Earnings Labs

Jazz Pharmaceuticals plc (JAZZ)

Q4 2018 Earnings Call· Tue, Feb 26, 2019

$201.04

-1.49%

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Welcome to the Jazz Pharmaceuticals Plc Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2018 Earnings Conference Call. Following an introduction from the company, we'll open the call to questions. I will now turn the call over to Katherine Littrell, Head of Investor Relations at Jazz Pharmaceuticals.

Katherine Littrell

Analyst · JPMorgan. Please go ahead

Thank you, Dolan. And thanks to those of you joining our investor call today. We reported our fourth quarter and full year 2018 financial results and provided financial guidance for 2019. The press release and the slide presentation accompanying this call are available on the Investors section of our website. On the call today are Bruce Cozadd, Chairman and CEO, Matt Young, CFO. Joining for the Q&A session are Dan Swisher, President and COO, Mike Miller, our Executive Vice President U.S. Commercial, Allen Yang, Head of Clinical Development and Acting CMO; and Jed Black, Senior Vice President, Sleep and CNS Med. I'd like to remind you that some of the statements we will make on this call relate to future events and performance rather than historical facts and are forward looking. Examples of forward-looking statements include those related to our future financial and operating results including 2018 financial guidance and goals, corporate development efforts, future growth and growth strategy, product sales and volumes, supply challenges, product launches, regulatory approvals, ongoing and future clinical trials, data readouts and other product development and regulatory activities, and the timing of these matters. These forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual events, performance and results to differ materially. They are identified and described in today's press release and the accompanying slide presentation and under risk factors in our Form 10-Q for the quarter ended September 30, 2018 and our Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2018 which we will file shortly. We undertake no duty or obligation to update our forward-looking statements. On this call, we will discuss non-GAAP financial measures. We believe these measures are helpful in understanding our past financial performance and potential future results. They are not meant to be considered in isolation or as a substitute for comparable reported GAAP measures. Reconciliations of GAAP to non-GAAP financial measures discussed on this call are included in today's press release and slide presentation found in the Investors section of our website. I'll now turn the call over to you, Bruce.

Bruce Cozadd

Analyst · Cantor Fitzgerald. Please go ahead

Good afternoon everyone and thank you for joining us. 2018 was a year of significant progress across our sleep and hem/onc therapeutic areas. The expansion of our R&D capabilities over the past few years has been instrumental in accelerating and diversifying our pipeline. In sleep medicine, we've established a framework to enable us to realize the long-term value of our oxybate franchise through our continued investments in the development of new options for patients with sleep disorders. Key among these is our plan to deliver an improved and safer therapeutic option for patients with our oxybate product candidate JZP-258 that contains 90% less sodium than Xyrem. We look forward to top line data from our Phase 3 study of JZP-258 in adult narcolepsy patients this spring. We also advanced other key R&D programs and executed on multiple regulatory objectives. The approval of Xyrem for pediatric narcolepsy and an MA submission for solriamfetol. For hem/onc, we are working on new drug discovery and development in cancer, utilizing our CombiPlex platform and partner collaboration technologies, including exosomes and antibody-drug conjugates. With our expanded internal and partnered expertise we are growing the breadth and depth of our hem/onc pipeline and product portfolio with multiple preclinical the late stage programs, balancing innovative new product candidates with programs aimed at generating new data and indications for current products. We are generating new data for Vyxeos in a broad range of AML and MDS patient populations and pursuing new indications for defibrotide. We also continued our global expansion with the EU approval and rolling launch of Vyxeos. In 2019, we will continue to focus on operational excellence and scalability as we grow and evolve as a global biopharmaceutical company. And we expect to deliver growth on both the top and bottom line. 2019 will be a…

Matthew Young

Analyst · Evercore ISI. Please go ahead

Thanks, Bruce and good afternoon everyone. We are pleased with our strong year-over-year growth as we continue to execute on our business model. We made significant progress in 2018, delivering double-digit growth in our top and bottom line. In 2018 total revenues were $1.9 billion, an increase of 17% over 2017. Revenues in the fourth quarter of 2018 increased 9% to $476 million compared to $436 million in the fourth quarter of 2017. Xyrem net sales for 2018 were $1.4 billion, up 18% from $1.2 billion in 2017. Net sales of Xyrem for the fourth quarter were $375 million, up 20% from $312 million in the fourth quarter of last year. Our Xyrem net sales guidance for 2019 is in the range of $1.53 billion to $1.75 billion, representing expected growth of 10% over 2018 at the midpoint. The guidance reflects the 7% price increase that we took in early January on our expectation of returns and formalized volume growth in the mid-single digits for 2019, absent the tailwind of 2018. We are looking forward to continued growth in Xyrem and expect our oxybate franchise to be a key contributor for many years. As a reminder, as with many specialty products net sales can be impacted by typical industry payer churn in the first quarter. Turning to Erwinaze. Net s sales for 2013 were $175 million, a decrease of 11% compared to 2017. Fourth quarter net sales were $24 million, a decrease of 49% compared to the fourth quarter of 2017. Our Erwinaze net sales guidance for 2019 is in the range of $160 million to $195 million. We experienced supply disruptions in early 2019 and wide - the wide range of our guidance reflects our expectation of further supply disruptions throughout the year. In 2019, we also expect some…

Katherine Littrell

Analyst · JPMorgan. Please go ahead

Thank you, Matt. We kindly request that you limit yourself to one question during this call, so that everyone has an opportunity to ask a question. We will gladly address any additional questions after the call or you can re-enter the queue. With that said, operator, please open the line for questions.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. [Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from Brandon Folkes from Cantor Fitzgerald. Please go ahead.

Brandon Folkes

Analyst · Cantor Fitzgerald. Please go ahead

Hi. Thanks for taking my question and congratulations on the good results. And firstly, you see anything in the settlement - settlement agreements with Xyrem generics pilot that would be triggered if you had a hard switch there to 258? And then secondly, as we look to the 258 results later this year, are there any key study differences that we should keep in mind compared to Xyrem study? Thank you.

Bruce Cozadd

Analyst · Cantor Fitzgerald. Please go ahead

So Brandon on your first question is there something in the existing settlement agreements that would be specifically triggered by a hard switch itself, I think the answer is probably no. But there are provisions that relate to potential decline in sales of Xyrem generally and clearly I would have an impact on that, but not specific to that. And on your second question, which is differences in study design. Maybe I'll refer that over to Jed black.

Jed Black

Analyst · Cantor Fitzgerald. Please go ahead

Yes, the - each of the three studies are randomized withdrawal studies that has been conducted - or have some differences. The first was an adult study many years ago. The second was a pediatric study, recently, the third is a - an adult study again and the patient population may vary a bit given the time difference between the two adult populations. The study design has some nuances that are different, but the overall theme is the same.

Brandon Folkes

Analyst · Cantor Fitzgerald. Please go ahead

Okay, great. Thank you very much.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Our next question comes from Akash Tewari from Wolfe Research. Please go ahead.

Akash Tewari

Analyst · Wolfe Research. Please go ahead

Hi. So our understanding is that your current collaborations with Phoenix [ph] on a next gen, Erwinase you don't really have to disclose where they are until you kind of enter Phase 2, 3. So can you help us understand in a best case scenario what's the earliest you could get those products onto market and frame to us the kind of clinical development path ahead? Thanks.

Bruce Cozadd

Analyst · Wolfe Research. Please go ahead

Yeah. So you know, we've disclosed only limited information about our progress on that program. We did say today we'll provide updates as we go through this year. You know, you're generally right that we're not obligated to make disclosures until we're farther along. On the clinical development and you asked specifically when would we get to market and we can't answer that question right now without giving more color on the development programs. But it's you know, it's our goal to get to market as soon as we possibly can, you know, particularly in a situation where the current Erwinase product has periods when it's not available and patients need therapy. We'd like to do everything we can to make that product available just as soon as possible. On the clinical development and regulatory pathway, I think we've said before that the key objective in that program would be to demonstrate that we successfully deliver at - at an appropriate level and that we do that safely. That is different from doing a long term outcome study where you're actually measuring you know, multi-year survival rates because the regulators clearly understand the impact of that sufficient level of active enzyme and what that does in the treatment of a [Technical Difficulty]. Think of it almost as a PK and safety endpoint, you're trying to make sure you're in fact delivering active agent safely at the appropriate levels to these patients.

Akash Tewari

Analyst · Wolfe Research. Please go ahead

Thanks so much.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Our next question comes from Umer Raffat from Evercore ISI. Please go ahead.

Umer Raffat

Analyst · Evercore ISI. Please go ahead

Hi. Thanks so much for taking my question. One is a quick clarification for Matt and one perhaps for you Bruce. Matt I noticed the low end of the guidance doesn't include any solriamfetol as per my math. Am I am not doing my math right which is very possible. And Bruce I noticed the 258 trial has four different groups of narcolepsy patients based on their prior treatment status and presumably the design was in consultation with FDA. So my question is, is FDA interested and/or focused on seeing consistency in the trends across these groups of prior treatment status. Because in theory given the small size of this trial you could expect some variability across let's say Xyrem naïve versus Xyrem experience et cetera? Thank you very much.

Bruce Cozadd

Analyst · Evercore ISI. Please go ahead

Yeah. Matt, you want to take the first part.

Matthew Young

Analyst · Evercore ISI. Please go ahead

Sure. Umer, the first part you are correct, you didn't miss anything. Given the - some of the timing uncertainties related to approval and ultimately scheduling and when we would be launching and then also with that payer negotiations which you know are not perfectly determinable in terms of timing the low end of guidance would contemplate effectively no sales for solriamfetol, but there are some minimal sales in there in the guidance range.

Bruce Cozadd

Analyst · Evercore ISI. Please go ahead

And on your second question maybe I'll have Jed I'll take that one as well. A - Jed Black Sure, yeah. So the FDA is interested in efficacy and safety. However, as you highlighted this is one of the differences in this adult study with 258 versus Xyrem that I referenced in the prior comment and the goal here is to evaluate all potential patients that might be appropriate for 258 treatment. And so we've included them in this study.

Umer Raffat

Analyst · Evercore ISI. Please go ahead

Thank you very much.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Our next question comes from Ronny Gal from Bernstein. Please go ahead.

Ronny Gal

Analyst · Bernstein. Please go ahead

Thank you for taking my question. Just a quick question about your obligations and not to launch a competitive program if you going with important does not renew, essentially you do have a different format in other manufacturing process you already got from Phoenix [ph] can you bring that one to market, if you're going to expires? And second, now that we have full settlements, we know when Xyrem [indiscernible] coming to the market. Are you regulatory barred from buying a competitive product or from the perspective of the FTC as you understand it you may buy a pre-commercial product from a competitor in the - in the same market?

Bruce Cozadd

Analyst · Bernstein. Please go ahead

Yes, so Ronny on the first question we do have the freedom to move our recombinant crisantaspase program all the way through to the market. On the second question, I think I'm going to decline the answer, you know you're essentially asking a question about what's deemed competitive and what's not. And that's a complex question. You know we do have a strong commitment to the therapeutic areas we're in and we think we're an excellent developer and commercializer of medicines for serious sleep disorders and where appropriate will seek outside opportunities as well as our internal development pipeline to continue being a leader in the area. But I can't comment on a specific opportunity.

Ronny Gal

Analyst · Bernstein. Please go ahead

Thank you.

Ronny Gal

Analyst · Bernstein. Please go ahead

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Our next question comes from Gary Nachman from BMO Capital Markets. Please go ahead.

Gary Nachman

Analyst · BMO Capital Markets. Please go ahead

Hi. Good afternoon. Now that volume growth has been accelerating nicely for Xyrem, do you plan on stepping up any of your DTC efforts even further to improve awareness and diagnosis rates. Just comment on how much more you can do there. And then when do you expect you'll start to see a real benefit from the pediatric indication. How long will that take? Thanks.

Bruce Cozadd

Analyst · BMO Capital Markets. Please go ahead

So couple of comments Gary, I think you know, I think as Matt commented on his guidance for 2019 you know, we expect a return to a more normalized mid single digit volume growth rate for Xyrem, remember that we had a little extra growth in 2018 that we don't think recurs in 20 [Technical Difficulty] to return to a more normalized mid single digit volume growth rate for Xyrem. Remember that we have a little extra growth in 2018 that we don't think recurs in 20 [Technical Difficulty] we expect to return to a more normalized mid single digit volume growth rate for Xyrem, remember that we had a little extra growth in 2018 that we don't think recurs in 20 [Technical Difficulty] this year.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Our next question comes from David Amsellem from Piper Jaffray. Please go ahead.

David Amsellem

Analyst · Piper Jaffray. Please go ahead

So just a couple of quick ones on solriamfetol. So you talked about the EDS data in Parkinson's patients. So realize you're still have decisions to make here. But you know is there is there anything we can glean into that regarding your willingness to pursue other EDS populations and maybe talk to what your latest thinking on that is? And then secondly regarding DEA scheduling, assuming it gets a schedule for designation which I believe is what you're aiming for. Can you tell us what that means in terms of what you can and cannot do in terms of sampling and branded DTC and whether that's the letters is in the cards? Thanks.

Bruce Cozadd

Analyst · Piper Jaffray. Please go ahead

So on your solriamfetol question, maybe I'll have Dan take that one.

Daniel Swisher

Analyst · Piper Jaffray. Please go ahead

Thanks. Yeah, on solriamfetol, I mean we remain very enthusiastic about the product profile and what we've seen across all the studies, including in narcolepsy and OSA. And so we're prioritizing you know, a range of areas where excessive sleepiness or fatigue could be key factors. And so we're just putting that in line with what we know about Parkinson's and where are the biggest market opportunities, where are the best sort of return for investment probability of success et cetera. Obviously near-term we're looking to get to approval and launch but we'll be updating on our development strategy later this year.

Bruce Cozadd

Analyst · Piper Jaffray. Please go ahead

And on scheduling and approach. Mike, you want to take that?

Michael Miller

Analyst · Piper Jaffray. Please go ahead

Yeah, sure Bruce. Just a reminder that DEA signs the scheduling to the product and then it's really the State Board of Pharmacy that directs how those schedule product should be handled in respective states. But generally as you suggested a schedule for - you could do DDC, you could do sampling that would not be restrictive.

David Amsellem

Analyst · Piper Jaffray. Please go ahead

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Our next question comes from Jason Gerberry from Bank of America. Please go ahead.

Jason Gerberry

Analyst · Bank of America. Please go ahead

Hey, good evening. Thanks for taking my questions. Just one for me, maybe Bruce or Matt, just sort of curious on the M&A front as you kind of look back on 2018 if you can just give us a general sense of maybe what are - one of the one or two biggest reasons that maybe has held up the company from being more active on the M&A front and doing a larger transaction to address sort of the Xyrem concentration issue. Just trying to get a sense of is it valuation, do you feel like it's just the assets that you're looking for maybe predominantly hem/onc you know the value arbitrage opportunity is not quite there yet. Any color that you can give us in terms of sort of maybe what's been the hang up from the M&A perspective would be helpful? Thanks.

Matthew Young

Analyst · Bank of America. Please go ahead

Sure, Jason. It's Matt. I'd say the biggest thing is just timing is difficult to predict. I think we've had a lot of ongoing engagements and continue to feel really good about the companies were involved with, whether that be in the context of partnerships or acquisitions at varying stages of development or proximal the commercialization. So that continues to be a robust dialogue. As we've said many times predicting exactly when you'll see know value risk and the right proposal line where there's the right complementary is really hard to predict for and most of all of our dialogues that have resulted in transactions have been the product of years of discussion. So I'd say the biggest issue is just - it's difficult to predict that and you know, I feel very good about the opportunity in front of us today as we said last year. That said, we did take the opportunity given we did deploy less capital than we had anticipated over the course of the year to buy back more stock with some of that excess liquidity which I think we'll be pleased that we've done that. And you know we will continue to look both within the hem/onc domain where there is obviously a lot of targets, but as you can see with that collaboration we're looking at broadly and precision oncology across sleep and relevant adjacencies in the CNS world and we'll - as we said before look beyond that. So I think - there's plenty of opportunity out there for us to execute on bringing in new assets to the company.

Jason Gerberry

Analyst · Bank of America. Please go ahead

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Our next question comes from Annabel Samimy from Stifel. Please go ahead.

Annabel Samimy

Analyst · Stifel. Please go ahead

Hi. Thanks for taking my question. So I just want to go back to Vyxeos [ph] as you mentioned given the competitor AML treatment there's clearly an urgency to establish that backbone, but it seems like a lot of assets [ph] are going to meaningful read out of study. So you have a few coming out this year. To what extent does your guidance include some expansion to these other populations, how much is the survival data [indiscernible] really helping this growth right now. And does your guidance exclude any expansion to other populations other than the well steady population growth may be better for better use consolidation like what's driving the growth right now? Thanks.

Bruce Cozadd

Analyst · Stifel. Please go ahead

So maybe I'll turn that one over to Dan.

Daniel Swisher

Analyst · Stifel. Please go ahead

Yeah. Okay. Thanks. I think just broadly there is plenty of opportunity for us to penetrate further into secondary AML and now we can penetrate not only in the U.S. but internationally as we're getting very nice initial outcomes from pricing reimbursement in the major European countries. I think we're facing two issues in the market. One is for four years people have used seven and three and that's been their standard therapy and we have to really get the message across about the superior profile of our drug relative to seven and three which is you know you look at the study and it's very clear. But if you haven't read that and you haven't thought about it it's easy just to think of it as a reformulated seven and three. And so we really have to land the message that change medical practice which just takes repetition, medical education you know, a fair amount of that and it's coming at a time when eight new products are in the market and there's a lot of noisiness and so it takes more voice and more impact and more repetition to land that. But we're very confident with the data we have in hand and the outcomes we're seeing in the marketplace for those who've adopted the therapy that we have plenty of growth and the growth in the current indication is what's driving our guidance.

Annabel Samimy

Analyst · Stifel. Please go ahead

Is it also coming from increased use of consolidation?

Daniel Swisher

Analyst · Stifel. Please go ahead

Yes. Yeah. And importantly making sure there's a continuum of care that people are getting sufficient induction therapy sometimes requiring two and then going on for consolidation therapy as well.

Annabel Samimy

Analyst · Stifel. Please go ahead

Okay, great. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Our next question comes from David Risinger from Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.

David Risinger

Analyst · Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead

Yes. Thanks very much. I don't know if I missed it. I did hear the instruction to ask just one question, so I'll do that. But with respect to the next gen asparaginase, what's the timing of that. I mean when - you know what will be the pathway to a filing with the FDA and then when can you launch that product? Thank you.

Bruce Cozadd

Analyst · Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead

Yeah David we did address that question a little earlier, so we'll follow up with you after this call and just make sure you've got that. Short answer is we haven't given a date but we're pursuing what we think is you know the fastest possible path to making that product available to patients, particularly given the ongoing inability to supply enough Erwinaze to satisfy demand and we think we've got a clinical regulatory strategy that accomplishes that.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Our next question comes from Jessica Fye from JPMorgan. Please go ahead.

Jessica Fye

Analyst · JPMorgan. Please go ahead

Great. Thanks for taking my question. My is for Allen, just following up on Amy's question. Can you talk a little bit more about the M.D. Anderson study evaluating the combination of Vyxeos and venetoclax in both relapsed/refractory and untreated AML. It sounds like you can't comment on things like exactly how many patients we might be able to see at ASH. But can you maybe speak to what you would consider encouraging in each of those groups relapsed refractory and newly diagnosed from CRA? And then can you also just help us understand that study design a little better. How many relapsed refractory patients are targeted for the lead in versus expansion cohort A and then the cohort b in de novo AML?

Allen Yang

Analyst · JPMorgan. Please go ahead

Yes, I'll tell you as much as I know about the study and you know I have to admit that I'll have to refer to a lot of the details around my team around that. But it is a collaboration. It's just one of many studies that we plan to do with M.D. Anderson. I think more exciting than the study itself is our collaboration and sort of the novel approach that we're taking there to do studies quickly with them. So if I remember correctly it's 46 patients. There's no sort of dose escalation phase there's a sort of safety run in phase, as well and it's looking at both frontline patients as well as relapsed refractory patients as well. So I think you know the complexity of M.D. Anderson having trained there as though there's a huge referral center for patients with AML depending on what their previous treatment was the condition status there can be variability in sort of what you would expect as the response rate you know whether they were secondary AML, first relapse, second relapse, whether they've had a transplant or not, but M.D. Anderson has very large databases so they can sort of gauge what they think the relative expected outcome will be, whether they'll release that is up to them. But again we're collaborating closely with them. But again it's not the only venetoclax study that we plan to have. I mean since University of Cincinnati has announced one for relapsed refractory, a Melbourne [ph] pediatric population, we expect to have our own studies and you know it's an area of huge interest, all the investing [Technical Difficulty]

Katherine Littrell

Analyst · JPMorgan. Please go ahead

Thank you again for joining us today. We will be participating in the upcoming Cowen Healthcare Conference. This now ends our call.

Operator

Operator

Thank you ladies and gentlemen for attending today's conference. This concludes the program. You may all disconnect. Good day.