Seres Therapeutics, Inc. (MCRB) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning, and thank you for joining us today. My name is [ Malika ], and I am an associate in JPMorgan's health care group. Before I introduce you to our presenters today, I want to call your attention to the blue button on your screen. This is where you will submit questions that will be addressed during Q&A. With that, I am pleased to introduce you to Eric Shaff, CEO; Carlo Tanzi, Investor Relations; David Ege, Chief Technology Officer; Matt Henn, Chief Scientific Officer; Lisa von Moltke, Chief Marketing Officer; Terri Young, Chief Commercial and Strategy Officer; and David Arkowitz, Chief Financial Officer at Seres Therapeutics. I know that they are all very excited to tell you about their story, so we'll turn it over to Eric and his team.

Well, good morning, everybody. And let me start by saying, I hope everyone on the line is healthy and well, and we look forward to speaking together in person, hopefully soon. Thank you to [ Malika ] and to JPMorgan for inviting us to present today. I'm grateful to speak on behalf of Seres and my colleagues. And we think it's a great time to connect with you. Ultimately, we are at a critical point for Seres Therapeutics and for the microbiome space in general. In a new modality like the microbiome, there can be data, there can be progress, there can be an aspiration or a hope to serve patients sometime in the future. We feel that we are at an important moment with the company, with the microbiome space and with SER-109 for patients with recurrent C. diff, where we think we can help patients now. Seres continues to lead the way in creating a new treatment modality through the microbiome in recurrent C. diff, but also in additional therapeutic areas where we know that the microbiome has a direct connection to human health. So we're pleased to be here to connect with you and to talk about our work in helping patients with microbiome therapeutics. Now on Slide 2, I will be making forward-looking statements in today's presentation. And I would refer you to our safe harbor statement and risk factors in our SEC filings for your review. Now on Slide 3, Seres is leading the field of microbiome therapeutics. And I always like to start with our mission, which is to transform the lives of patients worldwide with microbiome therapeutics. And the company was started with what was, I think, a remarkable or maybe even at the time an audacious premise, which was what if you could use bacteria as therapy. And there was some additional -- some interesting data from fecal transplants that suggested that you could interdict into the health of a patient's microbiome. But the founders at Seres said, what if you could do it in a reliably safe and effective way? But what if it were GMP manufactured? What if it were rigorously studied under FDA oversight? And importantly, what if you could deliver a therapy in the oral form? And our goal, by using bacteria as therapy, is to modulate the human microbiome from a state of injury or disorder, or what we call dysbiosis to a state of health. Our drugs are orally formulated in the bacterial consortia. And mechanistically, they're designed to modify the GI microbiome to deliver clinical benefit. We know that the microbiome is essential to human health. And disruptions to a healthy microbiome can have direct connections to serious diseases like C. diff infection. So on Slide 4, just outlining our goals for today with just 3 important topics. The first is to talk about our work in SER-109. And our intention, and what we soon believe will be a reality, to change the lives of patients broadly suffering from recurrent C. diff infection. C. diff is a terrible disease that hasn't seen meaningful innovation in some time. And certainly, we're proud of the journey that we took to get here. And we think that SER-109 is illustrative of the power of this technology. And to that point, second, to begin a conversation around the infection prevention modality, and the idea that we can take significant learnings and capabilities and insights into adjacencies from C. diff with the goal of addressing unmet medical need. And this will be an important topic for the company in 2022. And lastly, to update you on our work in IBD and specifically our SER-287 and SER-301 programs, where we're in the process of mining a data-rich study to better frame our path forward in UC. So on Slide 5, as we think about 2022 specifically, as we sit here at virtual JPMorgan, I'd like to highlight a few areas of particular focus. The first is that we expect to drive our SER-109 program to a BLA filing in mid-'22, mid this year, for recurrent C. diff infection. Second is that we will leverage the clinical data that we've obtained from SER-109 and then expand it to new opportunities in infection prevention. We have an ongoing Phase Ib study with SER-155 designed to prevent infections in GVHD in vulnerable patient populations, and we're advancing that study. And we're actively deploying our R&D engine into the next generation of programs. And finally, we will continue to analyze data from our development efforts in osterflitis to determine next steps for clinical development. On 6, just a quick snapshot of our pipeline. Our lead program in the area of infection prevention is SER-109 for recurrent C. diff. We are now actively working on the components of the BLA. And as a reminder, SER-109 has both breakthrough and orphan designation from the FDA. We're developing SER-155 as our second program in infection prevention. And this is followed by other earlier-stage programs also in targeting infectious disease. Another area of focus for Seres is our immune modulation modality in our work in ulcerative colitis, given the evidence linking this disease to the microbiome. We have 2 programs in UC, SER-287 and SER-301. And beyond these therapeutic categories, we're also exploring additional applications and a variety of other inflammatory and oncology indications. So a pipeline that is deep and focused in areas where we know the microrobiome can have a meaningful role in the health of the patients, supported by leading partners. And we continue to be excited about the platform aspect of our approach. So we know we can be successful in C. diff. And we feel that, that success confers advantages in pursuing other opportunities to help patients in other areas of unmet medical need. So I'd like to dig deeper into SER-109. And we're thrilled with the prospect of SER-109's approval and launch because we're proud of the journey that has taken us here, because we think that SER-109 will be the first approved FDA microbiome therapeutic. But really, most of all, because we think that the safety and efficacy profile that we have with SER-109 puts us in a position to change patients' lives. And certainly, as we talk about 2022 priorities, actively preparing for a BLA and maximizing the value of our SER-109 launch is at the top of our list. So on 8, we think that the opportunity to help patients is considerable, right? So just for background, C. diff is an urgent threat, as designated by the CDC. It's estimated that over 20,000 people die each year in the U.S. from C. diff. And this is a major health care issue. If you think about the nature of the disease, you understand that you're more likely to get C. diff once you've already had it. And once you get into the recurrent C. diff patient group, which is the group that we're looking to help with SER-109, it's an orphan disease, high unmet medical need. It's extremely costly to the system. And there are, we believe, inadequate solutions for patients in the space. Patients talk about a PTSD-like mentality of clearing the infection with antibiotics and then wondering if they're going to recur. So the hope that antibiotics alone will work is inadequate. So for us, we think a significant market opportunity for a therapeutic that can break the vicious cycle of recurrent infections. So on Slide 9, we outlined the study results from our Phase III study, which were and are remarkable. So 88% sustained clinical response rate for those that were treated with SER-109 versus placebo. So it's a 27% absolute delta and the reduction of recurrence, which is a significant effect for patients with very challenging treatment options in a multiply recurrent segment. Of course, it's a significantly greater relative delta and sustained clinical benefit maintained at 12 weeks. And as we presented last year, 24 weeks as well. Now as a reminder, the FDA had set for us a statistical threshold by which this Phase III study could qualify as one single pivotal study. As we've mentioned before, these results not only met, but meaningful exceeded that hurdle. So in a field where there has historically been perhaps more speculation than actual data as to how effective other approaches or unapproved procedures like FMT can be, we think that this study result really sets the bar. Now on Slide 10. As importantly, SER-109 stood a favorable safety profile in our study. This safety profile is important in relation to the safety concerns from contamination and potential pathogen transmission that are possible with FMT. And certainly, we think our approach with SER-109 in our process, utilizing our CMC process, and it includes pathogen and activation and purification steps in addition to the donor screening, differentiates SER-109 as an approach versus other therapeutic approaches are certainly FMT. Donor screening, we think is necessary but insufficient to fully support patient safety. You can screen for the pathogens that you are aware of, but certainly you can't screen for new or emerging pathogens, which, of course, the last couple of years included SARS-COVID, too. And while the efficacy from our Phase III results leaves the field, we also strongly believe that our approach to safety is importantly differentiated as well. Now on Slide 11, we remain on track to submit our BLA in mid-2022. In September, we announced that we had achieved the target enrollment of at least 300 subjects for the SER-109 safety database across our open-label study in our Phase III study. And I'll note that the momentum that we saw around open-label enrollment really grew throughout the course of the study, which we believe is indicative of the fact that the word is beginning to get out to key stakeholders as it relates to the program's profile, but it's also pretty encouraging to us as we can think about the commercial market ahead of us. We have had a productive engagement with the FDA. We have breakthrough an orphan designation. And we know that multiple stakeholders are looking forward to having an improved therapeutic in this space. Now on Slide 12, one of the more chronically underappreciated capabilities in the new modality, at least in my opinion, is often CMC. And we have been investing in our manufacturing capabilities since the company's inception with a practical fact that if you're looking to do something novel, it's not always easily accessible off the shelf, but also with the idea that we were and we are looking to control our own destiny. In November, we announced a significant collaboration with Bacthera, who is a global leader in product manufacturing that further enhances our longer-term commercial supply. Bacthera is a joint venture between Lonza and Chr. Hansen. And Bacthera is establishing a facility for commercial manufacturing with a Seres on the Lonza campus. So we look forward to partnering with Bacthera to expand upon our existing production capacity and to meet the demand beyond the initial phase of launch. So bottom line is we think that this is going to be a significant drug. And this agreement allows us to industrialize the manufacturing of SER-109 to meet what we believe -- what we expect will be a significant global demand. So we've talked about the data, the profile, the unmet need. We've talked about CMC. On 13, the question that we get often is, how attractive is this market? And we have engaged with health care providers and payers on the profile of SER-109 and it's clear to us that physicians are eager for better options. As you can see on the page, our research suggests a very favorable percentage of providers that indicate that they would prescribe SER-109. Payers also recognize this need, especially in light of the costs that recurrences can generate. If you can stop the cycle of recurrence, and recurrence is estimated to cost about $34,000 on average, you can help the patient, you can avoid the downstream costs of a recurrence, and we believe you can charge a price that is indicative and reflective of the value and innovation that's provided. So we think that there's a very strong pharmacoeconomic case here. And frankly, we think that these are the type of solutions that are needed in today's citizen. Now 14, just as a review, we announced the strategic collaboration with Nestlé Health Science to co-commercialize SER-109 in the U.S. and Canada. Nestlé Immune has been a terrific partner to Seres historically. Previously, with ex-North American rights to SER-109 before this most recent transaction. We think that there are considerable synergies and advantages as to having a global strategy and a global approach to things like marketing, reimbursement and pricing, regulatory strategy. So -- and the structure of the deal is designed to have each party focused on what it does best. So we're pleased with the transaction and the opportunity to enhance our relationship with Nestlé. The economics associated with the deal were and are attractive at about $300 million in near-term payments, $225 million in milestones that we think are achievable, plus 50% of the profitability of the product. Nestlé's GI capabilities allow us to reach patients more broadly, more quickly. Ultimately, we believe more profitably than we can do ourselves. And the structure of the deal is important. So Seres participates in the launch of the first microbiome therapeutic, which we feel is important, but it also allows us to focus on the next generation of microbiome therapeutics. So we've been working with Nestlé for years, and that work continues now with an expanded mandate. And we're thrilled with the prospect of bringing the first microbiome therapy to the market together with Nestlé. Okay. So on 15, as I mentioned towards the beginning of the presentation, one of the themes that you'll hear from us this year is that we are harnessing our R&D engine to maximize our opportunity. And we know that the microbiome has an extraordinary breadth of potential application. But as a company, we also think about focus. And focus on where we have had not just proof of concept, but really magnificent data with SER-109 and the opportunity to pursue adjacencies to 109 where we bring a proven mechanism to help patients, we believe improves our probability of success. So we have been and will be pointing our research engine into areas where we can leverage these factors to help patients in the company. Now on 16, Seres has built capabilities that allow us to delineate at a high resolution, the mechanism of action, the PK and the PD of our drugs and to learn from our clinical studies and apply those learnings to future development efforts and applications in new disease settings. So on this page, I'm showing you an example from SER-109, on the left, showing that treatment with SER-109 leads to a significant onboarding of bacteria from our drug term that we call engraftment, which leads to a restructuring of a patient's GI microbiome. This restructuring is associated with shifting the functional metabolic landscape of the GI tract. And here, on the right, I'm showing an example of secondary bile acids, which has relevance to pathogen's ability to -- out. Our clinical studies demonstrate that SER-109 bacteria engraft rapidly, they restructure microbiome composition and change microbiome function, including metabolite production. So on 17, why is this relevant view on C. diff? An important discovery in our research is that treatment with SER-109 can also reduce the total abundance of other pathogenic bacteria and notably, other pathogens that are associated with antibiotic resistance. As we look at the level of individual genes, we can observe, as shown on the right, that treatment with SER-109 leads with significantly lower abundance of antibiotic-resistant genes in the GI tract as compared to placebo. And we know the bacteria that are strongly associated with the carriage of antibiotic-resistant genes in our patients. And our SER-19 program provides strong in-human proof of concept that our microbiome therapeutics have the potential to be a novel technology to address infections by reducing the abundance of pathogens that harbor antibiotic resistance. So on 18, antibiotic resistance is a major public health threat resulting in mortality and substantial health care costs. We have seen that with the urgent threat of the pandemic. We've seen incredible innovation in terms of the vaccines and therapeutics. However, while this threat continues to accelerate, there has been fairly limited innovation to prevent these types of infections. And the mechanisms that SER-109 uses to prevent recurrent C. diff infections have promised to prevent a broader spectrum of infections. These are particularly relevant and needed in patient populations at greater risk such as hospitalized patients, people with suppressor compromised immune systems and people with chronic diseases that may struggle to fight off infections. We are advancing SER-155, as one example, to target the pathogens that cause the most harm. So in 19 allogeneic stem cell recipients face major risks from a infection, Allo-HSCT recipients can have highly disruptive microbiomes. And we have data to connect these disruptions with increased mortality due to bloodstream infections in GVHD. Observational datasets from our partners at MSK and the University of Cologne show that these patients tend to have increased presence of specific bacterial species that can harbor antibiotic resistances and decrease presence of commensal bacterial species that can be associated with positive outcomes. So leveraging data from our partners, our clinical studies and our preclinical assays, we have designed SER-155 consortia to target multiple disease relevant pathways, including the direct decolonization of VRE and CRE as well as the prevention of translocation of VRE and CRE from the gut that can result in bloodstream infections. So in 20, we started the Phase Ib study for SER-155 to assess the safety and engraftment of the bacteria and also to observe if SER-155 can improve survival and reduce bloodstream infections of GVHD. Importantly, we think that SER-155 is just one of many opportunities in infection prevention. We are planning an investor event on January 31 to highlight our R&D strategy and infection prevention. At that event, we will have Dr. Marcel van den Brink from Memorial Sloan Kettering. And our intention will be to further discuss the opportunity and the action prevention, the scientific foundation of our excitement in the space, the unmet medical need and the commercial opportunity. So on 21, I'd like to check in on our efforts in IBD and specifically UC. And we believe strongly that there is a role for the microbiome to play in IBD. The available treatments today, we believe, are inadequate expensive therapies with relatively modest spreads versus placebo in terms of efficacy. They can include significant side effects, including immunosuppression. And there has been relatively little therapeutic development in the mild to moderate patient segment where you can envision that an oral efficacious safe therapy would be particularly useful. Now on 22, we've been investigating the role of the gastrointestinal microbiome in IBD for years. Our Phase Ib study with SER-287 shows statistically significant improvement in clinical remission following daily treatment, but our interest in the microbiomes rolling UC is certainly not just confined to our 1b data set. It's supported by clinical data, by our mechanistic data and a substantial amount of data outside the walls of Seres as illustrated on this slide. And while this work highlights the important potential role for the microbiome in IBD, there is also a need to identify patients who will be most receptive to treatments for UC. On 23, we ran a Phase IIb study of SER-287 for patients with mild to moderate UC. That study did not achieve the primary endpoint of clinical remission as compared to placebo. And we've been working to understand microbiome and metabolomic changes in patients that were treated with SER-287 as compared to placebo. As we indicated in an announcement at the end of last year, our analysis suggests that the SER-287 bacteria did engraft successfully. However, we did not see some of the disease-relevant metabolite changes that we had expected to see based on the Ib study. And the question we are continuing to see a part is why. These analyses suggest the potential for biomarker-based patient selection going forward, which we think is really important given the heterogeneity of ulcerative colitis. So at this point, this is a thread that we're pointing it on, and we think it's one that is worthwhile. If you can specify which patients particularly in a heterogeneous disease like you see are more likely to be amenable to therapy, we think that's pretty interesting and worth an additional attention. Now in 24, at the same time, we're continuing our work on our ongoing Phase Ib study for SER-301 in ulcerative colitis. SER-301 is from our synthetic platform. So not biologically sourced, but rather cultivated from our library of bacterial strains. Results from this trial, including microbiome and metabolomic analyses, will guide our plans. And what we've said before is that we have made progress in study. But we aren't so far along that if there are learnings from SER-287 that could provide additional insights into 301, we'll have an opportunity to incorporate those learnings to potentially make changes. Now just to finish on Slide 25. Overall, we believe that Seres is in a very strong spot to extend our leadership position in microbiome therapeutics. We're on a path to file a BLA in the middle of this year for SER-109, with the potential to be first -- to be the first-in-class microbiome therapeutic and one with a considerable opportunity to help patients. We'll build on the success of 109 by delivering the SER-155 clinical program and expanding our efforts in infection prevention. We'll talk more about those plans on January 31. And we also have continued programs in inflammation. And we'll continue to define our plans in ulcerative colitis as we work through the SER-287 and 301 data analyses. Our balance sheet is in a very strong position based on our collaboration with Nestlé with $353 million in cash as of our last reported filing. So again, we'd like to thank JPMorgan for having us at this year's conference. And the team and I would be very pleased to answer questions from you, [ Malika ], or from the audience.

Thank you, Eric. We have a couple of questions from the audience. For the audience members, please submit your questions using the blue ask question button on your screen. Congratulations on creating your first -- potentially first-in-class microbiome therapeutic. To kick things off, could you please tell us a little more about the status of BLA for SER-109?

Sure. Let me start, and maybe I'll ask Lisa to comment and perhaps Dave as well. But as a reminder, when we handled readout, the FDA had asked us to have at least 300 subjects on what was the successful dose, the Phase III dose. At the time of the readout, we had about 1/3 of those patients. So we enrolled patients to our open-label study in order to satisfy that requirement. That really has been the critical path item for us in moving forward the BLA. As I said in the prepared remarks, we were really encouraged with the momentum that we saw in the enrollment of that study. And now we'll follow the subjects for 6 months. So we continue to prepare each aspect of the BLA. But certainly, that is the gating item for us and moving forward. Maybe I can have Lisa to comment further.

Sure. No, we're on track to wrap up that database and drop the data into the BLA and file midyear. We anticipate getting an accelerated review schedule. So that would be a 6-month PDUFA after a 2-month period in which the FDA has to review and accept the file.

Could you tell us a little more about the commercial preparations for the launch?

Sure. We've been thinking about the commercial opportunity even before the Phase III result, obviously, with the Phase III result. We were in a fortunate position of having to readdress our assumptions based on the incredible read-outs. But really, we're working hand in hand with Nestlé as we think about preparing for not just the BLA, but the market. And maybe I can ask Terri to comment further.

Sure. Well, on the back of signing the co-commercial agreement with Nestlé, we very quickly integrated that team into our efforts. So we're working together now to scale our market education and data dissemination efforts primarily in medical affairs and market access. For example, we're developing a robust payer value proposition that is supported by the strong category-leading profile of SER-109 and the high cost of treating recurrence after recurrence with limited options today. [indiscernible] customer segmentation. Eric covered some of this on the slide in our corporate deck and campaign development. In fact, we launched our first disease education campaign in October of last year at IDWeek. Finally, we're continuing to hire industry-leading commercial talent, both into my team here at Seres Therapeutics, but also within the Nestlé organization as we prepare for launch. I'd also like to ask Lisa, our Chief Medical Officer, now to comment on the medical affairs efforts in the field with respect to data dissemination and opinion leader engagement since the medical affairs team is part of her organization. Lisa, over to you.

Yes. Thanks, Terri. So our medical affairs group has been actively engaging with the medical community over the past year. And we're seeing a lot of excitement and awareness of the data. And as Eric said, that helped really drive the enrollment for that open-label study. So we expect that engagement to intensify this year and be accompanied by more presentations and publications.

Could you give us a little more color around the deal terms with Nestlé?

Sure. Let me start, and I'll ask David to comment. As I said in the prepared remarks, Nestlé has been a trusted valued partner with Seres for years. And I think they were early in understanding the potential to microbiome. And as we thought about who we would share the precious responsibility of launching what we think will be the first microbiome drug into the space, it was a pretty high bar. And certainly, part of our existing relationship, but not only that, but the prospect of working with Nestlé going forward was highly attractive to us. They bring capabilities that we certainly don't have. And as I said, we think that we can approach the market in a faster, broader, more profitable way than we can do ourselves. So we're thrilled with the prospect of working with them, and we're thrilled with the terms of the deal itself. And maybe I can ask David to comment further on that.

Yes. Thank you, Eric. And as Eric mentioned, the collaboration that we entered into with Nestlé for SER-109 in North America in the middle of last year really builds upon the collaboration that we had in place from 2016 that is focused on C. diff and UC ex-North America. So just a tremendous relationship with Nestlé that we're building upon. So in terms of the financial terms, which are very attractive, over $0.5 billion in upfront and milestones. And that's broken down as $175 million upon entering into this agreement that we received in July of last year. There's another $125 million milestone upon SER-109 approval in the U.S. Another $10 million for SER-109 approval in Canada. And then up to $225 million in sales milestones, which we believe are very achievable for us. And then once SER-109 is commercialized, it is a 50-50 profit split. So again, just excellent financial terms and with a partner that we've got a long-standing collaboration and constructive relationship with. And this collaboration continues to build on the strengths of each of the 2 parties.

One follow-up question there is, what is the game plan for EU commercialization? And will Nestlé be taking the lead here as well?

Yes. So the approach the -- it actually goes back to our first collaboration with Nestlé where they licensed ex-North American rights to 109. What I'll say is that part of the synergy in having one global approach with one partner is that interest objectives are aligned, which is a great thing for us. We certainly envision the world in which Nestlé had ex-North American rights, someone else might have had U.S. rights, and we might have been somewhere in the middle, not ideal, right? So with the positive Phase III results in 109 in the U.S., we are working with Nestlé to determine next steps in the EU. Certainly, C. diff is a global issue. And we think that there is a global opportunity to help patients with SER-109. So we're in the process of working collaboratively with Nestlé to determine next steps and part of that is understanding what the regulatory framework is. And we'll probably have more to say on that at some point soon.

A small pivot here, but how do you think about opportunities in oncology immunotherapy?

Sure. Maybe I can ask Matt to comment on how we think about the earlier side of the pipeline. And we've spent some time talking about infection prevention and we'll have more to say on that on January 31. But certainly, we think there's a broad set of opportunities and maybe Matt can comment further on that.

Yes. I mean, I think there's a large body of evidence, both in the field and in our own hands that microbes in the gut can interact with human host -- with the human host in terms of cells and tissues in various different ways. Both have an impact in infectious disease, as we've talked about it, but as well as modulating host immunity. And so we have active programs at the company that span, as Eric talked about earlier, both in inflammatory diseases as well as in oncology. We are looking at various different opportunities there. I think where we have a strength as a company is we've been developing the tools and -- that we need to be able to do high-resolution analytics, as well as the preclinical tools that we need to be able to understand mechanistically which microbes are interacting with these human cells and tissues and specifically how they are. And using that aggregate knowledge and data, both from our in-human data sets as well as our preclinical data sets, we're excited about the opportunities broadly, both in infectious disease as well as in various immune modulation settings, including oncology.

How would you differentiate the attributes of SER-287 versus SER-301 for the treatment of ulcerative colitis? And do you believe that the microbiome is more specific to ulcerative colitis in SER-287?

Matt, do you want to take that one?

Sure. So our SER-287, as we've talked about, is a donor-derived product. And SER-301 is a rationally designed consortia of bacteria. So in both cases, you're talking about consortia of bacteria, with the bacteria that had been built into and designed in the SER-301 are optimized towards the particular functional properties that we've identified through our research over the past 10 years to be important specific drivers, as well as particular species that are particularly potent with respect to modulating the various disease pathways that we're most interested in modulating in the context of ulcerative colitis. And so you can think of SER-301 as an optimized consortia, and that we can as well as dose with high level of potency.

Eric, you spoke about a new area in infection prevention. We know you're going to give us more details about it eventually, but any insights today?

Well, look, I think that the -- let me start from the high level and then ask Matt to comment a little bit more on the science. But certainly, we think that we have not just proof of concept with SER-109, but just an incredible dataset. But a dataset that allows us to think about the adjacencies and infection prevention beyond just C. diff. And there are truly capabilities and learnings and insights and experience which we can apply in areas around C. diff, where there is unmet medical need, where there is an opportunity to help patients. And we think doing still allows us to approach the earlier side of our pipeline with a higher probability of success than other areas that we might address. And maybe Matt can comment a little bit more on that.

Yes. I mean, I think the first thing I'd say is if you think about major public health threats, the emergence of antibiotic-resistant bacterial infections is amongst the top. Significant problem and arguably potentially one of the most significant threats, and from a public health standpoint, after the current pandemic that we are all working through. And I'd like to think about antibiotic-resistant bacterial infections really as a slow pandemic that's been ticking for a long time. And so what we've been doing at Seres is we believe we have a transformative technology to bring forward in terms of how we go after these various different types of bacterial infections and other infections more broadly. And importantly, what our drugs are designed to do are, first and foremost, as all our drugs are, be able to target multiple different disease-relevant pathways simultaneously. And in the context of infection prevention, what we're looking to do is both prevent the specific infections and knock back the problem bacteria. In the case of SER-155, it's VRE and CRE, as well, we have a technology that I think is one of the only technologies we're aware of that can actually modulate host epithelium and help prevent epithelial damage. And what that does is it prevents the bacteria in the gut doing what's called translocate into the blood to lead to bloodstream infections. And then in addition, we're reducing the overall level of these bacteria in patients who are infected, which can also have meaningful impacts on the ability to potentially transmit, which is important in a hospital setting.

Eric and team, we have enjoyed learning about Seres Therapeutics. Thank you for all the amazing work on what you are doing. We don't see any further questions from the audience. So do you have any parting thoughts for us?

Just thanks again for having us. We hope everyone is healthy and well. We look forward to connecting soon.

Thank you.