Altimmune, Inc. (ALT) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

It is now 7 -- I'm sorry, 10:11 Eastern Daylight Time on September 24, 2020, and the polls for each matter to be voted on at this meeting are now closed. No additional ballots, proxies or votes and no changes or revocations will be accepted. Mr. [ Raitt ], please report on the results of the voting.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. With regard to Proposal 1, a plurality of the shares present or represented and entitled to vote has been voted in favor of the election of the persons nominated. With regard to Proposal 2, a majority of the shares present or represented and entitled to vote has been voted in favor of the ratification of Ernst & Young LLP as corporation's independent registered accounting firm for the fiscal year ending December 31, 2020. With regards to Proposal 3, a majority of the shares present or represented and entitled to vote has been voted in favor of the approval on an advisory basis of the compensation of corporation's named executive officers as disclosed in the proxy. With regard to Proposal 4, a majority of the shares present or represented and entitled to vote has been voted in favor of the approval of the authorization to adjourn the annual meeting, if necessary or appropriate, to solicit additional proxies in favor of the foregoing proposals if there are no -- not sufficient votes to approve proposal. And that is all, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. [ Raitt ]. I declare that all of the proposals presented at the meeting have been overwhelmingly ratified or approved by the stockholders. The final results of voting, including any ballots and proxies recorded during this meeting, will be set forth in the report of the Inspector of Election and will be included in the minutes of the meeting. The final results will also be included in our reports filed with the secretary. There being no other -- I'm sorry, with the SEC. There being no other matters for consideration at this meeting, I hereby adjourn this meeting. And let me now turn the floor over to Dr. Vipin Garg, our CEO and President. Vipin?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Having concluded the formal business of the meeting, I would like to take a few minutes to provide an update on our progress at Altimmune and share my perspective for the outlook of our company, which I believe has never been more promising. Before I begin, however, just a quick housekeeping note. I am required to inform you that these statements may include forward-looking information based on the company's current expectations. These forward-looking statements are subject to a number of significant risks and uncertainties, and our actual results may differ materially. For a discussion of factors that could affect our future results, please refer to our most recent 10-Q filing with the SEC. It has been a transformational year for Altimmune and our shareholders as we rose to the challenge of finding novel solutions for the COVID-19 pandemic. Never have we had so much opportunity to build value and so many promising shots on goal that are advancing towards clear inflection points over the next 12 months. As the COVID-19 pandemic took hold around the world and quickly escalated throughout 2020, I am exceptionally proud of our team as we swiftly deployed our expertise and capabilities to develop 2 new and promising portfolio candidates: T-COVID and AdCOVID to combat this global threat. Much of our focus this year has been dedicated to rapidly developing these candidates and preparing to commence human clinical trials. As these studies get underway, we're very proud to see Altimmune join the ranks of some of the world's leading pharmaceutical companies in finding desperately needed solutions for this global crisis. While there are many companies in the race, our approach is unique and highly differentiated from other COVID-19 vaccines and therapeutics and could offer significant advantages compared to other approaches. As you know, both AdCOVID and T-COVID are administered intranasally, which provides important benefits. First, nasal administration is optimal both for ease of use and because it delivers vaccine directly to the site of viral entry and infection. This has the potential to provide numerous downstream benefits by blocking the infection at the site of its origin, the nasal cavity, and helping to prevent further spread of the virus. Second, intranasal delivery is the only delivery method that can stimulate what is called nasal mucosal immunity, which is a very important component of the body's immune response. Vaccines that are delivered by intramuscular injection are unable to activate this important first line of defense. The preclinical data are very encouraging and demonstrate that a single intranasal dose of AdCOVID stimulates a broad immune response, promoting strong systemic and mucosal immunity to provide improved protection from disease and disease transmission. On the practical side, we expect AdCOVID to have excellent stability, allowing for common storage conditions at community-based vaccination centers without the need for specialized freezer storage required for some other vaccine candidates. In fact, we expect to ship AdCOVID to vaccination centers at room temperature, greatly simplifying its distribution and reducing costs. And combined with our simple, scalable manufacturing process, AdCOVID becomes an ideal vaccine candidate, which exceeds the World Health Organization's expectations for a COVID-19 vaccine. We are very excited to move this candidate into human clinical trials, which is planned to start in the fourth quarter, with the data readout anticipated in early 2021. Also moving forward is our novel COVID-19 therapeutic, T-COVID. We are especially excited about this program as it represents a novel mechanism of action with tremendous promise. T-COVID is one of the few COVID-19 therapeutics intended to stop the progression of early COVID-19 to severe disease and hospitalization. The Phase I EPIC study is underway, and we have several sites that are actively screening patients. We also recently announced that we have completed enrollment in our Phase Ib trial of NasoShield for anthrax and expect to provide a data readout in the fourth quarter. If NasoShield is shown to be safe and immunogenic, the remaining options of our $130.7 million contract with BARDA could be awarded to conduct Phase II clinical testing with the path to begin stockpiling NasoShield in the Strategic National Stockpile. We are also very excited about ALT-801 program, which remains on track to begin human testing in the fourth quarter. We expect to have a readout around the first quarter of 2021 on 2 key endpoints: body weight loss and reduction in liver fat. This would be an important value inflection point for Altimmune and our shareholders as positive data would position ALT-801 squarely at the forefront of NASH development. We are very encouraged as our preclinical data suggests that ALT-801 could be better tolerated than similar therapies and achieve weight loss and improvement in liver fat without the need to dose titrate for GI tolerability, which has negatively impacted other GLP-1 investigational candidates. In addition, we plan to initiate a 12-week trial in patients with nonalcoholic fatty liver disease. We expect data readout from this study in the second half of 2021. Pending these results, we would then transition rapidly to the Phase II biopsy trial based on NASH endpoints. Finally, we are on track to begin a Phase II trial for HepTcell, our chronic hepatitis B immunotherapeutic. The Phase II trial is designed to evaluate the antiviral activity of HepTcell in chronically infected patients and is an important milestone in our goal to develop a functional cure for this disease. We anticipate commencing this study in the fourth quarter. As you can see, this is an exceptionally productive time for our company. Following the completion of our capital raise this year, Altimmune is solidly positioned to advance multiple candidates to value-creating inflection points over the next 12 months. In closing, this past year has clearly been a transformational one for our company, positioning us to pursue success on several fronts. With our product candidates advancing a solid foundation beneath us and momentum building in our pipeline, we see significant opportunity ahead of Altimmune and our shareholders, and we are committed to realizing this potential. Once again, I thank you for your continued support for Altimmune and for your participation today at our Annual Meeting of Shareholders. Have a nice day. Thank you.

Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes today's conference call. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.