMA. It sounds like you're going to hit that 75 target really quick. So can you give us some idea based on how the enrollment numbers are looking now, when we might hit the 550? And that’s part one. Part two has to do with, once the trial is completely enrolled, what do you think the timing might look like given the assumptions around standard of care for the overall survival endpoint? Thanks and then I’ll hand it off to McCarthy.

Michael Tardugno

Analyst · Griffin Securities

So good question, I think I believe we’ve always been reasonably precise with our [indiscernible], like our understanding what enrollment rates should look like in [pre-clinical] like we have a great deal of experience obviously enrolling patients in our earlier Phase 3 trial. With the difference being that the patients they we are enrolling in the OPTIMA Study in a single lesion as opposed to patients in the HEAT Study had [mock populations]. So, I am pleased to tell you that for the study types that we have open, the enrollment rate and actually it's exceeding our expectations. Over the last four months we have been pleasantly surprised with enrollment rates. And I think it's not only a function of the availability of our clinical trial in some areas where if you see a problem. But also confidence we’re seeing among physicians with regards to the value of putting patients into the study. Dr. Borys just came back, we’ve had -- actually we’ve been meeting with physicians around the world. Dr. Borys just came back from the ACTA Conference he may want to comment about on some of the insights and support that he saw from interventionalists in Japan. But also we had a kind of congress for PIs in Bangkok not too long ago with an extraordinary level of support to them there. So I am not answering with precision your question. so let me just take it little bit further. So at current enrollment rates we could -- viewing without China, we could see a study enroll, within the projections that we gave you and I think when we first mentioned over a year ago that we expected to enroll between 30 and 36 months, China will be a nice positive to that. So subsequently -- so the…

Jason Kolbert

Analyst

Thank you Mike, that’s really helpful. Let me turn over to Dr. McCarthy, who had a couple of questions, I know he was excited by some of the things he learned at the R&D Day.

Jason McCarthy

Analyst

Hi guys. What I’ve been finding really interesting and I think is not talked about so large is that, there has been a lot of push backs on the CAR T stage that vaccines and TIL therapies are not going to work. And what we’re finding out is that ovarian cancers and lung cancers and melanoma cancers seem to be the most highly immunogenic cancers that are out there. So a lot of that it seems to be tied to IL-12 and IL-12 delivering was particularly attractive to GEN-1 at the R&D Day, because things like you figured out how to get it into an ovarian tumor at least into the area, which could have significant upside in ovarian cancer treatments particularly with vaccine or some type of TIL therapy. And my question is have you been talking to partners and people in the vaccine stages or the T-cell stage, we’ve already seen Inovio partner with MedImmune on core cervical cancers, which are also highly immunogenic?

Michael Tardugno

Analyst · Griffin Securities

So in this regards to this -- first thank you very much for those comments. We’re quite excited with this approach that we have invested for the most part by our colleagues in Huntsville very, very exciting proposition not only provides this -- being a stimulating agent on the first dosing. But the ability to continue to dose patients to recruit the immune system to work in combination with chemotherapy was very exciting to us. And now with Avastin some preclinical data we’ve seen in the early models is nothing short of astounding. So with regards to business development, I can tell you that we have a very active business development and outreach program to a variety of companies. Those involved with biologics, who are in this space and those who are involved with earlier stage development programs in other therapeutic areas as we have. That’s about as much as I can say at this point.

Jason McCarthy

Analyst

Okay. I also think it’s really interesting, the combination with chemotherapy which is some people think that chemotherapy is just going to go away, it’s not and we’re seeing some of the CAR T people like [indiscernible] using chemotherapy to influence their T-cells. And I’m excited to see where GEN-1 with chemotherapy have potentially with the vaccine and where that's heading in the next year. Thank you, guys.

Michael Tardugno

Analyst · Griffin Securities

Yes. So already we have moved the check point inhibitors to the cell.

Jason McCarthy

Analyst

Thanks guys. I appreciate the update.

Michael Tardugno

Analyst · Griffin Securities

Thank you. Next please.

Operator

Operator

We’ll go next to [Barry Rubin] with [indiscernible].

Michael Tardugno

Analyst · Griffin Securities

Good morning, [Barry].

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Thank you, good morning and thank you for the great progress as always. I just had a quick question on glioblastoma. You answered my question on the last conference call about the difference on your product versus others. But are you planning to -- [indiscernible] I don’t know. Are you planning to do this alone or with a partner?

Michael Tardugno

Analyst · Griffin Securities

So our three initial programs are beyond in the first stage in the clinic won't be done alone. That’s our current plan.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Okay. And when do we get the first results on any treatment. Is that a year or so away or what timeline I wasn’t sure?

Michael Tardugno

Analyst · Griffin Securities

You’re talking about glioblastoma specifically.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Yes, that’s correct.

Michael Tardugno

Analyst · Griffin Securities

So I think we gave a pretty comprehensive update. Just let me tick back a little bit and maybe the rest of the listeners can better understand where it is coming from. So GBM we have shown in preclinical models that GEN-1 works very, very synergistically with one strategy in post surgical patients and that's using a technology that delivers a BCNU therapeutic called Gliadel. We are seeing that again in animal models. Now we have seen an improved outcome overall survival in tumor inhibition. .We've also evaluated our GEN-1 with an emerging standard of care, maybe the standard of care for many surgeons treating these patients and that's with temozolomide. We admit the data we've seen is incontrovertible. Tumor inhibition in these animals when we combine our GEN-1 with temozolomide is pretty astounding and we are able to discuss this data with quite a bit of confidence and some of it is included in our vaccine. Now with regards to our clinical program, Dr. Borys and Khursheed Anwer, our Chief Science Officer have been meeting with both surgeons and neuro surgeons around the world literally, mostly in the United States but some European physicians also and surgeons also. They discussed methods of administration. We probably have a one last step here, Barry, lastly to ensure that the method of administration that we are contemplating as it meets all of the expectations of surgeons who treat these patients. And we expect to, all in the next three to four months complete our work in that regard. Subsequently we believe we would have enough mechanism on this method of administration information along with the safety and efficacy data from preclinical models to file an IND. An IND in this indication obviously will require a discussion with FDA. So I would say the earliest that we would be treating patients could be in the second half of next year, will be the very earliest. Because these patients unfortunately have a very aggressive disease and subsequently a short life span, the data from treating patients, this is one I think that's interesting to us. Data from treating a small number of patients can tell us with some confidence whether or not we are on the right track in a relatively short period of time. So as we said in the past, assuming that we have the answer through this method of administration in the relative near term, it's about a matter of reference, just a matter of when. So the answer to this method of administration our GBM could become the priority for the company.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Great. Thank you for taking the time. I appreciate it.

Operator

Operator

We will go next to Hartaj Singh with BTIG.

Hartaj Singh

Analyst

Hi, guys. How are you doing? Thanks for letting me take this question. I will just ask a question, which I generally tend to ask management teams when they've got lots of stuff going on. As we get into this year, into next year and we are thinking already about next year. What are your sort of priorities from a strategic, operational and financial perspective? And just help us order this vast range of activities that you are going -- have going on and how you think about it in terms of just the prioritization kind of framework? Thanks.

Michael Tardugno

Analyst · Griffin Securities

Yes. So our lead development program is optimal, there is no question about that. And priority one is to ensure that soon as we have clinical trial agreements with the Chinese, is to take advantage of all the pre work that has been done in China to initiate the Chinese sites of which there are 20 plus. So there is a lot of water behind the dam in that regard, clinical trial application and then we expect the application to be reviewed for the final time in the relative near term. So priority one is initiating those clinical trials sites, which as I said earlier, Hartaj, could add to what appears to be an enrollment rate that is -- that at least for the last number of months over a quarter have exceeded our expectations. Our priority two is, to change the enrollment in our Phase 1 program for ovarian cancer. We know quite a bit about the value of GEN-1 is earlier Phase 1 studies that were conducted by the GOG. Confirming that information in a company sponsored study as well as establishing the starting dose and maybe having some understanding of what an enhanced population looks like and establishing the starting dose for the Avastin plus Doxil plus GEN-1 study in the second half of next year would be priority two. So priority three then, is our work in recurrent chest wall breast cancer and while this is not a big market opportunity and certainly presents for us one of the more compelling applications of our chemotherapy technology to a group of patients who deserve better. Nic and I and particularly Nic, have taken this indication in these people as a personal challenge. We've been working with we believe some of the best and most motivated investigators in…

Hartaj Singh

Analyst

Thanks Mike that really helps a lot. Now actually just with all the ASH abstracts out today and some of the new fangled gene therapeutic approaches taking a little bit, let's say in a sense just not a great reaction, I think maybe folks might circle back and start looking at companies with drugs that actually have a benefit. Thank you, I appreciate the color.

Operator

Operator

We have no more questions at this time. so I will turn the call back over to our speakers for any additional or closing remarks.

Michael Tardugno

Analyst · Griffin Securities

So again on behalf of the company, I want to thank everybody who has joined us on the call. We are as always very appreciative of your interest and your support. The work that we do could not be done without the support that we get from the investment community and our shareholders. So we greatly appreciate your interest and we look forward to updating you on our progress as we continue to move forward with what we believe are some of the most important clinical programs. Thank you very much.

Operator

Operator

That does conclude today’s conference. We thank you for your participation.