Kyverna Therapeutics, Inc 10-Q for FY2025 Q2
Kyverna Therapeutics, Inc. (KYTX)
About this 10-Q
Kyverna Therapeutics, Inc filed this 10-Q on August 12, 2025, covering the quarter ended June 30, 2025 (FY2025 Q2).
Headline figures
Quarter ended June 30, 2025, as reported in this filing, compared with the same period a year earlier where the filing states it.
- Net loss
- $42.08M
- compared with a net loss of $28.8M a year earlier
- Diluted EPS
- -$0.97
- compared with -$0.67 a year earlier
ROC
UNITED STATES
SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION
WASHINGTON, DC 20549
FORM
(Mark One)
QUARTERLY REPORT PURSUANT TO SECTION 13 OR 15(d) OF THE SECURITIES EXCHANGE ACT OF 1934 |
For the quarterly period ended
OR
TRANSITION REPORT PURSUANT TO SECTION 13 OR 15(d) OF THE SECURITIES EXCHANGE ACT OF 1934 |
For the transition period from ______________ to ________________
Commission File Number:
(Exact Name of Registrant as Specified in its Charter)
(State or other jurisdiction of incorporation or organization) |
(I.R.S. Employer |
(Address of principal executive offices) |
(Zip Code) |
Registrant’s telephone number, including area code:
Securities registered pursuant to Section 12(b) of the Act:
Title of each class |
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Trading Symbol(s) |
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Name of each exchange on which registered |
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Indicate by check mark whether the registrant (1) has filed all reports required to be filed by Section 13 or 15(d) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 during the preceding 12 months (or for such shorter period that the registrant was required to file such reports), and (2) has been subject to such filing requirements for the past 90 days.
Indicate by check mark whether the registrant has submitted electronically every Interactive Data File required to be submitted pursuant to Rule 405 of Regulation S-T (§232.405 of this chapter) during the preceding 12 months (or for such shorter period that the registrant was required to submit such files).
Indicate by check mark whether the registrant is a large accelerated filer, an accelerated filer, a non-accelerated filer, smaller reporting company, or an emerging growth company. See the definitions of “large accelerated filer,” “accelerated filer,” “smaller reporting company,” and “emerging growth company” in Rule 12b-2 of the Exchange Act.
Large accelerated filer |
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Accelerated filer |
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Smaller reporting company |
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Emerging growth company |
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If an emerging growth company, indicate by check mark if the registrant has elected not to use the extended transition period for complying with any new or revised financial accounting standards provided pursuant to Section 13(a) of the Exchange Act.
Indicate by check mark whether the registrant is a shell company (as defined in Rule 12b-2 of the Exchange Act). Yes ☐ No
As of August 4, 2025, the registrant had
Table of Contents
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PART I. |
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Item 1. |
1 |
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1 |
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Condensed Statements of Operations and Comprehensive Income (Loss) |
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Condensed Statements of Redeemable Convertible Preferred Stock and Stockholders’ Equity (Deficit) |
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4 |
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5 |
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Item 2. |
Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations |
18 |
Item 3. |
29 |
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Item 4. |
30 |
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PART II. |
32 |
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Item 1. |
32 |
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Item 1A. |
32 |
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Item 2. |
96 |
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Item 3. |
96 |
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Item 4. |
96 |
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Item 5. |
96 |
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Item 6. |
97 |
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i
PART I—FINANCIAL INFORMATION
Item 1. Financial Statements (unaudited)
Kyverna Therapeutics, Inc.
Condensed Balance Sheets
(in thousands, except share and per share data)
(unaudited)
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June 30, |
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December 31, |
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2025 |
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2024 |
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Assets |
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Current assets |
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Cash and cash equivalents |
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$ |
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$ |
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Available-for-sale marketable securities |
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Prepaid expenses and other current assets |
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Total current assets |
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Restricted cash |
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Property and equipment, net |
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Operating lease right-of-use assets |
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Finance lease right-of-use assets |
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Other non-current assets |
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Total assets |
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$ |
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$ |
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Liabilities and stockholders’ equity |
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Current liabilities |
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Accounts payable |
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$ |
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$ |
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Accrued compensation |
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Accrued license expense – related party |
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Other accrued expenses and current liabilities |
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Operating lease liabilities, short-term portion |
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Finance lease liabilities, short-term portion |
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Total current liabilities |
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Operating lease liabilities, net of short-term portion |
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Finance lease liabilities, net of short-term portion |
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Total liabilities |
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Stockholders’ equity |
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Preferred stock, |
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Common stock, $ |
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Additional paid-in capital |
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Accumulated other comprehensive income (loss) |
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( |
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Accumulated deficit |
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( |
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( |
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Total stockholders’ equity |
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Total liabilities and stockholders’ equity |
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$ |
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$ |
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The accompanying notes are an integral part of these condensed financial statements.
1
Kyverna Therapeutics, Inc.
Condensed Statements of Operations and Comprehensive Income (Loss)
(in thousands, except share and per share data)
(unaudited)
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Three Months Ended June 30, |
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Six Months Ended June 30, |
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2025 |
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2024 |
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2025 |
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2024 |
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Operating expenses |
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Research and development |
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$ |
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$ |
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$ |
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$ |
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General and administrative |
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Total operating expenses |
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Loss from operations |
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( |
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( |
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( |
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Interest income |
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Interest expense |
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( |
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( |
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( |
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( |
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Other expenses, net |
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( |
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( |
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( |
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Total other income, net |
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Net loss |
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( |
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( |
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( |
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( |
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Other comprehensive loss |
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Unrealized loss on available-for-sale marketable securities, net |
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( |
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( |
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( |
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( |
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Total other comprehensive loss |
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( |
) |
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( |
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( |
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( |
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Net loss and other comprehensive loss |
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$ |
( |
) |
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$ |
( |
) |
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$ |
( |
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$ |
( |
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Net loss per share attributable to common stockholders, basic and diluted |
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$ |
( |
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$ |
( |
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$ |
( |
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$ |
( |
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Weighted-average shares of common stock outstanding, basic and diluted |
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The accompanying notes are an integral part of these condensed financial statements.
2
Kyverna Therapeutics, Inc.
Condensed Statements of Redeemable Convertible Preferred Stock and Stockholders’ Equity (Deficit)
(in thousands, except share data)
(unaudited)
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Redeemable Convertible |
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Common Stock |
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Additional |
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Accumulated |
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Accumulated |
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Total |
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Shares |
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Amount |
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Shares |
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Amount |
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Capital |
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Deficit |
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Income (Loss) |
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Equity (Deficit) |
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Balance as of December 31, 2024 |
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— |
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$ |
— |
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$ |
— |
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$ |
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$ |
( |
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$ |
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$ |
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Common shares issued upon exercise of options |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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Stock-based compensation expense |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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Net loss |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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( |
) |
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— |
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( |
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Unrealized loss on available-for-sale marketable securities, net |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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( |
) |
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( |
) |
Balance as of March 31, 2025 |
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— |
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$ |
— |
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$ |
— |
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$ |
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$ |
( |
) |
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$ |
( |
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$ |
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Stock-based compensation expense |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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Issuance of common stock upon settlement of restricted stock units, net of shares withheld for taxes |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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( |
) |
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— |
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— |
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( |
) |
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Net loss |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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( |
) |
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— |
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( |
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Unrealized loss on available-for-sale marketable securities, net |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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( |
) |
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( |
) |
Balance as of June 30, 2025 |
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— |
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$ |
— |
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$ |
— |
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$ |
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$ |
( |
) |
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$ |
( |
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$ |
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Balance as of December 31, 2023 |
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$ |
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$ |
— |
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$ |
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$ |
( |
) |
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$ |
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$ |
( |
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Issuance of common stock upon initial public offering, net of underwriting commissions and issuance costs of $ |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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Conversion of redeemable convertible preferred stock into common stock in connection with initial public offering |
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( |
) |
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( |
) |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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Common shares issued upon exercise of options |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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Stock-based compensation expense |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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Vesting of early exercised options and restricted stock |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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Net loss |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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( |
) |
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— |
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( |
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Unrealized loss on available-for-sale marketable securities, net |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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( |
) |
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( |
) |
Balance as of March 31, 2024 |
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— |
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$ |
— |
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$ |
— |
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$ |
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$ |
( |
) |
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$ |
( |
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$ |
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Common shares issued upon exercise of options |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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Stock-based compensation expense |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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Net loss |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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( |
) |
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— |
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( |
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Unrealized loss on available-for-sale marketable securities, net |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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— |
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( |
) |
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( |
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Balance as of June 30, 2024 |
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— |
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$ |
— |
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$ |
— |
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$ |
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$ |
( |
) |
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$ |
( |
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$ |
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The accompanying notes are an integral part of these condensed financial statements.
3
Kyverna Therapeutics, Inc.
Condensed Statements of Cash Flows
(in thousands)
(unaudited)
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Six Months Ended June 30, |
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2025 |
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2024 |
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Cash flows from operating activities: |
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Net loss |
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$ |
( |
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$ |
( |
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Adjustments to reconcile net loss to net cash used in operations: |
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Stock-based compensation |
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Accretion of discounts on available-for-sale marketable securities |
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( |
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( |
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Depreciation and amortization expense |
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Impairment of capitalized software |
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Non-cash lease expense |
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Changes in assets and liabilities: |
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Prepaid expense and other current assets |
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Other non-current assets |
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( |
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( |
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Accounts payable |
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Accrued compensation |
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( |
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Other accrued expenses and current liabilities |
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Operating lease liability |
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( |
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( |
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Net cash used in operating activities |
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Cash flows from investing activities |
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Purchases of available-for-sale marketable securities |
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( |
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( |
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Proceeds from maturities of available-for-sale marketable securities |
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Internal-use software development costs |
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( |
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Purchases of property and equipment |
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( |
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( |
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Net cash provided by (used in) investing activities |
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( |
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Cash flows from financing activities |
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Proceeds from issuance of common stock upon initial public offering, net of underwriting commissions |
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Proceeds from exercise of common stock options |
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Principal paid on finance lease liabilities |
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( |
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( |
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Payments for offering costs |
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( |
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( |
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Taxes paid related to net share settlement upon vesting of restricted stock units |
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( |
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Net cash (used in) provided by financing activities |
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( |
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Net (decrease) increase in cash and cash equivalents and restricted cash |
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( |
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Cash, cash equivalents and restricted cash, at beginning of period |
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Cash, cash equivalents and restricted cash, at end of period |
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$ |
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$ |
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Reconciliation of cash, cash equivalents and restricted cash to statement of financial position |
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|
||
Cash and cash equivalents |
|
|
|
|
|
|
||
Restricted cash |
|
|
|
|
|
|
||
Cash, cash equivalents and restricted cash at end of period |
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
||
Supplemental disclosure for non-cash investing and financing activities |
|
|
|
|
|
|
||
Conversion of |
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
||
Internal-use software development costs in accounts payable |
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
||
Purchases of property and equipment in accounts payable |
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
||
Vesting of restricted stock |
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
||
Right-of-use asset obtained in exchange for operating and finance lease liability |
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
||
Supplemental disclosure of cash flow information |
|
|
|
|
|
|
||
Cash paid for interest |
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
||
The accompanying notes are an integral part of these condensed financial statements.
4
Kyverna Therapeutics, Inc.
Notes to Unaudited Condensed Financial Statements
1. Description of Business, Organization and Liquidity
Kyverna Therapeutics, Inc. (“Kyverna” or “the Company”) is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company focused on developing cell therapies for patients with autoimmune diseases. The lead product candidate, KYV-101, is advancing through late-stage clinical development across two broad areas of autoimmune disease: neuroimmunology and rheumatology. The Company was incorporated on
Liquidity
The Company has incurred losses and negative cash flows from operations since inception. As of June 30, 2025, the Company had an accumulated deficit of $
The Company has historically financed its operations primarily through issuances of redeemable convertible preferred stock and convertible notes, revenue from its collaboration agreement and sale of shares of its common stock in the Company’s initial public offering (the “IPO”). The Company may also seek to raise capital through debt financings, license agreements, collaborative agreements or other sources of financing. As of June 30, 2025, the Company had cash and cash equivalents and available-for-sale marketable securities of $
2. Summary of Significant Accounting Policies
Basis of Presentation
The accompanying condensed financial statements have been prepared in accordance with U.S. generally accepted accounting principles (“U.S. GAAP”) and the requirements of the Securities and Exchange Commission (the “SEC”) for interim reporting. As permitted under those rules, certain footnotes or other financial information that are normally required by U.S. GAAP can be condensed or omitted. These condensed financial statements have been prepared on the same basis as the annual financial statements included in the Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2024, filed with the SEC on March 27, 2025.
In the opinion of the Company’s management, the information in these condensed financial statements reflects all adjustments, all of which are of a normal and recurring nature necessary for a fair statement of the financial position and results of operations for the reported interim periods. The Company considers events or transactions that occur after the balance sheet date but before the financial statements are issued to provide additional evidence relative to certain estimates or to identify matters that require additional disclosure. The results of operations for interim periods are not necessarily indicative of results to be expected for the full year or any other interim period.
Any reference in these notes to applicable guidance is meant to refer to the authoritative U.S. GAAP as found in the Accounting Standards Codification (“ASC”) and Accounting Standards Updates (“ASU”) of the Financial Accounting Standards Board (“FASB”).
Use of Estimates
The preparation of financial statements in conformity with U.S. GAAP requires management to make estimates and assumptions that affect the reported amounts of assets, liabilities and the disclosure of contingent assets and liabilities at the date of the financial statements and the reported amounts of expenses during the reporting period. On an ongoing basis, the
5
Company evaluates its estimates and assumptions, including those related to research and development accrued expenses and stock-based compensation. Management bases its estimates on historical experience and on various other assumptions that are believed to be reasonable under the circumstances, the results of which form the basis for making judgments about the carrying values of assets and liabilities and the amount reported as revenue and expenses that are not readily apparent from other sources. Actual results may differ materially from those estimates.
Significant Accounting Policies
There have been no material changes to the accounting policies discussed in Note 2 to the financial statements included in the Company’s Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2024, filed with the SEC on March 27, 2025.
Recent Accounting Pronouncements
In December 2023, the FASB issued ASU No. 2023-09, Income Taxes (Topic 740): Improvements to Income Tax Disclosures. This ASU requires public entities, on an annual basis, to provide disclosure of specific categories in the rate reconciliation, as well as disclosure of income taxes paid disaggregated by jurisdiction. ASU No. 2023-09 is effective for fiscal years beginning after December 15, 2024, with early adoption permitted. The amendments in this ASU should be applied prospectively; however, retrospective application is also permitted. The Company is currently evaluating the impact of the adoption of this standard on its financial statements.
In November 2024, the FASB issued ASU No. 2024-03, Income Statement - Reporting Comprehensive Income - Expense Disaggregation (Subtopic 220-40): Disaggregation of Income Statement Expenses. The amendments in ASU No. 2024-03 require a public business entity to disclose specific information about certain costs and expenses in the notes to its financial statements for interim and annual reporting periods. The objective of the disclosure requirements is to provide disaggregated information about a public business entity's expenses to help investors (i) better understand the entity's performance, (ii) better assess the entity's prospects for future cash flows, and (iii) compare an entity's performance over time and with that of other entities. ASU No. 2024-03 is effective for fiscal years beginning after December 15, 2026, and for interim periods within fiscal years beginning after December 15, 2027, with early adoption permitted. The Company is currently evaluating the impact of the adoption of this standard on its financial statements.
3. Fair Value Measurements and Fair Value of Financial Instruments
Fair value is defined as the price that would be received to sell an asset or paid to transfer a liability in an orderly transaction between market participants at the measurement date. As such, fair value is a market-based measurement that should be determined based on assumptions that market participants would use in pricing an asset or liability. The authoritative guidance on fair value measurements establishes a three-tier fair value hierarchy for disclosure of fair value measurements, as follows:
Level 1—Quoted prices in active markets for identical assets or liabilities.
Level 2—Observable inputs other than Level 1 prices, such as quoted prices for similar assets or liabilities, quoted prices in markets that are not active or other inputs that are observable or can be corroborated by observable market data for substantially the full term of the assets or liabilities.
Level 3—Unobservable inputs that are supported by little or no market activity and that are significant to the fair value of the assets or liabilities.
Assets and liabilities measured at fair value are classified in their entirety based on the lowest level of input that is significant to the fair value measurement. The Company’s assessment of the significance of a particular input to the fair value measurement in its entirety requires management to make judgments and consider factors specific to the asset or liability.
6
The Company’s fair value hierarchy for its financial instruments measured at fair value on a recurring basis as of June 30, 2025, was as follows (in thousands):
|
|
Fair Value Measurements |
|
|||||||||||||
As of June 30, 2025 |
|
Total |
|
|
Level 1 |
|
|
Level 2 |
|
|
Level 3 |
|
||||
Cash equivalents |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
Money market funds |
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
— |
|
|
$ |
— |
|
||
Corporate debt obligations |
|
|
|
|
|
— |
|
|
|
|
|
|
— |
|
||
U.S. Treasury bills |
|
|
|
|
|
— |
|
|
|
|
|
|
— |
|
||
Available-for-sale marketable securities |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
U.S. Treasury bills |
|
|
|
|
|
— |
|
|
|
|
|
|
— |
|
||
Total fair value of assets |
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
— |
|
|||
The Company’s fair value hierarchy for its financial instruments measured at fair value on a recurring basis as of December 31, 2024, was as follows (in thousands):
|
|
Fair Value Measurements |
|
|||||||||||||
As of December 31, 2024 |
|
Total |
|
|
Level 1 |
|
|
Level 2 |
|
|
Level 3 |
|
||||
Cash equivalents |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
Money market funds |
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
— |
|
|
$ |
— |
|
||
Corporate debt obligations |
|
|
|
|
|
— |
|
|
|
|
|
|
— |
|
||
U.S. Treasury bills |
|
|
|
|
|
— |
|
|
|
|
|
|
— |
|
||
Available-for-sale marketable securities |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
U.S. Treasury bills |
|
|
|
|
|
— |
|
|
|
|
|
|
— |
|
||
Total fair value of assets |
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
— |
|
|||
Financial assets measured at fair value on a recurring basis consist of the Company’s cash equivalents and available-for-sale marketable securities. Cash equivalents consisted of money market funds, corporate debt obligations and U.S. Treasury bills, and available-for-sale marketable securities consisted of U.S. Treasury bills. The Company obtains pricing information from its investment manager and generally determines the fair value of available-for-sale marketable securities using standard observable inputs, including reported trades, broker/dealer quotes and bids and/or offers. The Company recognizes transfers into and out of levels within the fair value hierarchy in the period in which the actual event or change in circumstances that caused the transfer occurs.
4. Available-for-Sale Marketable Securities
As of June 30, 2025, the Company’s available-for-sale marketable securities consisted of debt securities issued by the U.S. Treasury and corporate debt obligations with contractual maturities on various dates within the next 12 months.
The following table summarizes the amortized cost, unrealized gains and losses and fair value of the Company’s available-for-sale marketable securities as of June 30, 2025 (in thousands):
|
|
Total |
|
|
Total |
|
|
Total |
|
|
Total |
|
||||
|
|
Amortized |
|
|
Unrealized |
|
|
Unrealized |
|
|
Estimated |
|
||||
As of June 30, 2025: |
|
Cost |
|
|
Gains |
|
|
Losses |
|
|
Fair Value |
|
||||
Money market funds ($ |
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
— |
|
|
$ |
— |
|
|
$ |
|
||
U.S. Treasury bills ($ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
( |
) |
|
|
|
|||
Corporate debt obligations ($ |
|
|
|
|
|
— |
|
|
|
( |
) |
|
|
|
||
Total available-for-sale marketable securities |
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
( |
) |
|
$ |
|
|||
As of June 30, 2025, $
7
The following table summarizes the amortized cost, unrealized gains and losses and fair value of the Company’s available-for-sale marketable securities as of December 31, 2024 (in thousands):
|
|
Total |
|
|
Total |
|
|
Total |
|
|
Total |
|
||||
|
|
Amortized |
|
|
Unrealized |
|
|
Unrealized |
|
|
Estimated |
|
||||
As of December 31, 2024 |
|
Cost |
|
|
Gains |
|
|
Losses |
|
|
Fair Value |
|
||||
Money market funds (included in cash and cash equivalents) |
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
— |
|
|
$ |
— |
|
|
$ |
|
||
U.S. Treasury obligations ($ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
— |
|
|
|
|
|||
Corporate debt obligations (included in cash and cash equivalents) |
|
|
|
|
|
— |
|
|
|
( |
) |
|
|
|
||
Total available for sale marketable securities |
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
( |
) |
|
$ |
|
|||
As of June 30, 2025 and December 31, 2024, no significant facts or circumstances were present to indicate a deterioration in the creditworthiness of the issuers of the Company’s marketable securities, and the Company has no requirement or intention to sell these securities before maturity or recovery of their amortized cost basis. The Company considered the current and expected future economic and market conditions and determined that its investments were not significantly impacted by such conditions. For all securities with a fair value less than its amortized cost basis, the Company determined the decline in fair value below amortized cost basis to be immaterial and non-credit related, and therefore no allowance for losses has been recorded. During each of the three and six months ended June 30, 2025 and 2024, the Company did
As of each of June 30, 2025 and December 31, 2024, accrued interest receivable was
5. Balance Sheet Components
Property and Equipment, Net
Property and equipment, net, consists of the following (in thousands):
|
|
June 30, |
|
|
December 31, |
|
||
|
|
2025 |
|
|
2024 |
|
||
Laboratory equipment |
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
||
Furniture and fixtures |
|
|
|
|
|
|
||
Leasehold improvements |
|
|
|
|
|
|
||
Computer equipment and software |
|
|
|
|
|
|
||
Property and equipment, gross |
|
|
|
|
|
|
||
Less accumulated depreciation |
|
|
( |
) |
|
|
( |
) |
Property and equipment, net |
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
||
Depreciation and amortization expense related to property and equipment was $
8
Other Accrued Expenses and Current Liabilities
Other accrued expenses and current liabilities consist of the following (in thousands):
|
|
June 30, |
|
|
December 31, |
|
||
|
|
2025 |
|
|
2024 |
|
||
Accrued research and development expenses - Contract Research Organizations |
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
||
Accrued research and development expenses - Contract Manufacturing Organizations |
|
|
|
|
|
|
||
Other accrued expenses |
|
|
|
|
|
|
||
Total other accrued expenses and current liabilities |
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
||
6. License and Collaboration Agreements
Patent License Agreements with the National Institutes of Health
In May 2021, the Company entered into
Unless terminated sooner, the NIH Agreements remain in effect until the last licensed patent right granted pursuant to the respective agreement expires.
The acquisition of the licenses, including patent rights and know-how, was accounted for as an asset acquisition. As the acquired technology did not have an alternative use for accounting purposes, the consideration of $
Intellia License and Collaboration Agreement
In December 2021, the Company entered into a License and Collaboration Agreement (the “Intellia Agreement”) with Intellia Therapeutics, Inc. (“Intellia”) to research and develop an allogeneic CD19-directed CAR cell therapy product (the “CRISPR Product”), suitable for validation through pre-clinical and clinical proof-of-concept clinical trials, including the performance of activities as agreed in the collaboration plan. Pursuant to the Intellia Agreement, Intellia granted to the Company an exclusive, worldwide, sublicensable in multiple tiers, royalty bearing license under certain of Intellia’s intellectual property to research, develop, sell and otherwise exploit the CRISPR Product. The Company is performing the majority of the work under the collaboration plan.
As consideration for the licenses granted to the Company pursuant to the Intellia Agreement, the Company issued to Intellia shares of its Series B Preferred Stock with the fair value of $
9
regulatory milestones and is obligated to pay to Intellia low to mid-single-digit royalties as a percentage of annual worldwide sales, subject to certain adjustments, and additional potential royalties and milestones to Intellia’s licensors. The royalties are payable on a country-by-country basis, commencing upon the first commercial sale of the CRISPR Product in the applicable country and expiring upon the later of (i) 12 years after the first commercial sale or (ii) the expiration of the last-to-expire valid patent claim.
In addition, the Company granted Intellia an exclusive option (the “Intellia Option”) to enter into a co-development and co-commercialization agreement with the Company for the CRISPR Product, (the “Co-Co Agreement”) for a fee payable to the Company. If Intellia exercises the Intellia Option, the Company and Intellia would share equally the regulatory and clinical development expenses associated with obtaining approval of the CRISPR Product in the U.S. and would also share equally all net profits and losses from commercialization of the CRISPR Product in the U.S. If Intellia exercises the Intellia Option, no milestone payments will be due and payable from that time forward and the Company will only pay royalties on sales outside of the U.S. In addition, upon exercise of the Intellia Option, following regulatory approval of the CRISPR Product, Intellia will have exclusive commercialization rights for the CRISPR Product for U.S. administration, subject to the Company’s rights to co-promote the CRISPR Product in the U.S., and the Company will retain the sole and exclusive rights to research, develop, or otherwise exploit the CRISPR Product for rest-of-world administration and shall have sole decision-making authority in relation thereto, subject to the parties’ obligations to cooperate regarding certain development, regulatory and commercialization strategies.
During the term of the Co-Co Agreement, subject to certain exceptions, neither party will clinically develop or commercialize a cell therapy product directed to CD19 other than the CRISPR Product for use in the treatment or prevention of certain indications set forth in the Intellia Agreement and any additional indication that the parties mutually agree to include (any such product, a “Competitive Product”); provided, however, that (i) any products for use in any indications that are the subject of a development program or third-party collaboration as of the effective date of the Co-Co Agreement shall not be considered Competitive Products and (ii) any products for use in any additional indications that are the subject of a development program or third-party collaboration as of the date that such additional indications are included in the global development plan shall not be considered Competitive Products.
The Intellia Agreement terminates on a country-by-country basis upon the expiration of the last valid claim within Intellia’s patent rights covering the CRISPR Product within such country, unless the agreement is earlier terminated in its entirety by either party for insolvency, by either party for material breach of contract, by Intellia if the Company participates in legal action or proceeding challenging the validity or enforceability of Intellia’s patents, or by the execution of the Co-Co Agreement. The Company may terminate the Intellia Agreement in its entirety, or on a country-by-country basis, by providing a written notice after the expiration or termination of the Intellia Option. Following the expiration of the term for a given country, the licenses granted to the Company in such country will automatically become fully paid-up, perpetual, irrevocable and royalty-free licenses.
Kite License Agreement (Related Party)
In January 2020, the Company entered into a License Agreement (the “Kite Agreement”) with Kite Pharma, Inc. (“Kite”), an affiliate of Gilead Sciences, Inc. (“Gilead”), a related party of the Company. In January 2020, the Company entered into a stock purchase agreement with Gilead, pursuant to which the Company issued to Gilead an aggregate of
Pursuant to the Kite Agreement, Kite granted to the Company a ten-year, co-exclusive license for the SynNotch technology primarily used in the Company’s own internal research and development programs for the treatment, diagnosis or prevention of autoimmune, inflammatory or allogeneic stem cell transplant inflammatory diseases (excluding post-transplant infectious diseases). Upon expiration of the ten-year co-exclusive license term, the license will become a non-exclusive license through expiration of the related patents.
10
Kite had licensed certain of the SynNotch technology included in the Kite Agreement pursuant to that certain Amended and Restated Exclusive License Agreement, between The Regents of the University of California and Kite (as successor to Cell Design Labs, Inc.) (the "UCSF License Agreement"). The Company is responsible for all costs and payments arising under the UCSF License Agreement and as a result of activities under the Kite Agreement, including earned royalties based on a low single-digit percentage of net sales, milestone payments in an aggregate amount of up to $
Unless terminated earlier, the Kite Agreement will expire upon the expiration of all licensed patents and Kite improvement patents therein. The Company has the right to terminate the Kite Agreement at will, in the Company’s sole discretion, in its entirety upon 90 days’ written notice to Kite. In addition, either party may terminate the Kite Agreement for uncured material breach by the other party, or upon the occurrence of insolvency-related events of the other party.
The acquisition of the co-exclusive license under the Kite Agreement, including patent rights and know-how, was accounted for as an asset acquisition. As the acquired technology did not have an alternative use for accounting purposes, the license consideration of $
As of each of June 30, 2025 and December 31, 2024, the Company had the total sublicensing fee of $
The annual maintenance fee, patent prosecution costs and minimal annual royalties are expensed as incurred and were minimal for each of the three and six months ended June 30, 2025 and 2024.
7. Commitments and Contingent Liabilities
Leases
Components of the lease expense for the three and six months ended June 30, 2025 and 2024, were as follows (in thousands):
|
|
Three Months Ended June 30, |
|
|
Six Months Ended June 30, |
|
||||||||||
|
|
2025 |
|
|
2024 |
|
|
2025 |
|
|
2024 |
|
||||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
Operating lease cost |
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
||||
Finance lease cost: |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
Amortization of right-of-use assets |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
Interest on lease liabilities |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
Variable lease cost |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
Total lease expense |
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
||||
Total undiscounted lease obligations under the Company’s operating and finance leases were $
License Agreements
The Company entered into license agreements with the NIH, Intellia and Kite, pursuant to which the Company is required to pay certain milestone payments contingent upon the achievement of specific development and regulatory events, and royalties on sales of products developed under these agreements (See Note 6).
11
Contractual Obligations and Commitments
The Company enters into contracts in the normal course of business with clinical research organizations (“CROs”) for clinical trials, with clinical manufacturing organizations (“CMOs”) for clinical supplies manufacturing and with other vendors for preclinical studies, supplies and other products and services for operating purposes. These agreements generally provide for termination at the request of either party generally with less than one-year notice. The Company did not expect any of these agreements to be terminated and did not have any non-cancellable obligations under these agreements as of June 30, 2025 and December 31, 2024.
Legal Contingencies
From time to time, the Company may become involved in legal proceedings arising from the ordinary course of business. The Company records a liability for such matters when it is probable that future losses will be incurred and that such losses can be reasonably estimated. Significant judgment is required to determine both probability and the estimated amount.
On December 9, 2024, a shareholder class action complaint was filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California against the Company, certain of its current and former officers and directors, and the underwriters of the IPO. Per a stipulated schedule, an amended complaint was filed on May 2, 2025 (the “Amended Complaint”). The Amended Complaint alleges that the registration statement on Form S-1 filed in connection with the IPO and the prospectus contained therein contained material misstatements or omissions in violation of federal securities laws. Pursuant to a stipulated order setting a response schedule, on June 26, 2025, the defendants filed a motion to dismiss the Amended Complaint.
In addition, on May 14, 2025, a stockholder derivative complaint was filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California against certain of the Company's current and former officers and directors which was captioned Perez v. Seidenberg, et al., Case No. 3:25-cv-04163- PCP (the “Perez Action”). On May 22, 2025, another stockholder derivative complaint was filed alleging the same claims against the same individual defendants captioned McDaniel v. Seidenberg, et al., Case No. 3:25-cv-04393-PCP (the “McDaniel Action”, and together with the Perez Action, the “Derivative Actions”). The complaints filed in the Derivative Actions allege claims related to the allegations raised in the Amended Complaint. On June 2, 2025, the court entered a stipulation and order to stay the Perez Action pending the disposition of a motion to dismiss the Amended Complaint in the related securities class action. On June 25, 2025, the court entered a stipulation and order to consolidate the Derivative Actions as In re Kyverna Therapeutics Derivative Litigation, Case No. 5:25-cv-04163-PCP. Finally, on July 22, 2025, the court entered a stipulation and order staying the consolidated derivative action pending the disposition of the motion to dismiss the Amended Complaint in the related securities class action.
The Company believes it has good and substantial defenses to the claims in the Amended Complaint and the Derivative Actions, but there is no guarantee that it will be successful in these efforts. The Company is unable to determine whether any loss ultimately will occur or to estimate the range of such loss; therefore,
Guarantees and Indemnifications
In the normal course of business, the Company enters into agreements that contain a variety of representations and provide for general indemnification. The Company’s exposure under these agreements is unknown because it involves claims that may be made against the Company in the future. To date, the Company has not paid any claims or been required to defend any action related to its indemnification obligations. As of June 30, 2025 and December 31, 2024, the Company did not have any material indemnification claims that were probable or reasonably possible.
12
8. Stockholders' Equity
Common Stock
As of June 30, 2025 and December 31, 2024, common stock reserved for future issuance was as follows:
|
|
June 30, |
|
|
December 31, |
|
||
|
|
2025 |
|
|
2024 |
|
||
Outstanding stock option awards |
|
|
|
|
|
|
||
Unvested restricted stock units awards |
|
|
|
|
|
|
||
Shares available for future grants under the 2024 Equity Incentive Plan and 2024 Inducement Equity Incentive Plan |
|
|
|
|
|
|
||
Shares available for future grants under the Employee Stock Purchase Plan |
|
|
|
|
|
|
||
Total shares reserved for future issuance |
|
|
|
|
|
|
||
Early Exercise of Options for a Promissory Note
In December 2022, the Company’s former chief executive officer (the “Former CEO”), a then-related party, early exercised options for
On January 12, 2024, the Company and the Former CEO entered into a note forgiveness letter, pursuant to which the promissory note and all accrued interest thereon in an aggregate amount of $
Shelf Registration Statement
On March 27, 2025, the Company filed a shelf registration statement on Form S-3 (the “Registration Statement”), covering the offer and sale from time to time of up to $
Initial Public Offering
On February 7, 2024, the Company’s Registration Statement on Form S-1 for its IPO was declared effective, and on February 12, 2024, the Company closed the IPO and issued
13
9
In January 2024, the Company’s board of directors adopted, and stockholders approved, the Company’s 2024 Equity Incentive Plan (the “2024 Plan”), which became effective on February 6, 2024. The 2024 Plan superseded the Company’s 2019 Equity Incentive Plan (the “2019 Plan”).
As of June 30, 2025,
In January 2024, the Company’s board of directors and stockholders adopted the Company’s 2024 Employee Stock Purchase Plan (the “ESPP”), which became effective on February 6, 2024. As of June 30, 2025,
In September 2024, the Company adopted the 2024 Inducement Equity Incentive Plan (the “Inducement Plan”). As of June 30, 2025,
Stock Options
Stock options issued under the 2019 Plan, 2024 Plan and the Inducement Plan generally vest over a
A summary of option activity under the 2019 Plan, 2024 Plan and the Inducement Plan is as follows:
|
|
Number of |
|
|
Weighted- |
|
|
Weighted- |
|
|
Aggregate |
|
||||
Outstanding at December 31, 2024 |
|
|
|
|
$ |
|
|
|
|
|
$ |
|
||||
Options granted |
|
|
|
|
$ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
Options exercised |
|
|
( |
) |
|
$ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|||
Options forfeited |
|
|
( |
) |
|
$ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|||
Options expired |
|
|
( |
) |
|
$ |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|||
Outstanding at June 30, 2025 |
|
|
|
|
$ |
|
|
|
|
|
$ |
|
||||
Exercisable at June 30, 2025* |
|
|
|
|
$ |
|
|
|
|
|
$ |
|
||||
Vested and expected to vest at June 30, 2025 |
|
|
|
|
$ |
|
|
|
|
|
$ |
|
||||
* Includes
Aggregate intrinsic value represents the difference between the fair value of the underlying common stock and the exercise price. The weighted-average grant date fair value of options granted for the three and six months ended June 30, 2025 was $
Restricted Stock Units
During the three and six months ended June 30, 2025, the Company granted Restricted Stock Units (“RSUs”) for
14
2025 was $
|
|
Number of RSUs |
|
|
Weighted- |
|
||
Unvested at December 31, 2024 |
|
|
|
|
$ |
|
||
Granted – RSUs |
|
|
|
|
|
|
||
Vested – RSUs |
|
|
( |
) |
|
|
|
|
Forfeited – RSUs |
|
|
( |
) |
|
|
|
|
Unvested at June 30, 2025 |
|
|
|
|
$ |
|
||
During the year ended December 31, 2024, the Company granted performance RSUs for
Stock-Based Compensation Expense
The Black-Scholes option pricing model, used to estimate fair value of the option awards, requires the use of the following assumptions:
15
The fair value of options granted was estimated using the Black-Scholes valuation model using the following assumptions for the three and six months ended June 30, 2025 and 2024, respectively:
|
|
Three Months Ended June 30, |
|
Six Months Ended June 30, |
||||
|
|
2025 |
|
2024 |
|
2025 |
|
2024 |
Expected volatility |
|
|
|
|
||||
Expected dividend yield |
|
|
|
|
||||
Expected term (in years) |
|
|
|
|
||||
Risk-free interest rate |
|
|
|
|
||||
The following table presents the classification of stock-based compensation expense related to stock options granted (in thousands):
|
|
Three Months Ended June 30, |
|
|
Six Months Ended June 30, |
|
||||||||||
|
|
2025 |
|
|
2024 |
|
|
2025 |
|
|
2024 |
|
||||
Research and development |
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
||||
General and administrative |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
Total stock-based compensation expense |
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
||||
In January 2024, in connection with the Former CEO note forgiveness (see Note 8), the Company recognized stock-based compensation expense of $
10. Net Loss Per Share Attributable to Common Stockholders
The following table sets forth the computation of basic and diluted net loss per share attributable to common stockholders (in thousands, except share and per share data):
|
|
Three Months Ended June 30, |
|
|
Six Months Ended June 30, |
|
||||||||||
|
|
2025 |
|
|
2024 |
|
|
2025 |
|
|
2024 |
|
||||
Numerator: |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
Net loss attributable to common stockholders |
|
$ |
( |
) |
|
$ |
( |
) |
|
$ |
( |
) |
|
$ |
( |
) |
Denominator: |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
Weighted average shares used in computing basic and diluted net loss per share |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
Net loss per share attributable to common stockholders, basic and diluted: |
|
$ |
( |
) |
|
$ |
( |
) |
|
$ |
( |
) |
|
$ |
( |
) |
The potential shares of common stock that were excluded from the computation of diluted net loss per share attributable to common stockholders for the periods presented because including them would have had an antidilutive effect were as follows:
|
|
As of June 30, |
|
|||||
|
|
2025 |
|
|
2024 |
|
||
Options issued and outstanding |
|
|
|
|
|
|
||
Restricted stock units |
|
|
|
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||
16
11. Income Taxes
On July 4, 2025, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (the “OBBBA”) was enacted in the United States. The OBBBA includes significant provisions, including, but not limited to, modifications of capitalization of research and development expenses and accelerated fixed asset depreciation. In accordance with ASC 740, "Income Taxes," the effects of changes in tax rates and laws on deferred tax balances will be recognized in the period in which the tax legislation is enacted. The Company is currently assessing the impact of the OBBBA on the Company’s condensed financial statements.
12. Related Party Transactions
On January 12, 2024, the Company and the Former CEO entered into a note forgiveness letter, pursuant to which the promissory note and all accrued interest thereon in an aggregate amount of $
The Company recognized $
13. Segment Reporting
The Company operates and manages its business as
The following table sets forth the Company’s summary of segment loss, including significant segment expenses for the three and six months ended June 30, 2025 and 2024 (in thousands):
|
|
|
Three Months Ended June 30, |
|
|
Six Months Ended June 30, |
|
||||||||||||
|
|
|
2025 |
|
|
|
2024 |
|
|
2025 |
|
|
|
2024 |
|
||||
Research and development expenses: |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
KYV-101 program |
|
$ |
|
|
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
|
|
$ |
|
|
||||
Other programs |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
Other research and development expenses(a) |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
General and administrative expenses(b) |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
Interest (income) |
|
|
|
( |
) |
|
|
|
( |
) |
|
|
( |
) |
|
|
|
( |
) |
Interest expense and other expenses, net |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
Segment Loss and Net loss |
|
$ |
|
|
|
$ |
|
|
$ |
|
|
|
$ |
|
|
||||
(a) Primarily includes personnel costs, R&D professional services, unallocated CRO and CMO costs and allocated overhead and facilities expenses
(b) Primarily includes personnel costs, allocated overhead and facilities expenses, legal, IT, accounting and general and administrative expenses
17
Item 2. Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations.
The following discussion and analysis of our financial condition and results of operations should be read in conjunction with the unaudited interim condensed financial statements and related notes included elsewhere in this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q as well as our audited financial statements and related notes thereto as of and for the year ended December 31, 2024 and the related Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations, both of which are contained in Part II of the Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2024 filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, or the SEC, on March 27, 2025. This discussion and analysis and other parts of this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q contain forward-looking statements based upon current beliefs, plans and expectations related to future events and our future financial performance that involve risks, uncertainties and assumptions, such as statements regarding our intentions, plans, objectives and expectations for our business. Our actual results and the timing of selected events could differ materially from those described in or implied by these forward-looking statements as a result of several factors, including those set forth under “Risk Factors” in Part II, Item 1A of this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q. See also the section below titled “Special Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements.”
Throughout this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q, unless the context otherwise requires, the terms “Kyverna,” “we,” “us” and “our” in this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q refer to Kyverna Therapeutics, Inc.
SPECIAL NOTE REGARDING FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS
This Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q contains forward-looking statements about us and our industry within the meaning of the federal securities laws, which statements involve substantial risks and uncertainties. Forward-looking statements generally relate to future events or our future financial or operating performance. All statements other than statements of historical facts contained in this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q, including statements regarding our future results of operations and financial position, business strategy, drug candidates, planned preclinical studies and clinical trials, results of preclinical studies, clinical trials, research and development costs, plans for manufacturing, regulatory approvals, timing and likelihood of success, as well as plans and objectives of management for future operations, are forward-looking statements. In some cases, you can identify forward-looking statements because they contain words such as “may,” “will,” “should,” “expects,” “plans,” “anticipates,” “could,” “intends,” “target,” “projects,” “contemplates,” “believes,” “estimates,” “predicts,” “potential” or “continue” or the negative of these words or other similar terms or expressions that concern our expectations, strategy, plans or intentions. Forward-looking statements contained in this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q include, but are not limited to, statements about:
18
We caution you that the forward-looking statements highlighted above do not encompass all of the forward-looking statements made in this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q.
We have based the forward-looking statements contained in this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q primarily on our current expectations and projections about future events and trends that we believe may affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects. The outcome of the events described in these forward-looking statements is subject to risks, uncertainties and other factors described in Part II, Item 1A of this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q titled “Risk Factors” and elsewhere in this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q. Moreover, we operate in a very competitive and challenging environment. New risks and uncertainties emerge from time to time, and it is not possible for us to predict all risks and uncertainties that could have an impact on the forward-looking statements contained in this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q. We cannot assure you that the results, events and circumstances reflected in the forward-looking statements will
19
be achieved or occur, and actual results, events or circumstances could differ materially from those described in the forward-looking statements.
The forward-looking statements made in this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q relate only to events as of the date on which the statements are made. We undertake no obligation to update any forward-looking statements made in this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q to reflect events or circumstances after the date of this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q or to reflect new information or the occurrence of unanticipated events, except as required by law. We may not actually achieve the plans, intentions or expectations disclosed in our forward-looking statements and you should not place undue reliance on our forward-looking statements. Our forward-looking statements do not reflect the potential impact of any future acquisitions, mergers, dispositions, joint ventures, other strategic transactions or investments we may make or enter into.
Overview
We are a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company focused on developing cell therapies for patients with autoimmune diseases. Our goal is to liberate patients from autoimmune diseases through the curative potential of cell therapy. Our approach is supported by our breadth of experience treating patients with our lead product candidate, KYV-101, across more than 15 autoimmune disease indications. This has been documented through the scientific publication of multiple autoimmune case studies, our proprietary dataset of patients treated through named patient forms of compassionate use, our experience in ongoing investigator-initiated trials at leading academic institutions, as well as early clinical data from our ongoing company-sponsored trials illustrating the potential of these therapies to deeply deplete B cells with the aim of achieving durable treatment-free remission. This validation provides us with a clear path to continue advancing KYV-101 through late-stage clinical development and commercialization across two broad areas of autoimmune disease: neuroimmunology and rheumatology.
Our lead program, KYV-101, is a fully human, autologous CD19 CAR T-cell product candidate with CD28 co-stimulation, designed for potency and tolerability. KYV-101 is made from an underlying chimeric antigen receptor, or CAR, licensed from the National Institutes of Health, or the NIH. We believe that this uniquely designed CAR in KYV-101 has the potential to deliver a differentiated therapeutic profile in autoimmune disease. In addition to a fully human scFv domain, the CAR in KYV-101 was also designed with a human CD8α hinge and transmembrane domain, a human CD28 costimulatory domain, and a human CD3ζ activation domain. This same underlying CAR in KYV-101 has completed a 20-patient Phase 1 trial in oncology conducted by the NIH, and the results from this Phase 1 trial published in Nature Medicine reported similar rates of durable antitumor responses while delivering improved tolerability in the clinic among adult oncology patients, as compared to the CAR used to create Yescarta®. We believe that these differentiated properties of the CAR in KYV-101 are critical for the potential success of CAR T cells as autoimmune disease therapies.
Our focused clinical development pipeline includes registrational trials for stiff person syndrome, or SPS, and generalized myasthenia gravis, or MG, and two ongoing multi-center Phase 1/2 trials for patients with lupus nephritis, or LN. We are also harnessing investigator-initiated trials, or IITs, and other Kyverna-sponsored clinical trials, or KYSA trials, including in multiple sclerosis, or MS, and rheumatoid arthritis, or RA, to inform the next priority indications to advance into late-stage development. Additionally, our pipeline includes next-generation CAR T-cell therapies in both autologous and allogeneic formats, including efficiently expanding into broader autoimmune indications and the potential to increase patient reach with KYV-102 using our proprietary whole blood rapid manufacturing process. We believe our cell therapy approach to autoimmune disease may present a significant advantage over current standard-of-care therapies by aiming for deep B cell depletion, an immune reset and durable drug-free, disease-free remission in autoimmune diseases.
We have aligned with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, or the FDA, on a registrational Phase 2 trial design in SPS, KYSA-8. We completed patient enrollment for this KYSA-8 pivotal Phase 2 trial in SPS during the second quarter of 2025. We expect to report Phase 2 data from this study in the first half of 2026. We also continue to progress our chemistry, manufacturing and controls, or CMC, readiness efforts in a capital-efficient manner in support of our first anticipated biologics license application, or BLA, filing for SPS with the FDA in the first half of 2026.
Patient enrollment in our Phase 2 trial in MG, KYSA-6, has been completed and we plan to report interim data in the fourth quarter of 2025. Following a successful end-of-Phase 2 meeting with the FDA, we are expanding our existing KYSA-6 trial to include a Phase 3 portion, for which we expect to initiate enrollment by the end of 2025. The Phase 3 portion of the trial is expected to include approximately 60 patients. We previously received Regenerative Medicine Advanced Therapy, or RMAT, designations and Orphan Drug Designations from the FDA for both SPS and MG as well as Orphan Drug Designation from the European Medicines Association in MG.
For our KYSA-1 and KYSA-3 Phase 1 trials for LN, patient enrollment has concluded and we expect to share data from these trials in a peer-reviewed publication in 2026 as we continue to prioritize accelerating our late-stage
20
neuroimmunology indications. Further, we expect to file an investigational new drug application for KYV-102 in the fourth quarter of 2025.
Since our inception in June 2018, we have devoted substantially all of our resources to performing research and development, enabling manufacturing activities in support of our product development efforts, hiring personnel, acquiring and developing our technology and product candidates, conducting clinical and regulatory activities, performing business planning, developing and establishing our intellectual property portfolio, raising capital and providing general and administrative support for these activities. We do not have any products approved for sale and have not generated any revenue from product sales.
We have incurred significant losses and negative cash flows from operations since our inception. We have funded our operations primarily from sales of our redeemable convertible preferred stock, issuances of convertible notes, revenue from our collaboration agreement with Gilead Sciences, Inc., which terminated effective as of January 22, 2024, and from the sale of shares of our common stock in our initial public offering, or the IPO, in February 2024. We may also seek to raise capital through debt financings, license agreements, collaborative agreements or other sources of financing. Our net losses were $42.1 million and $86.7 million for the three and six months ended June 30, 2025, respectively, compared with $28.8 million and $55.5 million net losses for the three and six months ended June 30, 2024, respectively. As of June 30, 2025, we had an accumulated deficit of $350.2 million. Management has estimated that our cash and cash equivalents and available-for-sale marketable securities of $211.7 million as of June 30, 2025 will be sufficient to fund our planned operations for at least one year from the date of this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q. We plan to monitor expenses and raise additional capital through equity or debt financings, strategic alliances or licensing arrangements. Our ability to access capital when needed is not assured and if capital is not available to us when, and in the amounts, needed, we could be required to delay, scale back or abandon some or all of our development programs and other operations, which could materially harm our business, financial condition and results of operations.
In particular, we anticipate that our current cash, cash equivalents and available-for-sale marketable securities will be sufficient to fund our operations into 2027. We expect that our cash, cash equivalents and available-for-sale marketable securities will allow us to support our first BLA filing for SPS, our registrational Phase 2/3 trial for MG and our pre-launch activities. The amounts and timing of our actual expenditures will depend on numerous factors, including the progress of our research and development, the timing of patient enrollment in clinical trials and evolving regulatory requirements, the time and cost necessary to conduct our ongoing and planned preclinical studies and clinical trials, the results of our preclinical studies and clinical trials and other factors described in Part II, Item 1A of this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q titled “Risk Factors” and elsewhere in this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q.
We expect to continue to incur substantial losses for the foreseeable future, and our transition to profitability will depend upon the successful development, approval and commercialization of our product candidates and upon the receipt of sufficient revenues to support our cost structure. We do not expect to generate any revenue from commercial product sales unless and until we successfully complete development and obtain regulatory approval for one or more of our product candidates. We may never achieve profitability, and unless we do and until then, we will need to continue to raise additional capital.
We expect our expenses will increase substantially in connection with our ongoing and planned activities, as we:
21
We do not currently own or operate any manufacturing facilities. We rely on contract manufacturing organizations, or CMOs, to produce our drug candidates in accordance with the FDA’s current Good Manufacturing Practices regulations for use in our clinical studies. In March 2025 the FDA confirmed our planned CMC package to support commercial manufacturing of KYV-101 for SPS and MG as well as future indications, with extensive CMC experience in autoimmune disease from KYSA studies, IITs and compassionate-use cases supporting process characterization. We have supplied clinical product from two clinical manufacturing sites for which the FDA accepted comparability data between manufacturing sites in April 2025. Under our Development and Manufacturing Services Agreement, dated July 2023, or the Elevate Agreement, with ElevateBio Base Camp, Inc., or Elevate, we engaged Elevate in November 2024 to provide us with cell manufacturing, release and testing services for our KYV-101 product candidate. In March 2022, we entered into a master services agreement with Minaris Advanced Therapies, Inc., or MAT. MAT’s facility in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, provides us with certain customized cell manufacturing, release and testing services for our KYV-101 product candidate. Pursuant to our License and Supply Agreement with Oxford Biomedica (UK) Limited, or Oxford, dated September 2023, we engaged Oxford to undertake lentiviral vector process development services, with the intention for Oxford to ultimately manufacture and supply to us lentiviral vectors for research and development purposes and for use in connection with our clinical trials.
We are also developing Ingenui-T, a rapid whole blood manufacturing process designed to improve patient experience and manufacturing capabilities through partnerships with world-class organizations in cell therapy manufacturing. Under the Elevate Agreement, Elevate is undertaking process development services for the development of a rapid whole blood manufacturing process for our CAR T-cell products, including KYV-102.
Given our stage of development, we do not yet have a marketing or sales organization or commercial infrastructure. Accordingly, if we obtain regulatory approval for any of our product candidates, we also expect to incur significant commercialization expenses related to product sales, marketing, manufacturing and distribution.
Because of the numerous risks and uncertainties associated with product development, we are unable to predict the timing or amount of increased expenses or when or if we will be able to achieve or maintain profitability, if at all. Even if we are able to generate revenue from the sale of our product candidates, we may not become profitable. If we fail to become profitable or are unable to sustain profitability on a continuing basis, we may be unable to continue our operations at planned levels and may be forced to reduce our operations.
Macroeconomic Trends
The disruption and volatility in the global and domestic capital markets resulting from heightened inflation, potential tariffs, capital market volatility, interest rate and currency rate fluctuations, artificial intelligence, government agency changes under the new administration, any potential economic slowdown or recession, including trade wars or civil or political unrest (such as the ongoing war between Ukraine and Russia, conflict in the Middle East, and tension between China and Taiwan) may increase the cost of capital and limit our ability to access capital. These and similar adverse market conditions may negatively impact our business, financial position and results of operations.
Components of Operating Results
Operating Expenses
Our operating expenses consist of (i) research and development expenses and (ii) general and administrative expenses.
Research and Development Expenses
The largest component of our total operating expenses since inception has been research and development activities, including the preclinical and clinical development of our product candidates. Research and development expenses consist primarily of expenses incurred under agreements with clinical research organizations, or CROs, and investigative sites that conduct preclinical and clinical studies; manufacturing process development activities and costs of acquiring and manufacturing clinical study materials and other supplies; payments under licensing and research and development agreements; other outside services and consulting costs; compensation and benefits for research and development employees, including stock-based compensation; and facilities, information technology and overhead expenses. Research and development costs are expensed as incurred. Our internal research and development employees are shared across multiple
22
programs and are not solely dedicated to individual programs. Other research and development expenses primarily include license fees, professional services, unallocated CRO and CMO costs and allocated overhead and facilities expenses.
We expect our research and development expenses to increase substantially for the foreseeable future as we advance our product candidates into and through preclinical studies and clinical trials, pursue regulatory approval of our product candidates and expand our pipeline of product candidates. The process of conducting the necessary preclinical and clinical research to obtain regulatory approval is costly and time-consuming. The actual probability of success for our product candidates may be affected by a variety of factors, including the safety and efficacy of our product candidates, early clinical data, investment in our clinical programs, competition, manufacturing capability and commercial viability. We may never receive regulatory approval for any of our product candidates. As a result of the uncertainties discussed above, we are unable to determine the duration and completion costs of our research and development projects or if, when and to what extent we will generate revenue from the commercialization and sale of our product candidates, if approved.
General and Administrative Expenses
General and administrative expenses consist primarily of payroll and personnel-related expenses, including: salaries, employee benefit costs and stock-based compensation expense; professional fees for legal, consulting, accounting and tax services; allocated overheads, including rent, facilities and information technology costs; and other general operating expenses not otherwise classified as research and development expenses.
Interest Income
Interest income consists primarily of interest and accretion of premiums and discounts on our investments in available-for-sale marketable securities and cash equivalents.
Interest Expense
Interest expense consists primarily of interest expense related to our laboratory equipment finance leases.
Other Expense, Net
Other expense, net primarily consists of settlement and revaluation of transactions and accounts payable in foreign currency.
Results of Operations
Comparison of the Three Months Ended June 30, 2025 and 2024
The following table summarizes our results of operations for the periods presented:
|
|
Three Months Ended June 30, |
|
|
Change |
|
||||||||||
|
|
2025 |
|
|
2024 |
|
|
$ |
|
|
% |
|
||||
|
|
(in thousands, except percentages) |
|
|||||||||||||
Operating expenses |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
Research and development |
|
$ |
35,816 |
|
|
$ |
27,321 |
|
|
$ |
8,495 |
|
|
|
31 |
% |
General and administrative |
|
|
8,594 |
|
|
|
6,114 |
|
|
|
2,480 |
|
|
|
41 |
% |
Total operating expenses |
|
|
44,410 |
|
|
|
33,435 |
|
|
|
10,975 |
|
|
|
33 |
% |
Loss from operations |
|
|
(44,410 |
) |
|
|
(33,435 |
) |
|
|
(10,975 |
) |
|
|
33 |
% |
Interest income |
|
|
2,364 |
|
|
|
4,694 |
|
|
|
(2,330 |
) |
|
|
(50 |
)% |
Interest expense |
|
|
(14 |
) |
|
|
(39 |
) |
|
|
25 |
|
|
|
(64 |
)% |
Other expense, net |
|
|
(21 |
) |
|
|
(23 |
) |
|
|
2 |
|
|
|
(9 |
)% |
Total other income, net |
|
|
2,329 |
|
|
|
4,632 |
|
|
|
(2,303 |
) |
|
|
(50 |
)% |
Net loss |
|
$ |
(42,081 |
) |
|
$ |
(28,803 |
) |
|
$ |
(13,278 |
) |
|
|
46 |
% |
23
Research and Development Expenses
The following table summarizes our research and development expenses for the periods presented:
|
|
Three Months Ended June 30, |
|
|
Change |
|
||||||||||
|
|
2025 |
|
|
2024 |
|
|
$ |
|
|
% |
|
||||
|
|
(in thousands, except percentages) |
|
|||||||||||||
KYV-101 |
|
$ |
22,541 |
|
|
$ |
13,326 |
|
|
$ |
9,215 |
|
|
|
69 |
% |
Other programs |
|
|
986 |
|
|
|
512 |
|
|
|
474 |
|
|
|
93 |
% |
Personnel related expenses |
|
|
8,272 |
|
|
|
7,713 |
|
|
|
559 |
|
|
|
7 |
% |
Other research and development expenses |
|
|
4,017 |
|
|
|
5,770 |
|
|
|
(1,753 |
) |
|
|
(30 |
)% |
Total research and development expenses |
|
$ |
35,816 |
|
|
$ |
27,321 |
|
|
$ |
8,495 |
|
|
|
31 |
% |
Research and development expenses increased by $8.5 million, or 31% to $35.8 million for the three months ended June 30, 2025 from $27.3 million for the three months ended June 30, 2024.
External research and development expenses related to our KYV-101 program increased by $9.2 million, or 69%, for the three months ended June 30, 2025, compared to the same period a year ago, as we continued advancing our lead product candidate, KYV-101, through clinical development. The increase is mainly driven by a $8.9 million increase in CMO costs primarily due to the strategic investment in CMC for SPS and MG, as well as a $2.0 million increase in CRO costs primarily due to accelerated enrollment in our KYSA trials. The increase in KYV-101 CMO and CRO costs was partially offset by a $1.3 million reduction in professional services costs and a $0.4 million reduction in other external research and development costs.
Other program expenses include research and development expenses for our KYV-201 and KYV-102 programs. Other program costs increased by $0.5 million, or 93%, for the three months ended June 30, 2025, compared to the same period a year ago. CRO costs increased by $0.3 million, while professional services decreased by $0.3 million for the three months ended June 30, 2025 compared with the same period a year ago. Costs related to the Ingenui-T rapid whole blood manufacturing process, which were classified as KYV-101 program costs in 2024 and are classified as other program costs in 2025, decreased from $0.8 million for the three months ended June 30, 2024 to $0.7 million for the three months ended June 30, 2025.
Personnel-related expenses increased by $0.6 million, or 7%, for the three months ended June 30, 2025, compared to the same period a year ago, primarily due to the growth in the number of employees in our research and development organization as well as higher stock-based compensation expense.
Other research and development expenses primarily consist of unallocated research and development costs, professional services, facilities, depreciation and overhead costs. The decrease of $1.8 million, or 30%, for the three months ended June 30, 2025, compared to the same period a year ago, primarily relates to a $1.4 million decrease in professional services, as well as a $0.7 million reduction in scientific conference costs and a $0.5 million increase in rent expense.
General and Administrative Expenses
General and administrative expenses increased by $2.5 million, or 41%, for the three months ended June 30, 2025, compared to the same period a year ago. The increase was primarily attributable to a $3.1 million increase in personnel-related costs, including stock-based compensation expense, partially offset by a $0.6 million decrease in facilities and overhead costs.
Interest Income
Interest income decreased by $2.3 million, from $4.7 million for the three months ended June 30, 2024 to $2.4 million for the three months ended June 30, 2025 primarily due to lower cash, cash equivalents and short-term investment balances in 2025.
24
Comparison of the Six Months Ended June 30, 2025 and 2024
The following table summarizes our results of operations for the periods presented:
|
|
Six Months Ended June 30, |
|
|
Change |
|
||||||||||
|
|
2025 |
|
|
2024 |
|
|
$ |
|
|
% |
|
||||
|
|
(in thousands, except percentages) |
|
|||||||||||||
Operating expenses |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
Research and development |
|
$ |
73,249 |
|
|
$ |
49,797 |
|
|
$ |
23,452 |
|
|
|
47 |
% |
General and administrative |
|
|
18,569 |
|
|
|
12,996 |
|
|
|
5,573 |
|
|
|
43 |
% |
Total operating expenses |
|
|
91,818 |
|
|
|
62,793 |
|
|
|
29,025 |
|
|
|
46 |
% |
Loss from operations |
|
|
(91,818 |
) |
|
|
(62,793 |
) |
|
|
(29,025 |
) |
|
|
46 |
% |
Interest income |
|
|
5,189 |
|
|
|
7,429 |
|
|
|
(2,240 |
) |
|
|
(30 |
)% |
Interest expense |
|
|
(38 |
) |
|
|
(83 |
) |
|
|
45 |
|
|
|
(54 |
)% |
Other expense, net |
|
|
(49 |
) |
|
|
(49 |
) |
|
|
— |
|
|
|
— |
% |
Total other income, net |
|
|
5,102 |
|
|
|
7,297 |
|
|
|
(2,195 |
) |
|
|
(30 |
)% |
Net loss |
|
$ |
(86,716 |
) |
|
$ |
(55,496 |
) |
|
$ |
(31,220 |
) |
|
|
56 |
% |
Research and Development Expenses
The following table summarizes our research and development expenses for the periods presented:
|
|
Six Months Ended June 30, |
|
|
Change |
|
||||||||||
|
|
2025 |
|
|
2024 |
|
|
$ |
|
|
% |
|
||||
|
|
(in thousands, except percentages) |
|
|||||||||||||
KYV-101 |
|
$ |
44,661 |
|
|
$ |
24,323 |
|
|
$ |
20,338 |
|
|
|
84 |
% |
Other programs |
|
|
1,498 |
|
|
|
3,140 |
|
|
|
(1,642 |
) |
|
|
(52 |
)% |
Personnel related expenses |
|
|
16,791 |
|
|
|
14,270 |
|
|
|
2,521 |
|
|
|
18 |
% |
Other research and development expenses |
|
|
10,299 |
|
|
|
8,064 |
|
|
|
2,235 |
|
|
|
28 |
% |
Total research and development expenses |
|
$ |
73,249 |
|
|
$ |
49,797 |
|
|
$ |
23,452 |
|
|
|
47 |
% |
Research and development expenses increased by $23.5 million, or 47%, to $73.2 million for the six months ended June 30, 2025, from $49.8 million for the six months ended June 30, 2024.
External research and development expenses related to our KYV-101 program increased by $20.3 million or 84% for the six months ended June 30, 2025, compared to the same period a year ago as we continued advancing our lead product candidate, KYV-101, through clinical development. The increase is mainly driven by a $16.6 million increase in strategic investment in CMO costs for SPS and MG, as well as a $6.4 million increase in CRO costs primarily due to accelerated enrollment in our KYSA trials. The increase in KYV-101 CMO and CRO costs was partially offset by a $2.0 million reduction in professional services costs.
Other program expenses include research and development expenses for our KYV-201 and KYV-102 programs. Other program costs decreased by $1.6 million, or 52%, for the six months ended June 30, 2025, compared to the same period a year ago due to a $1.4 million decrease in CMO costs. Costs related to the Ingenui-T rapid whole blood manufacturing process, which were classified as KYV-101 program costs in 2024 and are classified as other program costs in 2025, decreased to $1.8 million for the six months ended June 30, 2025 from $2.3 million for the same period a year ago. Other program expenses for the six months ended June 30, 2025 also included a $0.6 million credit received from a manufacturing vendor for our KYV-201 program.
Personnel-related expenses increased by $2.5 million, or 18%, to $16.8 million for the six months ended June 30, 2025 from $14.3 million for the same period a year ago primarily due to the growth in the number of employees in our research and development organization.
Other research and development expenses primarily consist of unallocated research and development costs, professional services, facilities, depreciation and overhead costs. The increase of $2.2 million, or 28%, for the six months
25
ended June 30, 2025, compared to the same period a year ago, is mainly due to higher facilities and overhead costs, a $1.2 million increase in professional services and a $0.6 million impairment charge related to a capitalized software.
General and Administrative Expenses
General and administrative expenses increased by $5.6 million, or 43%, for the six months ended June 30, 2025, compared to the same period a year ago. The increase primarily relates to a $5.5 million increase in personnel-related costs, including stock-based compensation expense, and a $1.5 million increase in professional services, partially offset by a $1.4 million decrease in facilities and overhead costs. The six months ended June 30, 2024 included a $1.1 million incremental stock-based compensation expense in connection with the former CEO note forgiveness.
Interest Income
Interest income decreased by $2.2 million for the six months ended June 30, 2025, compared to the same period a year ago, primarily due to lower cash, cash equivalents and short-term investment balances in 2025.
Liquidity and Capital Resources
Sources of Liquidity
Since our inception, we have not generated any revenue from product sales and have incurred significant operating losses and negative cash flows from our operations. Through June 30, 2025, we have primarily funded our operations from sales of shares of our redeemable convertible preferred stock, issuances of convertible notes, an upfront payment under the Gilead Agreement and net proceeds from the IPO. As of June 30, 2025, we had $211.7 million in cash, cash equivalents and available-for-sale marketable securities.
On March 27, 2025, we filed a shelf registration statement on Form S-3, or the Registration Statement, covering the offer and sale from time to time of up to $250.0 million in aggregate offering price of shares of our common stock, shares of our preferred stock, debt securities, warrants, rights, units and/or depositary shares. The Registration Statement was declared effective by the SEC on April 15, 2025. The terms of any offering under the Registration Statement will be established at the time of such offering and will be described in a prospectus supplement to the Registration Statement filed with the SEC prior to the completion of any such offering. The Registration Statement included a sales agreement prospectus, or the ATM Prospectus, covering the offer and sale from time to time through or to Jefferies, LLC, or Jefferies, as sales agent, of up to $50.0 million in aggregate offering price of shares of our common stock under an Open Market Sale AgreementSM entered into with Jefferies on March 27, 2025. As of June 30, 2025, $50.0 million remains allocated and available under the ATM Prospectus and $200.0 million remains available and unallocated under the Registration Statement.
Future Funding Requirements
Our primary uses of cash are to fund our operations, which consist primarily of research and development expenditures related to our programs and, to a lesser extent, general and administrative expenditures. We anticipate that we will continue to incur significant and increasing expenses for the foreseeable future as we continue to advance our product candidates, expand our corporate infrastructure, including the costs associated with being a public company, further our research and development initiatives for our product candidates and incur costs associated with the potential commercialization of our product candidates, if approved. We are subject to all of the risks typically related to the development of new drug candidates, and we may encounter unforeseen expenses, difficulties, complications, delays and other unknown factors that may adversely affect our business. We anticipate that we will need substantial additional funding in connection with our continuing operations.
We have incurred significant losses and negative cash flows from operations since our inception. As of June 30, 2025, we had an accumulated deficit of $350.2 million. Based on the current cash forecast, management has determined that our cash, cash equivalents and available-for-sale marketable securities of $211.7 million as of June 30, 2025 will be sufficient to fund our planned operations for at least one year from the date of this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q. This forecast of cash resources and planned operations involves risks and uncertainties, and the actual amount of expenses could vary materially as a result of a number of factors.
Cash used to fund operating expenses is impacted by the timing of when we pay these expenses, as reflected in the change in our outstanding accounts payable, accrued expenses and prepaid expenses.
26
Our future funding requirements will depend on many factors, including, but not limited to, the following:
Furthermore, our operating plans may change, and we may need additional funds to meet operational needs and capital requirements for clinical trials and other research and development expenditures.
Until such time as we can generate significant revenue from product sales, if ever, we expect to finance our operations through public or private equity or debt financings, or potentially other capital sources, such as collaboration or licensing arrangements with third parties or other strategic transactions. There are no assurances that we will be successful in obtaining an adequate level of financing to support our business plans when needed on acceptable terms, or at all. To the extent that we raise additional capital through the sale of equity or convertible debt securities, the ownership interest of our stockholders will or could be diluted, and the terms of these securities may include liquidation or other preferences that adversely affect the rights of our common stockholders. Debt financing and equity financing, if available, may involve agreements that include covenants limiting or restricting our ability to take specific actions, such as incurring additional debt, making capital expenditures or declaring dividends. If we raise additional funds through collaboration or licensing arrangements with third parties or other strategic transactions, we may have to relinquish rights to our intellectual property, future revenue streams, research programs, or product candidates, or we may have to grant licenses on terms that may not be favorable to us. If we are unable to raise capital as and when needed or on attractive terms, we may have to significantly delay, reduce or discontinue the development and commercialization of our product candidates or scale back or terminate our pursuit of new in-licenses and acquisitions.
27
Cash Flows
The following table summarizes our primary sources and uses of cash for the periods presented:
|
|
Six Months Ended June 30, |
|
|||||
|
|
2025 |
|
|
2024 |
|
||
|
|
(in thousands) |
|
|||||
Net cash used in operating activities |
|
$ |
(76,864 |
) |
|
$ |
(49,700 |
) |
Net cash provided by (used in) investing activities |
|
|
34,745 |
|
|
|
(190,800 |
) |
Net cash provided by (used in) financing activities |
|
|
(1,063 |
) |
|
|
337,480 |
|
Net increase in cash and cash equivalents |
|
$ |
(43,182 |
) |
|
$ |
96,980 |
|
Operating Activities
Net cash used in operating activities was $76.9 million and $49.7 million for the six months ended June 30, 2025 and 2024, respectively.
Cash used in operating activities for the six months ended June 30, 2025, was primarily due to our net loss of $86.7 million, decreased by non-cash charges of $3.8 million and by $6.0 million for changes in our net operating assets and liabilities. The non-cash charges primarily consisted of a $4.7 million stock-based compensation expense, a $1.4 million non-cash lease expense, a $1.0 million depreciation and amortization expense and a $0.6 million impairment charge of a capitalized software, partially offset by $4.0 million of income related to the accretion of discounts on available-for-sale marketable securities. The change in our net operating assets and liabilities was primarily due to an increase in accounts payable of $5.2 million, a decrease in prepaid expense and other current assets of $2.0 million, an increase in other accrued expenses and current liabilities of $1.0 million, and an increase in accrued compensation of $0.1 million, partially offset by a decrease in operating lease liability of $1.7 million and an increase in other non-current assets of $0.5 million.
Cash used in operating activities for the six months ended June 30, 2024, was primarily due to our net loss of $55.5 million, decreased by non-cash charges of $3.2 million and increased by a net reduction of $2.6 million in our net operating assets and liabilities. The non-cash charges primarily consisted of a $3.6 million stock-based compensation expense, a $1.2 million non-cash lease expense and a $1.0 million depreciation and amortization expense, partially offset by $2.5 million of income related to the accretion of discounts on available-for-sale marketable securities. The change in our net operating assets and liabilities was primarily due to a decrease in operating lease liability of $1.1 million, a decrease in other non-current assets of $0.3 million and a decrease in accrued compensation of $0.1 million, offset by an increase in other accrued expenses and current liabilities of $2.6 million, an increase in accounts payable by $1.0 million and an increase in prepaid expense and other current assets of $0.5 million.
Investing Activities
Net cash provided by investing activities for the six months ended June 30, 2025, was $34.7 million, which consisted of $210.8 million in proceeds from maturities of available-for-sale marketable securities, offset by $175.9 million of purchases of available-for-sale marketable securities and $0.2 million of capitalized internal-use-software costs.
Net cash used in investing activities for the six months ended June 30, 2024, was $190.8 million, which consisted of $225.2 million of purchases of available-for-sale marketable securities and $1.6 million of purchases of property and equipment, offset by $36.0 million in proceeds from maturities of available-for-sale marketable securities.
Financing Activities
Net cash used in financing activities for the six months ended June 30, 2025, was $1.1 million, which consisted of $0.6 million related to finance lease obligations, $0.4 million related to deferred offering costs paid in connection with the filing of the Registration Statement and less than $0.1 million related to shares withheld for tax obligations payments in connection with RSUs vested during the six months ended June 30, 2025.
Net cash provided by financing activities for the six months ended June 30, 2024, was $337.5 million, which consisted of $341.2 million cash proceeds from the issuance of shares of our common stock in the IPO, net of underwriting discount and less than $0.1 million of proceeds from exercises of stock options, partially offset by $3.4 million payments for deferred offering costs and a payment of $0.5 million related to finance lease obligations.
28
Contractual Obligations and Commitments
We enter into contracts in the normal course of business with CROs for clinical trials, with CMOs for clinical supplies manufacturing and with other vendors for preclinical studies, supplies and other products and services for operating purposes. These agreements generally provide for termination at the request of either party generally with less than one-year notice and, therefore, we believe that our non-cancellable obligations under these agreements are not material.
We have milestone, royalty and other payments due to third parties under our existing license and collaboration agreements. Refer to Note 6 to our condensed financial statements included in this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for additional details. We cannot estimate when such payments will be due and none of these events were probable to occur as of June 30, 2025. As of June 30, 2025, and December 31, 2024, we recognized a sublicensing fee of $6.3 million in our condensed balance sheets related to the fee due under our Kite Agreement as discussed in Note 6 to our condensed financial statements included in this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q.
As of June 30, 2025, we leased approximately 68,000 square feet of office and laboratory space in Emeryville, California under operating leases which have terms through February 2027. We also have multiple leases for laboratory equipment with 36-month terms that are accounted for as finance leases. As of June 30, 2025, our non-cancellable lease obligations were $6.0 million and $0.3 million under operating and finance leases, respectively, of which $3.8 million and $0.3 million related to operating and finance leases, respectively, are due within the next 12 months.
Recently Issued Accounting Pronouncements
A description of recently issued accounting pronouncements that may potentially impact our financial position, results of operations or cash flows is disclosed in Note 2 to our condensed financial statements included elsewhere in this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q.
Critical Accounting Estimates
Our significant accounting policies and critical accounting estimates are described in Note 2 to our audited financial statements for the year ended December 31, 2024 included in Part II, Item 8 of our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2024, filed with the SEC on March 27, 2025. There have been no material changes to our significant accounting policies or critical accounting estimates during the six months ended June 30, 2025.
Emerging Growth Company and Smaller Reporting Company Status
We are an emerging growth company, as defined in the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act of 2012, or the JOBS Act. Under the JOBS Act, emerging growth companies can delay adopting new or revised accounting standards issued subsequent to the enactment of the JOBS Act until such time as those standards apply to private companies. We have elected to use this extended transition period for complying with new or revised accounting standards that have different effective dates for public and private companies until the earlier of the date that we (a) are no longer an emerging growth company or (b) affirmatively and irrevocably opt out of the extended transition period provided in the JOBS Act. As a result, our condensed financial statements may not be comparable to those of companies that comply with the new or revised accounting pronouncements as of public company effective dates. We may choose to early adopt any new or revised accounting standards whenever such early adoption is permitted for private companies.
We are also a “smaller reporting company.” If we are a smaller reporting company at the time we cease to be an emerging growth company, we may continue to rely on exemptions from certain disclosure requirements that are available to smaller reporting companies. Specifically, as a smaller reporting company, we may choose to present only the two most recent fiscal years of audited consolidated financial statements in our Form 10-K and, similar to emerging growth companies, smaller reporting companies have reduced disclosure obligations regarding executive compensation.
Item 3. Quantitative and Qualitative Disclosures About Market Risk.
We are a smaller reporting company, as defined by Rule 12b-2 of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, or the Exchange Act, and are not required to provide the information required under this item.
29
Item 4. Controls and Procedures.
Evaluation of Disclosure Controls and Procedures
Our management, with the participation of our Chief Executive Officer, or the CEO, and Chief Financial Officer, or the CFO (our principal executive officer and principal financial officer, respectively), evaluated the effectiveness of our disclosure controls and procedures as of June 30, 2025. The term “disclosure controls and procedures,” as defined in Rules 13a-15(e) and 15d-15(e) under the Exchange Act, means controls and other procedures of an issuer that are designed to ensure that information required to be disclosed by an issuer in the reports that it files or submits under the Exchange Act is recorded, processed, summarized and reported, within the time periods specified in the SEC’s rules and forms. Disclosure controls and procedures include, without limitation, controls and procedures designed to ensure that information required to be disclosed by an issuer in the reports that it files or submits under the Exchange Act is accumulated and communicated to the issuer’s management, including its principal executive and principal financial officers, or persons performing similar functions, as appropriate to allow timely decisions regarding required disclosure.
Based on their evaluation, the CEO and the CFO have concluded that our disclosure controls and procedures were not effective as of June 30, 2025, because of the material weaknesses in our internal control over financial reporting described below, which we continued remediating as of June 30, 2025.
A material weakness is a deficiency, or a combination of deficiencies, in internal control over financial reporting, such that there is a reasonable possibility that a material misstatement of annual or interim financial statements will not be prevented or detected on a timely basis.
In connection with our audit of the financial statements for the year ended December 31, 2024, we identified material weaknesses in the design and operating effectiveness of our internal control over financial reporting related to the fact that we did not appropriately design and maintain entity-level controls impacting the control environment, risk assessment, control activities, information and communication and monitoring activities to prevent or detect material misstatements to the financial statements. These material weaknesses related to (i) an insufficient number of qualified resources to ensure adequate oversight and accountability over the performance of controls, including retention of control evidence, (ii) ineffective identification and assessment of risks impacting internal control over financial reporting, and (iii) insufficient evaluation and determination as to whether the components of internal controls were present and functioning based upon evidence maintained for management review controls and activity level controls across substantially all financial statement areas. These material weaknesses continue to exist as of June 30, 2025.
These material weaknesses contributed to the following additional material weakness: we did not design and maintain effective (i) general controls over information systems that support the financial reporting process, (ii) controls over the completeness and accuracy of information used in the operation of control activities across substantially all financial statement areas, and (iii) management review controls at a sufficient level of precision to detect a material misstatement across substantially all financial statement areas that involve complex and judgmental areas of accounting and disclosure.
There were no adjustments that resulted from the above material weaknesses. However, these material weaknesses could result in a misstatement of substantially all of our accounts or disclosures that would result in a material misstatement of our annual or interim financial statements that would not be prevented or detected.
Notwithstanding the material weakness, we believe that the financial statements contained in this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q fairly present our financial position, results of operations and cash flows for the periods covered by this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q in all material respects.
Remediation Plans
During the year ended December 31, 2024, and as of June 30, 2025, our management, with the oversight of the Audit Committee of our board of directors, took substantial measures toward remediating the control deficiencies contributing to the material weaknesses described in detail in our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2024. These remediation efforts have continued during the quarter ended June 30, 2025 and as of the quarter ended June 30, 2025,
30
we have completed the design and implementation of substantially all controls necessary to remediate the material weaknesses previously identified.
However, we have determined that the controls implemented have not operated for a sufficient period of time to fully conclude that the material weaknesses have been remediated as of June 30, 2025. Our management is committed to continuing to make efforts to address each of the identified material weaknesses and believes the measures described above and upon completion of further operation and testing of the required controls will remediate the remaining material weaknesses and strengthen our internal control over financial reporting. This remediation process may require additional resources and will require time to implement. Refer to the "Limitation on the Effectiveness of Controls" section below. We will continue to monitor the effectiveness of these remediation measures.
Changes in Internal Control Over Financial Reporting
Except as discussed above under “Remediation Plans”, there were no other changes in our internal control over financial reporting during the quarter ended June 30, 2025, that have materially affected, or are reasonably likely to materially affect, our internal control over financial reporting.
Limitations on the Effectiveness of Controls
In designing and evaluating the disclosure controls and procedures, management recognizes that because of the inherent limitations in all control systems, no evaluation of controls can provide absolute assurance that all control issues and instances of fraud, if any, within the Company have been or would be detected. These inherent limitations include the realities that judgments in decision-making can be faulty, and that breakdowns can occur because of a simple error or mistake. Additionally, controls can be circumvented by the individual acts of some persons, by collusion of two or more people or by management override of the controls. The design of any system of controls is also based in part upon certain assumptions about the likelihood of future events, and there can be no assurance that any design will succeed in achieving its stated goals under all potential future conditions; over time, controls may become inadequate because of changes in conditions, or the degree of compliance with policies or procedures may deteriorate. In addition, the design of disclosure controls and procedures reflect the fact that there are resource constraints and the benefits of controls and procedures will be considered relative to their costs.
31
PART II—OTHER INFORMATION
Item 1. Legal Proceedings.
From time to time, we may be involved in legal proceedings arising in the ordinary course of our business. In December 2024, a shareholder class action complaint was filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California against our Company, certain of our current and former officers and directors, and the underwriters of our initial public offering. Per a stipulated schedule, an amended complaint was filed on May 2, 2025, or the Amended Complaint. The Amended Complaint alleges that the registration statement on Form S-1 filed in connection with our initial public offering and the prospectus contained therein contained material misstatements or omissions in violation of federal securities laws. Pursuant to a stipulated order setting a response schedule, on June 26, 2025, the defendants filed a motion to dismiss the Amended Complaint.
In addition, on May 14, 2025, a stockholder derivative complaint was filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California against certain of our current and former officers and directors which was captioned Perez v. Seidenberg, et al., Case No. 3:25-cv-04163-PCP, or the Perez Action. On May 22, 2025, another stockholder derivative complaint was filed alleging the same claims against the same individual defendants captioned McDaniel v. Seidenberg, et al., Case No. 3:25-cv-04393-PCP, or the McDaniel Action, and together with the Perez Action, the Derivative Actions. The complaints filed in the Derivative Actions allege claims related to the allegations raised in the Amended Complaint. On June 2, 2025, the court entered a stipulation and order to stay the Perez Action pending the disposition of a motion to dismiss the Amended Complaint in the related securities class action. On June 25, 2025, the court entered a stipulation and order to consolidate the Derivative Actions as In re Kyverna Therapeutics Derivative Litigation, Case No. 5:25-cv-04163-PCP. Finally, on July 22, 2025, the court entered a stipulation and order staying the consolidated derivative action pending the disposition of the motion to dismiss the Amended Complaint in the related securities class action.
We believe we have good and substantial defenses to the claims in the Amended Complaint and the Derivative Actions, but there is no guarantee that we will be successful in these efforts. We are unable to determine whether any loss ultimately will occur or to estimate the range of such loss; therefore, no amount of loss has been accrued by us in our financial statements as of and for the quarter ended June 30, 2025. Regardless of outcome, litigation can have an adverse impact on us due to defense and settlement costs, diversion of management resources, negative publicity, reputational harm and other factors.
Item 1A. Risk Factors.
Investing in our common stock involves a high degree of risk. Before making an investment decision, you should carefully consider the risks described herein, as well as the risks and uncertainties discussed above under “Special Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements”, before deciding whether to invest in our common stock. Our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2024, filed with the SEC on March 27, 2025, in Part I –Item 1A, Risk Factors, describes important risk factors that could cause our business, financial condition, results of operations and growth prospects to differ materially from those indicated or suggested by forward-looking statements made in this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q or presented elsewhere by management from time to time. Additional risks and uncertainties not currently known to us or that we currently deem to be immaterial may also materially and adversely affect our business. Risk factors marked with an asterisk (*) below include a change from or an update to the risk factors included in our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2024, filed with the SEC on March 27, 2025.
Risk Factor Summary
Below is a summary of material factors that make an investment in our securities speculative or risky. Importantly, this summary does not address all of the risks that we face. Additional discussion of the risks and uncertainties summarized in this risk factor summary, as well as other risks that we face, follows this summary. This summary is qualified in its entirety by that more complete discussion of such risks and uncertainties:
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Risks Related to Our Business, Limited Operating History and Financial Position
*We have limited operating history, have incurred substantial net losses and anticipate that we will continue to incur net losses for the foreseeable future. We have no products approved for commercial sale, have never generated any revenue from product sales and may never be profitable.
We are a clinical stage biotechnology company with a limited operating history. We were formed in 2018 and we have devoted substantially all of our efforts and financial resources to organizing and staffing our company, business planning, raising capital, discovering product candidates and securing related intellectual property rights, and conducting research and development activities for our product candidates, including KYV-101. Consequently, we have no meaningful operations upon which to evaluate our business and predictions about our future success, and viability may not be as accurate as they could be if we had a longer operating history or a history of successfully developing and commercializing program candidates. Investment in biotechnology product development is highly speculative because it entails substantial upfront capital expenditures and significant risk that any potential product candidate will fail to demonstrate adequate effect or an acceptable safety profile, gain regulatory approval and become commercially viable. We have not yet demonstrated the ability to progress any product candidate through clinical trials, we have no products approved for commercial sale and we have not generated any revenue from product sales to date. We continue to incur significant research and development and other expenses related to our ongoing operations. As a result, we are not profitable and we have incurred net losses since our inception through June 30, 2025. For the six months ended June 30, 2025 and 2024, we reported a net loss of $86.7 million and $55.5 million, respectively. As of June 30, 2025, we had an accumulated deficit of $350.2 million. We expect to continue to incur significant losses for the foreseeable future, and we expect these losses to increase as we continue our research and development of our product candidates, and seek regulatory approvals for our product candidates.
We anticipate that our expenses will increase substantially if, and as, we:
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To become and remain profitable, we and any current or potential future collaborators must develop and eventually commercialize products with significant market potential. This will require us to be successful in a range of challenging activities, including completing preclinical studies and clinical trials, obtaining marketing approval for product candidates, manufacturing, marketing and selling products if we obtain marketing approval, obtaining market acceptance for such products and satisfying any post-marketing requirements. We may never succeed in any or all of these activities and, even if we do, we may never generate revenue that is significant or large enough to achieve profitability. If we do achieve profitability, we may not be able to sustain or increase profitability on a quarterly or annual basis. Our failure to become and remain profitable would decrease the value of our company and the price or of common stock, and could impair our ability to raise capital, maintain our research and development efforts, expand our business or continue our operations. A decline in the value of our company also could cause you to lose all or part of your investment.
Even if we succeed in commercializing one or more of our product candidates, we will continue to incur substantial research and development and other expenditures to develop and market additional product candidates. We also may encounter unforeseen expenses, difficulties, complications, delays and other unknown factors that may adversely affect our business. The size of our future net losses will depend, in part, on the rate of future growth of our expenses and our ability to generate revenue. Our prior losses and expected future losses have had and will continue to have an adverse effect on our stockholders’ (deficit) equity and working capital.
We will require substantial additional capital to finance our operations. If we are unable to raise such capital when needed, or on acceptable terms, we may be forced to delay, reduce and/or eliminate one or more of our research and drug development programs or future commercialization efforts.
Developing pharmaceutical products, including conducting preclinical studies and clinical trials, is a very time-consuming, expensive and uncertain process that takes years to complete. Our operations have consumed substantial amounts of cash since our inception. We expect to continue to spend substantial amounts to continue the preclinical and clinical development of, and seek regulatory approval for, KYV-101 and any future product candidates.
Because the design and outcome of our planned and anticipated preclinical studies and clinical trials are highly uncertain, we cannot reasonably estimate the actual amounts necessary to successfully complete the development and commercialization of any product candidates we develop. If we are required by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, or the FDA, or any comparable foreign regulatory authority to perform clinical trials or preclinical studies in addition to those that we currently anticipate, our expenses could increase. In addition, if we obtain regulatory approval to market any of our product candidates, we expect to incur significant commercialization expenses related to product sales, marketing, manufacturing and distribution. Other unanticipated costs may also arise.
We will incur additional costs associated with operating as a public company. Accordingly, we will need to obtain substantial additional funding in order to maintain our continuing operations.
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Until such time as we can generate significant revenue from sales of our product candidates, if ever, we will be required to obtain further funding through public or private equity offerings, debt financings, collaborations and licensing arrangements or other sources, which may dilute our stockholders or restrict our operating activities. Adequate additional financing may not be available to us on acceptable terms, or at all. Our failure to raise capital as and when needed or on acceptable terms would have a negative impact on our financial condition and our ability to pursue our business strategy, and we may have to delay, reduce the scope of, suspend or eliminate one or more of our research-stage programs, clinical trials or future commercialization efforts.
Our business depends entirely on the success of our product candidates and we cannot guarantee that any or all of our product candidates will successfully complete development, receive regulatory approval, or be successfully commercialized. If we are unable to develop, receive regulatory approval for, and ultimately successfully commercialize our product candidates, or experience significant delays in doing so, our business will be materially harmed.
We currently have no products approved for commercial sale or for which regulatory approval to market has been sought. We have invested a significant portion of our efforts and financial resources in the development of our product candidates, each of which is still in clinical development, and expect that we will continue to invest heavily in these product candidates, as well as in any future product candidates we may develop. Our business and our ability to generate revenue, which we do not expect will occur for many years, if ever, are substantially dependent on our ability to develop, obtain regulatory approval for, and then successfully commercialize our product candidates, which may never occur.
Our product candidates will require substantial additional preclinical and clinical development time, regulatory approval, commercial manufacturing arrangements, establishment of a commercial organization, significant marketing efforts and further investment before we can generate any revenue from product sales. We currently generate no revenue and we may never be able to develop or commercialize any products. We cannot assure you that we will meet our timelines for our current or future clinical trials, which may be delayed or not completed for a number of reasons. Our product candidates are susceptible to the risks of failure inherent at any stage of product development, including the appearance of unexpected adverse events or failure to achieve primary endpoints in clinical trials.
Even if our product candidates are successful in clinical trials, we will not be permitted to market or promote any of our product candidates until we receive regulatory approval from the FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authorities, and we may never receive sufficient regulatory approval that will allow us to successfully commercialize any product candidates. If we do not receive FDA or comparable foreign regulatory approval with the necessary conditions to allow commercialization, we will not be able to generate revenue from those product candidates in the United States or elsewhere in the foreseeable future, or at all. Any significant delays in obtaining approval for and commercializing our product candidates could adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.
We cannot be certain that our current or any future product candidates will be successful in clinical trials or receive regulatory approval. The FDA may also consider its approvals of competing products, which may alter the treatment landscape concurrently with their review of our investigational new drug applications, or INDs, or other submissions, and which may lead to changes in the FDA’s review requirements that have been previously communicated to us and our interpretation thereof, including changes to requirements for clinical data or clinical trial design. Such changes could delay approval or necessitate withdrawal of our INDs or other submissions.
If any of our product candidates is approved for marketing by applicable regulatory authorities, our ability to generate revenue from such product will depend on our ability to:
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We will incur significant increased costs as a result of operating as a public company, and our management will be required to devote substantial time and resources to new compliance initiatives.
As a public company, we are subject to the reporting requirements of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, or the Exchange Act, the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, or the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, the listing requirements of The Nasdaq Stock Market LLC, or Nasdaq, and other applicable securities rules and regulations. Complying with these rules and regulations has increased and will increase our legal and financial compliance costs, make some activities more difficult, time consuming or costly and increase demand on our systems and resources. The Exchange Act requires, among other things, that we file annual, quarterly and current reports with respect to our business and operating results. The Sarbanes-Oxley Act requires, among other things, that we maintain effective disclosure controls and procedures and internal control over financial reporting. We are required to disclose changes made in our internal control and procedures on a quarterly basis. In order to maintain and, if required, improve our disclosure controls and procedures and internal control over financial reporting to meet this standard, significant resources and management oversight may be required. As a result, management’s attention may be diverted from other business concerns, which could significantly harm our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects. We plan to hire additional financial reporting, internal controls and other finance personnel or consultants in order to develop and implement appropriate internal controls and reporting procedures, which will increase our costs and expenses.
In addition, changing laws, regulations and standards relating to corporate governance and public disclosure are creating uncertainty for public companies, increasing legal and financial compliance costs and making some activities more time consuming. These laws, regulations and standards are subject to varying interpretations, in many cases due to their lack of specificity and, as a result, their application in practice may evolve over time as new guidance is provided by regulatory and governing bodies. This could result in continuing uncertainty regarding compliance matters and higher costs necessitated by ongoing revisions to disclosure and governance practices. We intend to invest resources to comply with evolving laws, regulations and standards, and this investment may result in increased general and administrative expenses and a diversion of management’s time and attention from revenue-generating activities to compliance activities. If our efforts to comply with new laws, regulations and standards differ from the activities intended by regulatory or governing bodies due to ambiguities related to their application and practice, regulatory authorities may initiate legal proceedings against us and our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects may be significantly harmed.
We have identified material weaknesses in our internal control over financial reporting. If we fail to remediate these material weaknesses, or if we experience additional material weaknesses in the future or otherwise fail to maintain effective internal control over financial reporting in the future, we may not be able to accurately or timely report our financial condition or results of operations, which may adversely affect investor confidence in us and, as a result, the value of our common stock.
As discussed in Part II, Item 9A of our Annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2024, we previously identified material weaknesses in the design and operating effectiveness of our internal control over financial reporting. A material weakness is a deficiency, or combination of deficiencies, in internal control over financial reporting,
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such that there is a reasonable possibility that a material misstatement of the annual or interim financial statements will not be prevented or detected on a timely basis.
We did not appropriately design and maintain entity-level controls impacting the control environment, risk assessment, control activities, information and communication and monitoring activities to prevent or detect material misstatements to the financial statements. These material weaknesses related to (i) an insufficient number of qualified resources to ensure adequate oversight and accountability over the performance of controls, including retention of control evidence, (ii) ineffective identification and assessment of risks impacting internal control over financial reporting, and (iii) insufficient evaluation and determination as to whether the components of internal controls were present and functioning based upon evidence maintained for management review controls and activity level controls across substantially all financial statement areas.
These material weaknesses contributed to the following additional material weakness: we did not design and maintain effective (i) general controls over information systems that support the financial reporting process, (ii) controls over the completeness and accuracy of information used in the operation of control activities across substantially all financial statement areas, and (iii) management review controls at a sufficient level of precision to detect a material misstatement across substantially all financial statement areas that involve complex and judgmental areas of accounting and disclosure.
These material weaknesses could result in a misstatement of substantially all of our accounts or disclosures that would result in a material misstatement of our annual or interim financial statements that would not be prevented or detected.
During the year ended December 31, 2024, and as of June 30, 2025, our management, with the oversight of the Audit Committee of our board of directors, took substantial measures toward remediating the control deficiencies contributing to the material weaknesses described in detail in our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2024. These remediation efforts have continued during the quarter ended June 30, 2025 and as of the quarter ended June 30, 2025, we have completed the design and implementation of substantially all controls necessary to remediate the material weaknesses previously identified. Specifically, we completed our annual risk assessment and continued to focus on the principles of the Committee of Sponsoring Organizations of the Treadway Commission, or COSO, framework related to risk assessment; and we have hired additional accounting and IT personnel, including but not limited to a Vice President of Accounting/Corporate Controller, a Head of Information Technology, and an Assistant Controller. We have designed and implemented entity level controls across each of the COSO components necessary for effective internal control; we have designed and implemented general controls over information systems across our relevant financial systems; we have designed and implemented the necessary management review controls across all financial statement areas; and we continued to perform manual procedures to validate the completeness and accuracy of certain reports generated from various financial systems that are relevant to the preparation of the financial statements.
However, we have determined that the controls implemented have not operated for a sufficient period of time to fully conclude that the material weaknesses have been remediated as of June 30, 2025. Our management is committed to continuing to make efforts to address each of the identified material weaknesses and believes the measures described above and upon completion of further operation and testing of the required controls will remediate the remaining material weaknesses and strengthen our internal control over financial reporting. This remediation process may require additional resources and will require time to implement.
We may discover additional weaknesses in our system of internal financial and accounting controls and procedures that could result in a material misstatement of our financial statements. Our internal control over financial reporting will not prevent or detect all errors and all fraud. A control system, no matter how well designed and operated, can provide only reasonable, not absolute, assurance that the control system’s objectives will be met. We may not be able to implement improvements to our management information and control systems in an efficient or timely manner and may discover deficiencies in existing systems and controls. Because of the inherent limitations in all control systems, no evaluation of controls can provide absolute assurance that misstatements due to error or fraud will not occur or that all control issues and instances of fraud will be detected.
If we are not able to comply with the requirements of Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in a timely manner, or if we are unable to maintain proper and effective internal controls, we may not be able to produce timely and accurate financial statements. If that were to happen, our investors could lose confidence in our reported financial information, the market price of our stock could decline and we could be subject to sanctions or investigations by the SEC or other regulatory authorities. Refer to the section titled “Controls and Procedures” in Part II, Item 9A of our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2024.
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If our product candidates, if approved, do not achieve broad market acceptance, the revenue that we generate from their sales will be limited.
We have never commercialized a product candidate for any indication. Even if our product candidates are approved by the appropriate regulatory authorities for marketing and sale, they may not gain acceptance among physicians, patients, third-party payors and others in the medical community. If any product candidate for which we obtain regulatory approval does not gain an adequate level of market acceptance, we may not generate sufficient product revenue or become profitable.
The degree of market acceptance of any of our product candidates will depend on a number of factors, some of which are beyond our control, including:
Our efforts to educate the medical community and third-party payors as to the benefits of our product candidates may require significant resources and may never be successful. Even if the medical community accepts that our product candidates are safe and effective for their approved indications, physicians and patients may not immediately be receptive to such product candidates and may be slow to adopt them as an accepted treatment of the approved indications. If our current or future product candidates are approved, but do not achieve an adequate level of acceptance among physicians, patients, and third-party payors, we may not generate meaningful revenue from our product candidates and may never become profitable.
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Our business entails a significant risk of product liability and our ability to obtain sufficient insurance coverage could adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.
As we conduct clinical trials of our current or future product candidates and as our product candidates are used in named patient activities, we are exposed to significant product liability risks inherent in the development, testing, manufacturing and marketing of new treatments. Product liability claims could delay or prevent completion of our development programs. If we succeed in marketing products, such claims could result in FDA, the European Medicines Agency, or the EMA, or other investigation of the safety and effectiveness of our future product candidates, our manufacturing processes and facilities or our marketing programs and potentially a recall of our products or more serious enforcement action, limitations on the approved indications for which they may be used or suspension or withdrawal of approvals. Regardless of the merits or eventual outcome, liability claims may also result in decreased demand for our product candidates, termination of clinical trial sites or entire trial programs, withdrawal of clinical trial participants, injury to our reputation and significant negative media attention, significant costs to defend the related litigation, a diversion of management’s time and our resources from our business operations, substantial monetary awards to trial participants or patients, loss of revenue, the inability to commercialize and products that we may develop, and a decline in our stock price. We believe we may face greater risks with respect to our product candidates than many other biotechnology candidates because our product candidates are being developed to address conditions for which many prior products and product technologies have been unsuccessful. In addition, the patient population that our product candidates are seeking to target are often heavily immunosuppressed and may be more likely to experience serious adverse events with potential treatments and have higher morbidity rates generally than other patient populations. We may need to obtain higher levels of product liability insurance for later stages of clinical development or marketing any of our product candidates. Any insurance we may obtain may not provide sufficient coverage against potential liabilities. Furthermore, clinical trial and product liability insurance is becoming increasingly expensive. As a result, we may be unable to obtain sufficient insurance at a reasonable cost to protect us against losses caused by product liability claims that could adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.
*We will need to grow our organization, and we may experience difficulties in managing our growth and expanding our operations, which could adversely affect our business. In addition, if we lose key management or other scientific or clinical personnel, or if we fail to recruit additional highly skilled personnel, our business, results of operations and financial condition could be adversely affected.
As of June 30, 2025, we had 129 full-time employees. As our development and commercialization plans and strategies develop, and as we transition into operating as a public company, we expect to expand our employee base for managerial, operational, financial and other resources. In addition, we have limited experience in manufacturing, marketing and commercialization. As our product candidates enter and advance through preclinical studies and clinical trials, we will need to expand our development and regulatory capabilities and contract with other organizations to provide manufacturing and other capabilities for us. In the future, we expect to have to manage additional relationships with collaborators or partners, suppliers and other organizations. Our ability to manage our operations and future growth will require us to continue to improve our operational, financial and management controls, reporting systems and procedures. Our inability to successfully manage our growth and expand our operations could adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.
In addition, our success depends in part on our continued ability to attract, retain and motivate highly qualified management, clinical and scientific personnel. We are highly dependent upon our Chief Executive Officer and other members of our management team. The loss of services of any of these individuals could delay or prevent the successful development of our product pipeline, initiation or completion of our preclinical studies and clinical trials or the commercialization of our product candidates. Although we have executed employment agreements or offer letters with each member of our senior management team, these agreements are terminable at will with or without notice and, therefore, we may not be able to retain their services as expected. We do not currently maintain “key person” life insurance on the lives of our executives or any of our employees. This lack of insurance means that we may not have adequate compensation for the loss of the services of these individuals.
We will need to expand and effectively manage our managerial, operational, financial and other resources in order to successfully pursue our clinical development and commercialization efforts. We may not be successful in maintaining our unique company culture and continuing to attract or retain qualified management and scientific and clinical personnel in the future due to the intense competition for qualified personnel among biopharmaceutical, biotechnology and other businesses, particularly in the greater San Francisco Bay Area. Given the scarcity of professionals with the scientific knowledge that we require and the competition for qualified personnel among biotechnology businesses, we may not succeed in attracting or retaining the personnel we require to continue and grow our operations. If we are not able to attract, integrate, retain and
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motivate necessary personnel to accomplish our business objectives, we may experience constraints that will significantly impede the achievement of our development objectives, our ability to raise additional capital and our ability to implement our business strategy.
Our employees, independent contractors, consultants, commercial partners and vendors may engage in misconduct or other improper activities, including noncompliance with regulatory standards and requirements, which could adversely affect our business, results of operations and financial condition.
We are exposed to the risk of fraud or other misconduct by our employees, contractors or partners. Misconduct by these parties could include failures to comply with FDA regulations or comparable foreign regulations, to provide accurate information to the FDA or comparable foreign authorities, to comply with federal, state or foreign healthcare fraud and abuse laws and regulations, to report financial information or data timely, completely or accurately, or to disclose unauthorized activities to us, or failure to comply with comparable foreign requirements. It is not always possible to identify and deter misconduct, and the precautions we take to detect and prevent this activity may not be effective in controlling unknown or unmanaged risks or losses or in protecting us from governmental investigations or other actions or lawsuits stemming from a failure to comply with these laws or regulations. If any such actions are instituted against us resulting from this misconduct and we are not successful in defending ourselves or asserting our rights, those actions could have a significant impact on our business, including the imposition of significant civil, criminal and administrative penalties, damages, fines, disgorgement, imprisonment, exclusion from government funded healthcare programs, such as Medicare and Medicaid or comparable foreign equivalents, integrity oversight and reporting obligations, and the curtailment or restructuring of our operations.
We enter into various contracts in the normal course of our business in which we indemnify the other party to the contract. In the event we have to perform under these indemnification provisions, it could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.
In the normal course of business, we periodically enter into academic, commercial, service, collaboration, licensing, consulting and other agreements that contain indemnification provisions. With respect to our academic and other research agreements, we typically indemnify the institution and related parties from losses arising from claims relating to the products, processes or services made, used, sold or performed pursuant to the agreements for which we have secured licenses, and from claims arising from our or our potential sublicensees’ exercise of rights under the agreement. With respect to our commercial agreements, we indemnify our vendors from any third-party product liability claims that could result from the production, use or consumption of the product, as well as for alleged infringements of any patent or other intellectual property right by a third party.
Should our obligation under an indemnification provision exceed applicable insurance coverage or if we were denied insurance coverage, our business, financial condition and results of operations could be adversely affected. Similarly, if we are relying on a collaborator to indemnify us and the collaborator is denied insurance coverage or the indemnification obligation exceeds the applicable insurance coverage, and if the collaborator does not have other assets available to indemnify us, our business, financial condition and results of operations could be adversely affected.
Our ability to use our net operating loss, or NOL, carryforwards and certain other tax attributes to offset taxable income or taxes may be limited.
We have incurred substantial losses during our history and do not expect to become profitable in the near future, and we may never achieve profitability. As of December 31, 2024, we had federal NOL carryforwards of $79.2 million and state NOL carryforwards of $205.2 million. Under the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended, or the Code, our U.S. federal net operating losses will not expire and may be carried forward indefinitely but the deductibility of federal net operating losses is limited to no more than 80% of current year taxable income (with certain adjustments). In addition, under Sections 382 and 383 of the Code, if a corporation undergoes an “ownership change,” generally defined as a greater than 50 percentage point change (by value) in its equity ownership by certain stockholders over a three-year period, the corporation’s ability to use its pre-change NOL carryforwards and other pre-change tax attributes to offset its post-change income or taxes may be limited. We have performed a Section 382 study as of December 31, 2023, and expect approximately $2.0 million of federal net operating losses and $1.9 million California net operating losses to expire unused due to Section 382 limitations. As of December 31, 2024, the Section 382 study was updated and we concluded that there were no ownership changes during 2024. Furthermore, there may be additional ownership changes in the future, including as a result of subsequent changes in our stock ownership, some of which may be outside of our control. As a result, if we undergo an ownership change, and our ability to use our pre-change NOL carryforwards and other pre-change tax attributes (such as research tax credits) to offset our post-change income or taxes is limited, it would harm our future results of operations by effectively increasing our future
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tax obligations. Similar provisions of state tax law may also apply to limit our use of accumulated state tax attributes. In addition, at the state level, there may be periods during which the use of net operating losses is suspended or otherwise limited, which could accelerate or permanently increase state taxes owed. As a result, even if we attain profitability, we may be unable to use all or a material portion of our net operating losses and other tax attributes, which could adversely affect our future cash flows.
*Recent and future changes to tax laws could materially adversely affect our company.
The tax regimes we are subject to or operate under, including with respect to income and non-income taxes, are unsettled and may be subject to significant change. Changes in tax laws, regulations, or rulings, or changes in interpretations of existing laws and regulations, could materially adversely affect our company. For example, the Tax Cuts and JOBS Act, the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act, and the Inflation Reduction Act, or the IRA, enacted many significant changes to the U.S. tax laws. Future guidance from the Internal Revenue Service and other tax authorities with respect to such legislation may affect us, and certain aspects thereof could be repealed or modified in future legislation. For example, the IRA includes provisions that will impact the U.S. federal income taxation of certain corporations, including imposing a 15% minimum tax on the book income of certain large corporations and a 1% excise tax on certain corporate stock repurchases that would be imposed on the corporation repurchasing such stock. Additionally, new income, sales, use or other tax laws, statutes, rules, regulations or ordinances could be enacted at any time, which could adversely affect our business operations and financial performance. Further, existing tax laws, statutes, rules, regulations or ordinances could be interpreted, changed, modified or applied adversely to us. For example, on July 4, 2025, legislation commonly referred to as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act was signed into law and extended many of the tax law provisions that were set to expire in 2025. Further changes to the tax laws or changes to the administrative or judicial interpretations of such laws are possible and may apply with retroactive effect. It is also uncertain if and to what extent various states will conform to federal tax laws. In addition, many countries in Europe, as well as a number of other countries and organizations (including the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and the European Commission), have proposed, recommended, or (in the case of countries) enacted or otherwise become subject to changes to existing tax laws or new tax laws that could significantly increase our tax obligations in the countries where we do business or require us to change the manner in which we operate our business. Future tax reform legislation could have a material impact on the value of our deferred tax assets, could result in significant one-time charges, and could increase our future tax expense.
Our operations are concentrated in one location, and we or the third parties upon whom we depend may be adversely affected by a wildfire and earthquake or other natural disasters and our business continuity and disaster recovery plans may not adequately protect us from a serious disaster.
Our current operations are predominantly located in California. Any unplanned event, such as a flood, wildfire, explosion, earthquake, extreme weather condition, epidemic or pandemic, power outage, telecommunications failure or other natural or manmade accidents or incidents that result in us being unable to fully utilize our facilities may have a material and adverse effect on our ability to operate our business, particularly on a daily basis, and have significant negative consequences on our financial and operating conditions. Any similar impacts of natural or manmade disasters on our third-party CMOs and contract research organizations, or CROs, could cause delays in our clinical trials and may have a material and adverse effect on our ability to operate our business and have significant negative consequences on our financial and operating conditions. If a natural disaster, power outage or other event occurred that prevented us from using our clinical sites, impacted clinical supply or the conduct of our clinical trials, that damaged critical infrastructure, such as the manufacturing facilities of our third-party CMOs, or that otherwise disrupted operations, it may be difficult or, in certain cases, impossible, for us to continue our business for a substantial period of time. The disaster recovery and business continuity plans we and our CMOs and CROs have in place may prove inadequate in the event of a serious disaster or similar event. In the event of an accident or incident at these facilities, we cannot assure you that the amounts of insurance we currently carry will be sufficient to satisfy any damages and losses. If our facilities, or the manufacturing facilities of our CMOs or CROs, are unable to operate because of an accident or incident or for any other reason, even for a short period of time, any or all of our development programs may be harmed. Any business interruption could adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.
The increasing use of social media platforms presents new risks and challenges.
Social media is increasingly being used to communicate about our clinical development programs and the diseases our product candidates are being developed to treat. We intend to utilize appropriate social media in connection with communicating about our development programs. Social media practices in the biopharmaceutical industry continue to evolve and regulations relating to such use are not always clear. This evolution creates uncertainty and risk of noncompliance
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with regulations applicable to our business. For example, patients may use social media channels to report an alleged adverse event during a clinical trial. When such disclosures occur, we may fail to monitor and comply with applicable adverse event reporting obligations, or we may not be able to defend our business or the public’s legitimate interests in the face of the political and market pressures generated by social media due to restrictions on what we may say about our investigational products. There is also a risk of inappropriate disclosure of sensitive information or negative or inaccurate posts or comments about us on any social networking website, or a risk that a post on a social networking website by any of our employees may be construed as inappropriate promotion. If any of these events were to occur or we otherwise fail to comply with applicable regulations, we could incur liability, face regulatory actions, or incur other harm to our business.
Unfavorable global economic conditions, including any adverse macroeconomic conditions or geopolitical events could adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations or liquidity, either directly or through adverse impacts on certain of the third parties on which we rely to conduct certain aspects of our preclinical studies or clinical trials.
Our results of operations could be adversely affected by general conditions in the global economy and in the global financial markets. The global credit and financial markets have experienced extreme volatility and disruptions in the past several years, including severely diminished liquidity and credit availability, rising inflation and monetary supply shifts, rising interest rates, labor shortages, declines in consumer confidence, declines in economic growth, increases in unemployment rates, recession risks, and uncertainty about economic and geopolitical stability. Following the COVID-19 pandemic and in connection with geopolitical conflicts, global economic and business activities continue to face widespread uncertainties. A severe or prolonged economic downturn, or additional global financial or political crises, could result in a variety of risks to our business, including delayed clinical trials or preclinical studies, delayed approval of our product candidates, delayed ability to obtain patents and other intellectual property protection, weakened demand for our product candidates, if approved, or our ability to raise additional capital when needed on acceptable terms, if at all. The extent of the impact of these conditions on our operational and financial performance, including our ability to execute our business strategies and initiatives in the expected timeframe, as well as that of third parties upon whom we rely, will depend on future developments which are uncertain and cannot be predicted. A weak or declining economy also could strain our suppliers, possibly resulting in supply disruption. Any of the foregoing could harm our business and we cannot anticipate all of the ways in which the current economic climate and financial market conditions could adversely impact our business. Furthermore, our stock price may decline due in part to the volatility of the stock market and the general economic downturn.
Events involving limited liquidity, defaults, non-performance or other adverse developments that affect financial institutions, or concerns or rumors about any events of these kinds or other similar risks, have in the past and may in the future lead to market-wide liquidity problems. For example, the failures of Silicon Valley Bank, Signature Bank and First Republic Bank in the first half of 2023 resulted in significant disruption in the financial services industry. If any of the banks which hold our cash deposits were to be placed into receivership, we may be unable to access our cash, cash equivalents and available-for-sale marketable securities, which would adversely affect our business. In addition, if any of the third parties on which we rely to conduct certain aspects of our preclinical studies or clinical trials are unable to access funds pursuant to such instruments or lending arrangements with such a financial institution, such parties’ ability to fulfill their obligations to us could be adversely affected.
*We or our directors or officers may be subject to securities litigation, which is expensive and could divert management attention.
We may be the target of securities litigation in the future, including based on volatility in the market price of our stock and, as described more fully below, are currently named as a defendant in a recently filed securities class action complaint. The stock market in general, and Nasdaq and biopharmaceutical companies in particular, have experienced extreme price and volume fluctuations that have often been unrelated or disproportionate to the operating performance of companies. The market price of our common stock is likely to be volatile. In the past, companies that have experienced volatility in the market price of their stock have been subject to securities class action litigation. In addition, certain of our directors and officers are involved in ongoing securities or other lawsuits in the context of their roles with other public companies, and our directors or officers may in the future become involved in such litigation. Securities litigation (including the cost to defend against, and any potential adverse outcome resulting from any such proceeding) can be expensive, time-consuming, damage our reputation and divert our management’s and board of directors’ attention from other business concerns, which could seriously harm our business. As noted above, in December 2024, a shareholder class action complaint was filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California against our company, certain of our current and former officers and directors, and the underwriters of our initial public offering. Per a stipulated schedule, an amended complaint was filed on May 2, 2025, or the Amended Complaint. The Amended Complaint alleges that the registration statement on Form S-1
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filed in connection with our initial public offering and the prospectus contained therein contained material misstatements or omissions in violation of federal securities laws. Pursuant to a stipulated order setting a response schedule, on June 26, 2025, the defendants filed a motion to dismiss the Amended Complaint. In addition, on May 14, 2025, a stockholder derivative complaint was filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California against certain of our current and former officers and directors which was captioned Perez v. Seidenberg, et al., Case No. 3:25-cv-04163- PCP, or the Perez Action. On May 22, 2025, another stockholder derivative complaint was filed alleging the same claims against the same individual defendants captioned McDaniel v. Seidenberg, et al., Case No. 3:25-cv-04393-PCP, or the McDaniel Action, and together with the Perez Action, the Derivative Actions. The complaints filed in the Derivative Actions allege claims related to the allegations raised in the Amended Complaint. On June 2, 2025, the court entered a stipulation and order to stay the Perez Action pending the disposition of a motion to dismiss the Amended Complaint in the related securities class action. On June 25, 2025, the court entered a stipulation and order to consolidate the Derivative Actions as In re Kyverna Therapeutics Derivative Litigation, Case No. 5:25-cv-04163-PCP. Finally, on July 22, 2025, the court entered a stipulation and order staying the consolidated derivative action pending the disposition of the motion to dismiss the Amended Complaint in the related securities class action. We believe we have good and substantial defenses to the claims in the Amended Complaint and the Derivative Actions, but there is no guarantee that we will be successful in these efforts. We are unable to determine whether any loss ultimately will occur or to estimate the range of such loss; therefore, no amount of loss has been accrued by us in our financial statements for the quarter ended June 30, 2025.
Risks Related to Research, Development and Commercialization
We have never successfully completed any large-scale or pivotal clinical trials, and we may be unable to do so for any product candidates we develop.
We have not yet demonstrated our ability to successfully complete any large-scale or pivotal clinical trials, obtain regulatory approvals, manufacture a commercial scale product, or arrange for a third party to do so on our behalf, or conduct sales and marketing activities necessary for successful commercialization. Although our key employees have significant experience in leading clinical development programs, our experience conducting clinical trials with our product candidates is limited. Developing cell therapies, in particular autologous cell therapies, is a complex and resource-intensive process requiring a team of scientists, clinicians, and technical and regulatory experts. We may not be able to file INDs for any of our other product candidates on the timelines we expect, if at all. For example, we cannot be certain that the IND-enabling studies for our product candidates will be completed in a timely manner or be successful or that the manufacturing process will be validated in a timely manner. Even if we submit an IND for a product candidate, the FDA may not clear the IND and allow us to begin clinical trials in a timely manner or at all. The timing of submissions of INDs for our product candidates will be dependent on further preclinical and manufacturing success. Moreover, we cannot be sure that submission of an IND will result in the FDA allowing further clinical trials to begin, or that, once begun, issues will not arise that require us to suspend or terminate clinical trials. Commencing each of these clinical trials is subject to finalizing the trial design based on discussions with the FDA and other regulatory authorities. Any guidance we receive from the FDA or other regulatory authorities is subject to change. These regulatory authorities could change their position, including, on the acceptability of our trial designs or the clinical endpoints selected, which may require us to complete additional clinical trials or impose stricter approval conditions than we currently expect.
Additionally, we believe, through our interactions with the FDA under our Regenerative Medicine Advanced Therapy, or RMAT, designation, that our phase 2 trial in SPS, which we refer to as a pivotal trial, will be sufficient for use as a registration-enabling study, However, the FDA or other regulatory agencies may conclude that the trial is not sufficient to be registration-enabling to support a Biologic License Application, or BLA, or similar submission in other jurisdictions. If we are required to conduct additional clinical trials or other testing of our product candidates beyond those that we currently contemplate, if we are unable to successfully complete clinical trials of our product candidates or other testing, if the results of these trials or tests are not positive or are only modestly positive or if there are safety concerns, we may:
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Results of any patient who receives our product candidate in an investigator-initiated trial or on a named patient basis should not be viewed as representative of how the product candidate will perform in our clinical trials and may not be able to be used to establish safety or efficacy for regulatory approval.
We supply our investigational product candidate, KYV-101, in investigator-initiated trials and on a named patient basis to patients who have exhausted other treatment options and for whom there is a strong scientific rationale to support the use of an unapproved product candidate. The investigator-initiated trials we supply to are located in the United States and Germany, and the independent investigators of such trials file INDs for the treatment of multiple or individual patients with KYV-101. We also supplied KYV-101 for use in single named patients in Germany, through a European distributor. In Germany, these single-patient efforts are termed “Individueller Heilversuch,” or single-patient treatment healing attempts, and occur outside of a controlled clinical trial setting and are not part of a codified German regulatory path. “Individueller Heilversuch” is a form of compassionate use treatment for an individual patient in Germany, where a procedure or treatment that has not received marketing authorization may be used for the expected benefit of a patient who has exhausted all available treatment options, under the discretion of the treating physician. The provision of KYV-101 on a named patient basis and in investigator-initiated trials are not a substitute for, or intended to replace, our clinical trials. The primary goal of these compassionate use treatments is not to assess the effectiveness, but rather to provide a treatment option to patients who have exhausted all other options. We evaluate whether to grant such access or similar access in other foreign countries to KYV-101 outside of our sponsored clinical trials on a case-by-case basis.
We do not control the design, administration or timing of investigator-initiated trials. Similarly, named patient treatments are carried out by independent physicians in a manner that the physician determines in his or her discretion to be appropriate, which may be inconsistent from patient to patient and may not be conducted in strict compliance with good clinical practices, or GCPs, which can lead to a treatment effect that may differ from that in our controlled clinical trials. In addition, we rely on each investigator and physician to ensure their own compliance with clinical and regulatory requirements in using our product candidate for investigator-initiated trials and named patient activities, and we could be subject to liability if they are out of compliance. Individual patient results from named patient settings, including, but not limited to, data, experiences, images or videos, are observational, patient-specific and reported by the patients’ respective physicians. Because of our lack of control over the settings in which these patients are given KYV-101, there can be no assurances that any positive results from such named patient activities are attributable to KYV-101, or that administration of KYV-101 to other patients will have similar positive results. Patient data from these trials and named patient activities are not designed to be aggregated or reported as results and may be highly variable.
Before we can seek regulatory approval for any of our product candidates, we must demonstrate in well-controlled clinical trials statistically significant evidence that the product candidate is both safe and effective for the indication for which we are seeking approval. The results of investigator-initiated trials and named patient activities may not be used to establish safety or efficacy for purposes of obtaining regulatory approval.
In contrast, such trials and named patient activities could potentially identify significant concerns with respect to our product candidates that could impact our findings or clinical trials, and adversely affect our ability to obtain marketing approval from the FDA or other applicable regulatory authorities. To the extent the results of investigator-initiated trials or named patient activities are inconsistent with, or different from, the results of our sponsored trials or raise concerns regarding our product candidates, the FDA or a foreign regulatory authority may question the well-controlled results of the company-sponsored trial, or subject such results to greater scrutiny than it otherwise would. In these circumstances, the FDA or such foreign regulatory authorities may require us to obtain and submit additional clinical data, which could delay clinical development or marketing approval of our product candidates. In addition, the risk for serious adverse events in the patient population of such trials and named patient activities is high. Adverse events, if attributed to our product candidate, could have a negative impact on the safety profile of our product candidates, and in turn cause significant delays or an inability to obtain regulatory approval or successfully commercialize our drug candidates.
Furthermore, there is no guarantee that we will be able to continue to receive or publicize observational data through investigator-initiated trials or named patient activities using our product candidates. Our supply capabilities may limit the number of patients who are able to enroll in these trials or the number of named patients that can be treated, and we may in the future need to restructure or pause without advance notice such supply in order to enroll sufficient numbers of patients in our sponsored clinical trials, which could prompt adverse publicity or other disruptions. In addition, there is no clear regulatory framework under which we may supply our unapproved investigational product candidate in named patient settings, particularly for multiple named patients, outside of a clinical trial or a compassionate use program that is registered with applicable regulatory authorities. Our single-patient healing attempts are not part of a clinical trial or a compassionate use program that is registered with German regulatory authorities. As a result, if such supply of, or publication or other use of the observational data from named patient activities, is found to contravene regulatory requirements, we could potentially be
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subjected to liability, fines or other consequences, which could be further exacerbated if such patients experience adverse safety events. Furthermore, if we supply our unapproved investigational product candidate to a named patient who would have qualified for enrollment in our company-sponsored clinical trials in Germany, we may be subject to additional penalties. We also rely on each investigator and physician to ensure their own compliance with clinical and regulatory requirements in using our product candidate for investigator-initiated trials and named patient activities, and could be subject to liability if they are out of compliance.
Preclinical and clinical development involves a lengthy and expensive process, with an uncertain outcome, and results of earlier studies and trials may not be predictive of future trial results. We may incur additional costs or experience delays in completing, or ultimately be unable to complete, the development and commercialization of our current product candidates or any future product candidates.
All of our product candidates are either in preclinical or clinical development and their risk of failure is high. Some of the product candidates and technologies we are developing are novel and unproven, which makes it difficult to accurately predict the challenges we may face with respect to our product candidates as they proceed through development. We believe we may face greater risks with respect to our product candidates than many other biotechnology candidates because our product candidates are being developed to address conditions for which many prior products and product technologies have been unsuccessful. In addition, the patient population that our product candidates are seeking to target are often heavily immunosuppressed and may be more likely to experience serious adverse events with potential treatments and have higher morbidity rates generally than other patient populations. It is also impossible to predict whether our clinical trials will continue and when or if any of our product candidates will receive regulatory approval. To obtain the requisite regulatory approvals to commercialize any product candidates, we must demonstrate through extensive preclinical studies and lengthy, complex and expensive clinical trials that our product candidates are safe and effective in humans. Clinical testing can take many years to complete, and its outcome is inherently uncertain. The results of preclinical studies and early clinical trials of our product candidates may not be predictive of the results of later-stage clinical trials and results in one indication may not be predictive of results to be expected for the same product candidate in another indication. Differences in trial design between early-stage clinical trials and later-stage clinical trials make it difficult to extrapolate the results of earlier clinical trials to later clinical trials. A number of companies in the biopharmaceutical industry have suffered significant setbacks in advanced clinical trials due to lack of efficacy or unfavorable safety profiles, notwithstanding promising results in earlier trials. Moreover, clinical data are often susceptible to varying interpretations and analyses, and many companies that have believed their product candidates performed satisfactorily in clinical trials have nonetheless failed to obtain marketing approval of such product candidates. We may be unable to establish clinical endpoints that applicable regulatory authorities would consider clinically meaningful. Commencing any future clinical trials is subject to finalizing the trial design and submitting an application to the FDA or a similar foreign regulatory authority.
Even after we make our submission, the FDA or other regulatory authorities could disagree that we have satisfied their requirements to commence our clinical trials or disagree with our study design, which may require us to complete additional trials or amend our protocols or impose stricter conditions on the commencement of clinical trials. In addition, the FDA or other regulatory authority may require information beyond what we plan to provide in or expect to be required for a marketing application, including additional chemistry, manufacturing and control information, or additional preclinical or clinical data to support approval. These requirements may delay or prevent approval and our commercialization plans, or we may decide to abandon the development program. There is typically a high rate of failure of product candidates proceeding through clinical trials, and failure can occur at any time during the clinical trial process. Most product candidates that commence clinical trials are never approved as products and there can be no assurance that any of our current or future clinical trials will ultimately be successful or support the approval of our current or any future product candidates.
We expect to continue to rely in part on our collaborators, CROs and clinical trial sites to ensure the proper and timely conduct of our clinical trials, including the participant enrollment process, and we have limited influence over their performance. We or our collaborators may experience delays in initiating or completing clinical trials due to unforeseen events or otherwise, that could delay or prevent our ability to receive marketing approval or commercialize our current and any future product candidates, including:
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We may in the future experience participant withdrawals or discontinuations from our trials. Withdrawal of participants from our clinical trials may compromise the quality of our data. Even if we are able to enroll a sufficient number of participants in our clinical trials, delays in enrollment or small population size may result in increased costs or may affect the timing or outcome of our clinical trials. Any of these conditions may negatively impact our ability to complete such trials or include results from such trials in regulatory submissions, which could adversely affect our ability to advance the development of our product candidates.
We could also encounter delays if a clinical trial is suspended, put on clinical hold or terminated by us, the IRBs of the institutions in which such trials are being conducted, the FDA, EMA or other regulatory authorities, or if a clinical trial is recommended for suspension or termination by the Data Safety Monitoring Board, or DSMB, for such trial. A suspension or termination may be imposed due to a number of factors, including failure to conduct the clinical trial in accordance with regulatory requirements or our clinical protocols, failure by our CROs to perform in accordance with GCP requirements, or applicable regulatory guidelines in other countries, inspection of the clinical trial operations or trial site by the FDA, EMA or other regulatory authorities resulting in the imposition of a clinical hold, unforeseen safety issues or adverse side effects, failure to establish or achieve clinically meaningful trial endpoints, changes in governmental regulations, or administrative actions, or lack of adequate funding to continue the clinical trial. Clinical trials may also be delayed or terminated as a result of ambiguous or negative interim results. Many of the factors that cause, or lead to, a delay in the commencement or completion of clinical trials may also ultimately lead to the denial of regulatory approval of our product candidates. Further, the FDA, EMA or other regulatory authorities may disagree with our clinical trial design and our interpretation of data from clinical trials, or may change the requirements for approval even after they have reviewed and commented on the design for our clinical trials.
We may also conduct preclinical and clinical research in collaboration with academic, pharmaceutical and biotechnology entities in which we combine our development efforts with those of our collaborators. Such collaborations may be subject to additional delays because of the management of the trials, contract negotiations, the need to obtain agreement from multiple parties and may increase our future costs and expenses.
Our product development costs will increase if we experience delays in clinical testing or marketing approvals. We do not know whether any of our clinical trials will begin as planned, will need to be restructured or will be completed on schedule, or at all. Significant clinical trial delays also could shorten any periods during which we may have the exclusive right to commercialize our product candidates and may allow our competitors to bring products to market before we do, potentially impairing our ability to successfully commercialize our product candidates. Any delays or increase in costs in our clinical development programs may harm our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.
*If we encounter difficulties enrolling patients in clinical trials, our clinical development activities could be delayed or otherwise adversely affected, which could adversely affect our business, results of operations and financial condition.
Successful and timely completion of clinical trials will require that we enroll a sufficient number of patients who remain in a trial until its conclusion. We may not be able to initiate, continue or complete clinical trials that may be required
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by the FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authorities to obtain regulatory approval for any of our product candidates if we are unable to locate, enroll and retain a sufficient number of eligible patients to participate in these clinical trials. Patient enrollment, a significant factor in the timing to conduct and complete clinical trials, is affected by many factors, including:
We also may encounter difficulties in identifying and enrolling patients with a stage of disease appropriate for ongoing or future clinical trials. In addition, the process of finding and diagnosing patients may prove costly. Other pharmaceutical companies with more resources and greater experience in drug development and commercialization are targeting similar treatments, and this competition reduces the number and types of patients available to us, as some patients who might have opted to enroll in our trials may instead opt to enroll in a trial being conducted by one of our competitors. Because the number of qualified clinical investigators and clinical trial sites is also limited, we expect to conduct some of our clinical trials at the same clinical trial sites that some of our competitors use, which will reduce the number of patients who are available for our clinical trials at such clinical trial sites, and may delay or make it more difficult to fully enroll our clinical trials. We also rely on CROs and clinical trial sites to enroll subjects in our clinical trials and, while we have agreements governing their services, we will have limited influence over their actual performance.
These factors may make it difficult for us to enroll enough patients to complete our clinical trials in a timely and cost-effective manner. Delays in the completion of any clinical trial of our product candidates will increase our costs, slow down our product candidate development and approval process and delay or potentially jeopardize our ability to commence product sales and generate revenue. In addition, some of the factors that cause, or lead to, a delay in the commencement or completion of clinical trials may also ultimately lead to the denial of regulatory approval of our product candidates.
Interim, top-line and preliminary data from our clinical trials that we announce or publish from time to time may change as more patient data become available and are subject to audit and verification procedures that could result in material changes in the final data.
From time to time, we may publicly disclose preliminary or top-line data from our preclinical studies and clinical trials, which is based on a preliminary analysis of then-available data, and the results and related findings and conclusions are subject to change following a more comprehensive review of the data related to the particular study or trial. We also make assumptions, estimations, calculations and conclusions as part of our analyses of data, and we may not have received or had the opportunity to fully and carefully evaluate all data. As a result, the top-line or preliminary results that we report may differ from future results of the same studies, or different conclusions or considerations may qualify such results, once additional data have been received and fully evaluated. Top-line data also remain subject to audit and verification procedures that may result in the final data being materially different from the preliminary data we previously published. As a result, top-line data should be viewed with caution until the final data are available.
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From time to time, we may also disclose interim data from our preclinical studies and clinical trials. Interim data from clinical trials that we may complete are subject to the risk that one or more of the clinical outcomes may materially change as patient enrollment continues and more patient data become available or as patients from our clinical trials continue other treatments for their disease. Adverse differences between preliminary or interim data and final data could significantly harm our business prospects.
Others, including regulatory authorities, may not accept or agree with our assumptions, estimates, calculations, conclusions or analyses or may interpret or weigh the importance of data differently, which could impact the value of the particular program, the approvability or commercialization of the particular product candidate or product and our company in general. In addition, the information we choose to publicly disclose regarding a particular study or clinical trial is based on what is typically a significant volume of data and other information, and you or others may not agree with what we determine is material or otherwise appropriate information to include in our disclosure. If the interim, top-line, or preliminary data that we report differ from actual results, or if others, including regulatory authorities, disagree with the conclusions reached, our ability to obtain approval for, and commercialize, our product candidates may be harmed, which could harm our business, operating results, prospects or financial condition.
We may expend our limited resources to pursue a particular product candidate in specific indications and fail to capitalize on product candidates or indications that may be more profitable or for which there is a greater likelihood of success.
Because we have limited financial and managerial resources, we focus our development efforts on certain selected product candidates in certain selected indications. As a result, we may forgo or delay pursuit of opportunities with other product candidates, or other indications for our existing product candidates that later prove to have greater commercial potential. Our resource allocation decisions may cause us to fail to capitalize on viable commercial products or profitable market opportunities. Our spending on current and future development programs and product candidates for specific indications may not yield any commercially viable product candidates. If we do not accurately evaluate the commercial potential or target market for a particular product candidate, we may relinquish valuable rights to that product candidate through collaboration, licensing or other royalty arrangements in cases in which it would have been more advantageous for us to retain sole development and commercialization rights to such product candidate.
We may seek to establish commercial collaborations for our product candidates, and, if we are not able to establish them on commercially reasonable terms, we may have to alter our development and commercialization plans.
Our drug development programs and the potential commercialization of our product candidates will require substantial additional cash to fund expenses. We may decide to collaborate with other pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies for the development and potential commercialization of our product candidates. In December 2021, we entered into a License and Collaboration Agreement, or the Intellia Agreement, with Intellia Therapeutics, Inc., a clinical-stage biotechnology company focused on developing novel therapeutics leveraging CRISPR-based technologies, or Intellia, to research and develop an allogeneic cell therapy product, or the CRISPR Product Candidate. Collaborations are complex and time-consuming to negotiate and document. We may not be able to negotiate collaborations on a timely basis, on acceptable terms, or at all. If we are unable to do so, we may have to curtail the development of the product candidate for which we are seeking to collaborate, reduce or delay its development program or one or more of our other development programs, delay its potential commercialization or reduce the scope of any sales or marketing activities or increase our expenditures and undertake development or commercialization activities at our own expense.
We face competition from entities that have made substantial investments into the rapid development of novel treatments for immunological indications, including large and specialty pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, some of which already have approved therapies in our current indications.
The development and commercialization of therapies is highly competitive. Our product candidates, if approved, will face significant competition, including from well-established, currently marketed therapies and our failure to demonstrate a meaningful improvement to the existing standard of care may prevent us from achieving significant market penetration. Many of our competitors have significantly greater resources and experience than we do and we may not be able to successfully compete. We face substantial competition from multiple sources, including large and specialty pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, hospitals and clinics, academic research institutions and governmental agencies and public and private research institutions. Our competitors compete with us on the level of the technologies employed, or on the level of development of their products as compared to our product candidates. In addition, many small biotechnology companies have formed collaborations with large, established companies to (i) obtain support for their research, development and commercialization of products or (ii) combine several treatment approaches to develop longer lasting or more efficacious
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treatments that may potentially directly compete with our current or any future product candidates. We anticipate that we will continue to face increasing competition as new therapies and combinations thereof, and related data emerge.
Our current product candidates, initially under development for treatment of various immunological indications, if approved, would face competition from existing approved immunological treatments, some of which have achieved commercial success. For example, we are currently developing KYV-101 for the treatment of B-cell-driven autoimmune diseases. Many emerging and established life sciences companies have been focused on similar therapeutics, including CAR T-cell candidates for B-cell-driven autoimmune diseases. If approved, KYV-101 would compete with currently approved therapeutics, including Rituxan and Ocrevus, both from Roche Holding AG, and generic immunosuppressive or biosimilar drugs, such as mycophenolate mofetil, glucocorticoids, azathioprine, cyclophosphamide, and IVIG, among others we anticipate will receive approvals in the near term. There are also a number of product candidates in clinical development by third parties that are intended to treat some B-cell-driven autoimmune diseases, such as obinutuzumab (targeting CD20 on B cells), which is also from Genentech/Roche Holding AG.
To compete successfully, we need to disrupt these currently marketed drugs, meaning that we will have to demonstrate that the relative cost, method of administration, safety, tolerability and efficacy of our product candidates provides a better alternative to existing and new therapies. Our commercial opportunity and likelihood of success will be reduced or eliminated if our product candidates are not ultimately demonstrated to be safer, more effective, more conveniently administered, or less expensive than the current standard of care. Furthermore, even if our product candidates demonstrate meaningful improvements in these attributes, acceptance of our products may be inhibited by the reluctance of physicians to switch from existing therapies to our products, or if physicians choose to reserve our products for use in limited circumstances.
Many of our competitors have significantly greater financial, technical, manufacturing, marketing, sales and supply resources or experience than we have. If we obtain regulatory approval for any product candidate, we will face competition based on many different factors, including the safety and effectiveness of our current or any future product candidates, the ease with which our current or any future product candidates can be administered and the extent to which participants accept relatively new routes of administration, the timing and scope of regulatory approvals for these product candidates, the availability and cost of manufacturing, marketing and sales capabilities, price, reimbursement coverage and patent position. Competing products could present superior treatment alternatives, including by being more effective, safer, less expensive or marketed and sold more effectively than any products we may develop. Competitive products may make any products we develop obsolete or noncompetitive before we recover the expense of developing and commercializing our current or any future product candidates. Such competitors could also recruit our employees, which could negatively impact our level of expertise and our ability to execute our business plan.
Mergers and acquisitions in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries may result in even more resources being concentrated among a smaller number of our competitors. Early-stage companies may also prove to be significant competitors, particularly through collaborative arrangements with large and established companies. These third parties compete with us in recruiting and retaining qualified management and other personnel and establishing clinical trial sites and participants registration for clinical trials, as well as in acquiring technologies complementary to, or necessary for, our programs.
If we do not achieve our projected development goals in the timeframes we announce and expect, the commercialization of our programs may be delayed and our expenses may increase and, as a result, our stock price may decline.
From time to time, we estimate the timing of the anticipated accomplishment of various scientific, clinical, regulatory and other product development goals, which we sometimes refer to as milestones. These milestones may include the commencement or completion of scientific studies and clinical trials, as well as the submission of regulatory filings. From time to time, we may publicly announce the expected timing of some of these milestones. All of these milestones are and will be based on numerous assumptions. The actual timing of these milestones can vary dramatically compared to our estimates, in some cases for reasons beyond our control. If we do not meet these milestones as publicly announced, or at all, the commercialization of our programs may be delayed or never achieved and, as a result, our stock price may decline. Additionally, delays relative to our projected timelines are likely to cause overall expenses to increase, which may require us to raise additional capital sooner than expected and prior to achieving targeted development milestones.
Use of our product candidates could be associated with side effects, adverse events or other properties or safety risks, which could cause us to suspend or discontinue clinical trials, abandon a product candidate, delay or preclude approval,
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prevent market acceptance, limit the commercial profile of an approved label or result in other significant negative consequences that could severely harm our business, results of operations and financial condition.
Before obtaining regulatory approvals for the commercial sale of any of our products, we must demonstrate through lengthy, complex and expensive preclinical studies and clinical trials that our current product candidates, including our lead product candidates, and any future product candidate are both safe, pure and potent, or effective for use in such product candidate’s target indication. Clinical testing is expensive, can take many years to complete and its outcome is inherently uncertain. In addition, some of the product candidates and technologies we are developing are novel and unproven, which makes it impossible to predict whether our clinical trials will continue. The patient population that our product candidates are seeking to target also are often heavily immunosuppressed and may be more likely to experience serious adverse events with potential treatments and have higher morbidity rates generally than other patient populations. Failure can occur at any time during the clinical trial process. The results of preclinical studies and early clinical trials of our product candidates may not be predictive of the results of later-stage clinical trials. In addition, initial success in clinical trials may not be indicative of results obtained when such trials are completed. There is typically an extremely high rate of attrition from the failure of product candidates proceeding through clinical trials. Product candidates in later stages of clinical trials may fail to generate desired safety and efficacy data despite having progressed through preclinical studies and initial clinical trials. A number of companies in the biopharmaceutical and biotechnology industries have suffered significant setbacks in advanced clinical trials due to lack of efficacy or unacceptable safety issues, notwithstanding promising results in earlier trials. Most product candidates that commence clinical trials are never approved and there can be no assurance that any of our clinical trials will ultimately be successful or support further clinical development of our current product candidates or any of our future product candidates or ultimately their approval. We do not expect to be able to use the results from any investigator initiated trials or named patient activities conducted with our product candidates in any regulatory submission for marketing approval.
Results of our clinical trials could reveal a high and unacceptable severity and prevalence of side effects or unexpected characteristics. Undesirable side effects caused by our product candidates could cause us or regulatory authorities to interrupt, delay or halt clinical trials and could result in a more restrictive label or the delay or denial of regulatory approval by the FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authorities. In addition, negative results from investigator initiated trials as well as named patient activities involving our product candidates could cause similar issues. The drug-related side effects could affect patient recruitment or the ability of enrolled patients to complete the trial or result in potential product liability claims. Any of these occurrences may harm our business, results of operations and financial condition significantly.
If our product candidates are associated with undesirable side effects or have unexpected characteristics in preclinical studies, clinical trials, investigator initiated trials or named patient activities, we may need to interrupt, delay or abandon their development or limit development to more narrow uses or subpopulations in which the undesirable side effects or other characteristics are less prevalent, less severe or more acceptable from a risk-benefit perspective. Treatment-related side effects could also affect patient recruitment or the ability of enrolled subjects to complete the trial, or result in potential product liability claims. Any of these occurrences may prevent us from achieving or maintaining market acceptance of the affected product candidate and may harm our business, results of operations and financial condition significantly.
Patients in our ongoing and planned clinical trials may in the future suffer significant adverse events or other side effects not observed in our preclinical studies or previous clinical trials. In addition, if our product candidates are used in combination with other therapies, our product candidates may exacerbate adverse events associated with the therapy. Patients treated with our product candidates may also be undergoing surgical, radiation or chemotherapy treatments, which can cause side effects or adverse events that are unrelated to our product candidate, but may still impact the success of our clinical trials. The inclusion of critically ill patients in our clinical trials may result in deaths or other adverse medical events due to other therapies or medications that such patients may be using or due to the gravity of such patients’ illnesses.
If significant adverse events or other side effects are observed in any of our current or future clinical trials, in any investigator initiated trials conducted with our product candidates, or in our named patient activities, we may have difficulty recruiting patients to the clinical trials, patients may drop out of our trials, or we may be required to abandon the trials or our development efforts of that product candidate altogether. We, the FDA, other comparable foreign regulatory authorities or an IRB or ethics committee may suspend clinical trials of a product candidate at any time for various reasons, including a belief that subjects in such trials are being exposed to unacceptable health risks or adverse side effects. Some potential therapeutics developed in the biotechnology industry that initially showed therapeutic promise in early-stage trials have later been found to cause side effects that prevented their further development. Even if the side effects do not preclude the product candidate from obtaining or maintaining marketing approval, undesirable side effects may inhibit market acceptance due to its tolerability versus other therapies. Any of these developments could materially harm our business, results of operations and financial condition.
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Additionally, if any of our product candidates receives regulatory approval, and we or others later identify undesirable side effects caused by such product, a number of potentially significant negative consequences could result. Such delayed side effects might be observed during the long-term follow-up FDA has insisted upon for certain gene therapy products. For example, in 2024 the FDA initiated class safety labeling changes for BCMA- or CD19-directed genetically modified autologous CAR T cell immunotherapies after it concluded that changes to the boxed warning were warranted to highlight the serious risk of T cell malignancies. In addition to labeling changes, if we were to identify delayed side effects with any of our product candidates, the FDA could require us to adopt a Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategy, or REMS, to ensure that the benefits of treatment with such product candidate outweigh the risks for each potential patient, which may include, among other things, a communication plan to healthcare practitioners, patient education, extensive patient monitoring or distribution systems and processes that are highly controlled, restrictive and more costly than what is typical for the industry. Other potentially significant negative consequences include that:
Any of these events could diminish the usage or otherwise limit the commercial success of our product candidates and prevent us from achieving or maintaining market acceptance of the affected product candidate, if approved by applicable regulatory authorities.
Changes in product candidate manufacturing, formulation or analytical methods may result in additional costs or delay, which could adversely affect our business, results of operations and financial condition.
As product candidates are developed through preclinical studies to later-stage clinical trials towards approval and future commercialization, it is common that various aspects of the development program, such as manufacturing methods, formulation or analytical methods, are altered throughout the development process in an effort to optimize processes and results. Any of these changes could cause our product candidates to perform differently and affect the results of planned clinical trials or other future clinical trials conducted with the altered materials or utilizing different analytical methods. Such changes also may require additional testing, or notification to, or authorization by the FDA or a comparable foreign regulatory authority. This could delay completion of clinical trials, require the conduct of bridging clinical trials or studies, require the repetition of one or more clinical trials, increase clinical trial costs, delay approval of our product candidates and/or jeopardize our ability to commence product sales and generate revenue. If we or our CMOs are not able to successfully manufacture our product candidates in sufficient quality and quantity, clinical development and timelines for our product candidates and subsequent approval could be adversely impacted.
A variety of risks associated with conducting research and clinical trials abroad and marketing our product candidates internationally could materially adversely affect our business.
We plan to globally develop our product candidates. In addition, our enrollment timelines for our product candidates depend on initiating clinical trial sites outside of the United States. Accordingly, we expect that we will be subject to additional risks related to operating in foreign countries, including:
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Significant political, trade, or regulatory developments in the jurisdictions in which we may sell our products, if approved, such as those stemming from the change in U.S. federal administration, are difficult to predict and may have a material adverse effect on us. Similarly, changes in U.S. federal policy that affect the geopolitical landscape could give rise to circumstances outside our control that could have negative impacts on our business operations. The U.S. has recently imposed blanket 10% tariffs on virtually all imports to the U.S. and significantly higher so-called reciprocal tariffs applicable to imports from many countries. The current U.S. administration has threatened to continue to broadly impose tariffs, which could lead to corresponding punitive actions by the countries with which the U.S. trades. Historically, tariffs have led to increased trade and political tensions, between not only the U.S. and China, but also between the U.S. and other countries in the international community. In response to tariffs, other countries have implemented retaliatory tariffs on U.S. goods. Political tensions as a result of trade policies could reduce trade volume, investment, technological exchange and other economic activities between major international economies, resulting in a material adverse effect on global economic conditions and the stability of global financial markets. Any changes in political, trade, regulatory, and economic conditions, including U.S. trade policies, could have a material adverse effect on our financial condition or results of operations. Until we know what policy changes are made, whether those policy changes are challenged and subsequently upheld by the court system and how those changes impact our business and the business of our competitors over the long term, we will not know if, overall, we will benefit from them or be negatively affected by them.
These and other risks associated with our global development and collaboration with other pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, may materially adversely affect our ability to attain or maintain profitable operations.
The manufacturing process for any products that we may develop is subject to the FDA or comparable foreign authority approval process, and we currently, and will need to continue to, contract with manufacturers who can meet our and all applicable FDA or comparable foreign authority requirements on an ongoing basis.
The manufacturing process for any products that we may develop is subject to the FDA or comparable foreign authority approval process, and any contractors with which we contract for manufacturing must meet all applicable FDA or comparable foreign authority requirements on an ongoing basis. If we or our CMOs are unable to reliably produce products to specifications acceptable to the FDA or comparable foreign authority, we may not obtain or maintain the approvals we need to commercialize such products. Even if we obtain regulatory approval for any of our product candidates, there is no
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assurance that either we or our CMOs will be able to manufacture the approved product in accordance with requirements from the FDA or comparable foreign authority, to produce it in sufficient quantities to meet the requirements for the potential launch of the product, or to meet potential future demand. Any of these challenges could delay completion of clinical trials, require bridging clinical trials or the repetition of one or more clinical trials, increase clinical trial costs, result in sanctions being imposed on us, including clinical holds, fines, injunctions, civil penalties, delays, suspension or withdrawal of approvals, license revocation, suspension of production or recalls of the product candidates or marketed biologics, operating restriction and criminal prosecutions, delay approval of our product candidates, impair commercialization efforts, increase our cost of goods, and have an adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and growth prospects. Our future success depends on our ability to manufacture our products on a timely basis with acceptable manufacturing costs, while at the same time maintaining good quality and complying with applicable regulatory requirements. An inability to do so could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations. In addition, we could incur higher manufacturing costs if manufacturing processes or standards change, and we could need to replace, modify, design or build and install equipment, all of which would require additional capital expenditures. Specifically, because our product candidates may have a higher cost of goods than conventional therapies, the risk that coverage and reimbursement rates may be inadequate for us to achieve profitability may be greater.
We rely on third party CMOs to manufacture and supply cell therapy products for our research and development purposes and for our clinical trials. Under our Master Services Agreement with Minaris Advanced Therapies Inc., or MAT, dated March 2022, or the MAT Agreement, MAT provides us with cell manufacturing, release and testing services for our KYV-101 product candidate. Under our Development and Manufacturing Services Agreement, or the Elevate Agreement, with ElevateBio Base Camp, Inc., or Elevate, we engaged Elevate in November 2024 to provide us with cell manufacturing, release and testing services for our KYV-101 product candidate. Pursuant to our License and Supply Agreement with Oxford Biomedica (UK) Limited, or Oxford, dated September 2023, or the Oxford Agreement, we engaged Oxford to undertake lentiviral vector process development services, with the intention for Oxford to ultimately manufacture and supply to us lentiviral vectors for research and development purposes and for use in connection with our clinical trials. Although we believe we currently have sufficient clinical-grade vector in inventory to move forward with our anticipated clinical trials, there is no guarantee that sufficient clinical-grade vector will be available in the quantities we require in the future or on terms that are acceptable to us.
Reliance on third-party manufacturers entails exposure to risks to which we would not be subject if we manufactured the product candidate ourselves, including:
Should we continue to use CMOs, we may not succeed in maintaining our relationships with our current CMOs or establishing relationships with additional or alternative CMOs. Our product candidates may compete with other products and product candidates for access to manufacturing facilities. There are a limited number of manufacturers that operate under current Good Manufacturing Practice, or cGMP, regulations and that are both capable of manufacturing for us and willing to do so. If our CMOs should cease manufacturing for us, we would experience delays in obtaining sufficient quantities of our product candidates for clinical trials and, if approved, commercial supply. Further, our CMOs may breach, terminate, or not renew these agreements. If we were to need to find alternative manufacturing facilities it would significantly impact our
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ability to develop, obtain regulatory approval for or market our product candidates, if approved. The commercial terms of any new arrangement could be less favorable than our existing arrangements and the expenses relating to the transfer of necessary technology and processes could be significant.
Moreover, if we are unable to manufacture or contract for a sufficient supply of our product candidates on acceptable terms, or if we encounter delays or difficulties in the scale-up of our manufacturing processes or our relationships with MAT or other manufacturers, our preclinical and human clinical testing schedule would be delayed. This in turn would delay the submission of product candidates for regulatory approval and thereby delay the market introduction and subsequent sales of any products that receive regulatory approval, which would have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations. In addition, if any of our product candidates are approved for sale, our inability to manufacture or contract for a sufficient supply of such potential future products on acceptable terms would have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.
Even to the extent we use and continue to use CMOs, we are ultimately responsible for the manufacture of our products and product candidates. A failure to comply with these requirements may result in regulatory enforcement actions against our manufacturers or us, including fines and civil and criminal penalties, which could result in imprisonment, suspension or restrictions of production, injunctions, delay or denial of product approval or supplements to approved products, clinical holds or termination of clinical trials, warning or untitled letters, regulatory authority communications warning the public about safety issues with the biologic, refusal to permit the import or export of the products, product seizure, detention, or recall, operating restrictions, suits under the civil False Claims Act, corporate integrity agreements, consent decrees, or withdrawal of product approval.
Risks Related to Intellectual Property
We depend on intellectual property licensed from third parties and termination of any of these licenses could result in the loss of significant rights, which could adversely affect our business, results of operations and financial condition.
We are dependent on patents, know-how and proprietary technology, both our own and licensed from others. For example, we have two patent license agreements, or the NIH Agreements, with the National Institutes of Health, or the NIH, pursuant to which we obtained exclusive, worldwide licenses to certain patents to use an anti-CD19 CAR in our autologous and allogeneic CAR T-cell products for the treatment of patients with autoimmune disease, which is the CAR we used to create our lead product candidate, KYV-101. Any termination of these licenses could result in the loss of significant rights and could harm our ability to commercialize our product candidates.
Disputes also may arise between us and our licensors regarding intellectual property subject to a license agreement, including:
In addition, certain of our current and future agreements with third parties may limit or delay our ability to consummate certain transactions, may impact the value of those transactions, or may limit our ability to pursue certain activities. For example, we may enter into license agreements that are not assignable or transferable, or that require the licensor’s express consent in order for an assignment or transfer to take place. If disputes over intellectual property that we have licensed prevent or impair our ability to maintain our current licensing arrangements on acceptable terms, we may be unable to successfully develop and commercialize the affected product candidates.
We generally also are subject to all of the same risks with respect to protection of intellectual property that we license, as we are for intellectual property that we own, which are described in this “Risk Factors” section. If we or our licensors fail
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to adequately protect this intellectual property, our business, results of operations and financial condition could be adversely affected.
If we are unable to obtain and maintain sufficient intellectual property protection for our product candidates and any future product candidates we may develop, or if the scope of the intellectual property protection obtained is not sufficiently broad, our competitors or other third parties could develop and commercialize products similar or identical to ours, and our ability to successfully develop and commercialize our product candidates may be adversely affected.
We rely upon a combination of in-licensed patents, know-how and confidentiality agreements to protect the intellectual property related to our product candidates and technologies and to prevent third parties from copying and surpassing our achievements, thus eroding our competitive position in our market. For example, pursuant to the NIH Agreements, we obtained exclusive, worldwide licenses to certain patents to use an anti-CD19 CAR in our autologous and allogeneic CAR T-cell products for the treatment of patients with autoimmune disease, which is the CAR we used to create our lead product candidate, KYV-101.
Our success depends in large part on our ability to obtain and maintain patent protection in the United States and other countries for our product candidates and their uses, as well as our ability to operate without infringing, misappropriating or otherwise violating the proprietary rights of others. We seek to protect our proprietary position by filing patent applications in the United States and abroad related to our novel discoveries and technologies that are important to our business. We cannot assure you that our existing patents and any future issued patents will afford sufficient protection of our product candidates or their intended uses against competitors, nor can there be any assurance that the patents issued will not be infringed, designed around, invalidated by third parties, or effectively prevent others from commercializing competitive technologies, products or product candidates.
Obtaining and enforcing patents is expensive and time-consuming, and we may not be able to file, prosecute, maintain, enforce or license all necessary or desirable patent applications or maintain and/or enforce patents that may issue based on our patent applications, at a reasonable cost or in a timely manner. We may not be able to obtain or maintain patent applications and patents due to the subject matter claimed in such patent applications and patents being in disclosures in the public domain. It is also possible that we will fail to identify patentable aspects of our research and development results before it is too late to obtain patent protection. Although we enter into non-disclosure and confidentiality agreements with parties who have access to confidential or patentable aspects of our research and development output, such as our employees, corporate collaborators, outside scientific collaborators, CROs, CMOs, consultants, advisors and other third parties, any of these parties may breach these agreements and disclose such results before a patent application is filed, thereby jeopardizing our ability to seek patent protection. Consequently, we may not be able to prevent any third parties from using any of our technology that is in the public domain to compete with our technologies or product candidates.
We are also dependent on our licensors to take necessary action to comply with patent protection requirements with respect to our licensed intellectual property. In many cases, an inadvertent lapse can be cured by payment of a late fee or by other means in accordance with the applicable rules. There are situations, however, in which noncompliance can result in abandonment or lapse of the patent or patent application, resulting in partial or complete loss of patent rights in the relevant jurisdiction. In such an event, potential competitors might be able to enter the market and this circumstance could adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.
Composition of matter patents for biological and pharmaceutical product candidates often provide a strong form of intellectual property protection for those types of products, as such patents provide protection without regard to any method of use. However, we cannot be certain that the claims in our or our collaborators’ or licensors’ pending patent applications directed to composition of matter of our product candidates will be considered patentable by the United States Patent and Trademark Office, or the USPTO, or by patent offices in foreign countries, or that the claims in any of our or our licensors’ issued patents will be considered valid and enforceable by courts in the United States or foreign countries. Method of use patents protect the use of a product for the specified method. This type of patent does not prevent a competitor from making and marketing a product that is identical to our product candidates for an indication that is outside the scope of the patented method. Moreover, even if competitors do not actively promote their product for our targeted indications, clinicians may prescribe these products “off-label.” Although off-label prescriptions may infringe or contribute to the infringement of method of use patents, the practice is common and such infringement is difficult to prevent or prosecute.
The patent position of biopharmaceutical companies generally is highly uncertain, involves complex legal and factual questions and has in recent years been the subject of much litigation, resulting in court decisions, including Supreme Court decisions, which have increased uncertainties as to the ability to enforce patent rights in the future. As a result, the issuance,
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scope, validity, enforceability and commercial value of any patent rights are highly uncertain. Our pending and future owned and in-licensed patent applications may not result in patents being issued that protect our technologies or product candidates, effectively prevent others from commercializing our technologies or product candidates or otherwise provide any competitive advantage. In fact, patent applications may not issue as patents at all. The coverage claimed in a patent application can also be significantly reduced before the patent is issued, and its scope can be reinterpreted after issuance. In addition, the laws of foreign countries may not protect our rights to the same extent as the laws of the United States, or vice versa.
The patent application process is subject to numerous risks and uncertainties, and there can be no assurance that we will be successful in protecting our product candidates by obtaining and defending patents. For example, we may not be aware of all third-party intellectual property rights potentially relating to our product candidates or their intended uses, and as a result the impact of such third-party intellectual property rights upon the patentability of our own or our licensors’ patents and patent applications, as well as the impact of such third-party intellectual property upon our freedom to operate, is highly uncertain. Publications of discoveries in the scientific literature often lag behind the actual discoveries, and patent applications in the United States and other jurisdictions are typically not published until 18 months after filing or, in some cases, not at all. Therefore, we cannot know with certainty whether we were the first to make the inventions claimed in our patents or pending patent applications, or that we were the first to file for patent protection of such inventions. If a third party can establish that we or our licensors were not the first to make or the first to file for patent protection of such inventions, our owned or licensed patent applications may not issue as patents and even if issued, may be challenged and invalidated or rendered unenforceable. As a result, the issuance, inventorship, scope, validity, enforceability and commercial value of our or our licensors’ patent rights are highly uncertain.
The issuance of a patent is not conclusive as to its inventorship, scope, validity or enforceability and our or our licensors’ pending patent applications may be challenged in patent offices in the United States and abroad. Even issued patents may later be found invalid or unenforceable or may be modified or revoked in proceedings instituted by third parties before various patent offices or in courts. For example, our or our licensors’ pending patent applications may be subject to third-party pre-issuance submissions of prior art to the USPTO or our issued patents may be subject to post-grant review, or PGR, proceedings, oppositions, derivations, reexaminations, interferences, inter partes review, or IPR, proceedings or other similar proceedings, in the United States or elsewhere, challenging our or our licensors’ patent rights or the patent rights of others. Such submissions may also be made prior to a patent’s issuance, precluding the granting of a patent based on one or more of our owned or licensed pending patent applications. An adverse determination in any such challenges may result in loss of exclusivity or in patent claims being narrowed, invalidated, or held unenforceable, in whole or in part, which could limit our ability to stop others from using or commercializing similar or identical technology and product candidates, or limit the duration of the patent protection of our technology and product candidates. Such challenges also may result in substantial cost and require significant time from our scientists and management, even if the eventual outcome is favorable to us. Any of the foregoing could adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.
A third party may also claim that our owned or licensed patent rights are invalid or unenforceable in a litigation. The outcome following legal assertions of invalidity and unenforceability is unpredictable. An adverse result in any legal proceeding could put one or more of our owned or in-licensed patents at risk of being invalidated or interpreted narrowly and could allow third parties to commercialize our products and compete directly with us, without payment to us, or result in our inability to manufacture or commercialize our technology, products or product candidates without infringing third-party patent rights.
In addition, given the amount of time required for the development, testing and regulatory review of new product candidates, patents protecting such candidates might expire before or shortly after such candidates are commercialized. The degree of future protection for our proprietary rights is uncertain. Only limited protection may be available and may not adequately protect our rights or permit us to gain or keep any competitive advantage. Any failure to obtain or maintain patent protection with respect to our product candidates or their uses could adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.
We cannot ensure that patent rights relating to inventions described and claimed in our pending patent applications will issue, or that our issued patents or patents that issue in the future will not be challenged and rendered invalid and/or unenforceable.
The patent application process is subject to numerous risks and uncertainties, and there can be no assurance that we or any of our potential future collaborators will be successful in protecting our product candidates by obtaining and defending
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patents. We have pending and issued U.S. and foreign patents and patent applications in our portfolio; however, we cannot predict:
We may be subject to a third-party pre-issuance submission of prior art to the USPTO or become involved in post-grant review procedures, oppositions, derivations, revocation, reexaminations, inter partes review or interference proceedings, in the United States or elsewhere, challenging our patent rights or the patent rights of others. An adverse determination in any such challenge may result in loss of exclusivity or in our patent claims being narrowed, invalidated or held unenforceable, in whole or in part, which could limit our ability to stop others from using or commercializing similar or identical technology and products or limit the duration of the patent protection of our technology and products. Such challenges also may result in substantial cost and require significant time from our scientists and management, even if the eventual outcome is favorable to us. Any of the foregoing could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects. Furthermore, if the breadth or strength of protection provided by our patents and patent applications is threatened, regardless of the outcome, it could dissuade companies from collaborating with us to license, develop or commercialize current or future product candidates.
We may rely on more than one patent to provide multiple layers of patent protection for our product candidates. If the latest-expiring patent is invalidated or held unenforceable, in whole or in part, the overall protection for the product candidate may be adversely affected. For example, if the latest-expiring patent is invalidated, the overall patent term for our product candidate could be adversely affected.
Our pending and future patent applications may not result in patents being issued that protect our product candidates, in whole or in part, or which effectively prevent others from commercializing competitive products.
Assuming the other requirements for patentability are met, currently, the first to file a patent application is generally entitled to the patent. Because patent applications in the United States and most other countries are confidential for a period of time after filing, and some remain so until issued, we cannot be certain that we were the first to file any patent application related to our product candidates. Further, in cases where a particular compound of interest is in the public domain, third parties may be able to obtain patents on improvements or other inventions relating to such compound if they were to discover the same patentable inventions relating to such compounds after us but manage to file a patent application before we do. In addition, we may enter into non-disclosure and confidentiality agreements with parties who have access to confidential or patentable aspects of our research and development output, including any polymorphs and variants, such as our employees, collaborators, consultants, advisors and other third parties; however, any of these parties may breach the agreements and disclose such output before a patent application is filed, thereby jeopardizing our ability to obtain patent protection. Furthermore, if third parties have filed patent applications related to our product candidates or technology, an interference proceeding in the United States can be initiated by the USPTO or a third party to determine who was the first to invent any of the subject matter covered by the patent claims of our applications. Therefore, we cannot be certain that we were the first to make the inventions claimed in our patents or pending patent applications, or that we were the first to file for patent protection of such inventions.
Given the amount of time required for the development, testing and regulatory review of new product candidates, our patents protecting such product candidates might expire before or shortly after such product candidates are commercialized. As a result, our intellectual property may not provide us with sufficient rights to exclude others from commercializing products similar or identical ours. Our competitors and other third parties may also seek approval to market their own products similar to or otherwise competitive with our products. Alternatively, our competitors or other third parties may seek
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to market generic or biosimilar versions of any approved products and in so doing, claim that patents owned by us are invalid, unenforceable or not infringed. In these circumstances, we may need to defend or assert our patents, or both, including by filing lawsuits alleging patent infringement. In any of these types of proceedings, a court or other agency with jurisdiction may find our patents invalid or unenforceable, or may find that our competitors are competing in a non-infringing manner. Thus, even if we have valid and enforceable patents, these patents still may not provide protection against competing products or processes sufficient to achieve our business objectives.
Moreover, some of our patents may in the future be co-owned with third parties. If we are unable to obtain an exclusive license to any such third-party co-owners’ interest in such patents or patent applications, such co-owners may be able to license their rights to other third parties, including our competitors, and our competitors could market competing products and technology. In addition, we may need the cooperation of any such co-owners of our patents in order to enforce such patents against third parties, and such cooperation may not be provided to us. Any of the foregoing could have a material adverse effect on our competitive position, business, financial conditions, results of operations and prospects.
If we fail to comply with our obligations under our patent licenses with third parties, we could lose license rights that are important to our business, which could adversely affect our business, results of operations and financial condition.
We are a party to license agreements pursuant to which we in-license patent and patent applications, know-how, trade secrets and data rights for our product candidates. These include, for example, the NIH Agreements, pursuant to which we obtained exclusive, worldwide licenses to certain patents to use an anti-CD19 CAR in our autologous and allogeneic CAR T-cell products for the treatment of patients with autoimmune disease, and the Intellia Agreement, which provides for the research and development of the CRISPR Product Candidate. These existing licenses impose on us various diligence, milestone payment, royalty, insurance and other obligations. If we fail to comply with these obligations, our licensors may have the right to terminate the license, in which event we would not be able to develop or market the products covered by such licensed intellectual property.
We may also enter into license agreements with third parties under which we are a sub-licensee. If our sub-licensor fails to comply with its obligations under its upstream license agreement with its licensor, the licensor may have the right to terminate the upstream license, which may terminate our sub-license. If this were to occur, we would no longer have rights to the applicable intellectual property unless we are able to secure our own direct license with the owner of the relevant rights, which we may not be able to do on reasonable terms, or at all, which may impact our ability to continue to develop and commercialize our product candidates incorporating the relevant intellectual property.
We may have limited control over the maintenance and prosecution of these in-licensed patents and patent applications, activities or any other intellectual property that may be related to our in-licensed intellectual property. For example, such activities by these licensors may not have been or may not be conducted in compliance with applicable laws and regulations or will result in valid and enforceable patents and other intellectual property rights. Our licensors may not successfully prosecute the patent applications to which we are licensed in a manner consistent with the best interests of our business. We have limited control over the manner in which our licensors initiate an infringement proceeding against a third-party infringer of the intellectual property rights, or defend certain of the intellectual property that is licensed to us. It is possible that the licensors’ infringement proceeding or defense activities may be less vigorous than had we conducted them ourselves.
We cannot prevent other companies from licensing some of the same intellectual properties that we have licensed or from otherwise duplicating our business model and operations.
Since parties we have licenses with are developing therapies to similar technologies, they may make their methods and data available to third parties, who may want to enter into our line of business and compete against us. Although we currently exclusively license certain intellectual property for each of our product candidates, there can be no assurance we will not need to license other intellectual property on a non-exclusive basis in the future or that our exclusively licensed intellectual property could be used to prevent third parties from duplicating our business plan or from otherwise directly competing against us. Further, no assurance can be given that our existing exclusive rights are or will be sufficient to prevent others from competing with us and developing substantially similar products.
We may not be successful in obtaining or maintaining necessary rights to develop current and any future product candidates on acceptable terms.
Because our programs may involve additional product candidates that may require the use of proprietary rights held by third parties, the growth of our business may depend in part on our ability to acquire, in-license or use these proprietary
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rights. Our product candidates also may require specific formulations to work effectively and efficiently and these rights may be held by others. We may be unable to acquire or in-license any compositions, methods of use, processes or other third-party intellectual property rights from third parties that we identify as necessary or important to our business operations. We may fail to obtain any of these licenses at a reasonable cost or on reasonable terms, if at all, which would harm our business. We may need to cease use of the compositions or methods covered by such third-party intellectual property rights, and may need to seek to develop alternative approaches that do not infringe on such intellectual property rights which may entail additional costs and expenses and development delays, even if we were able to develop such alternatives, which may not be feasible. Even if we are able to obtain a license, it may be non-exclusive, thereby giving our competitors access to the same technologies licensed to us. In that event, we may be required to expend significant time and resources to develop or license replacement technology.
Additionally, we sometimes collaborate with academic institutions and governmental authorities to accelerate our preclinical research or development under written agreements with these institutions. In certain cases, these institutions provide us with an option to negotiate a license to any of the institution’s rights in technology resulting from the collaboration. Regardless of such option, we may be unable to negotiate a license within the specified timeframe or under terms that are acceptable to us. If we are unable to do so, the institution may offer the intellectual property rights to others, potentially blocking our ability to pursue our program. If we are unable to successfully obtain rights to required third-party intellectual property or to maintain the existing intellectual property rights we have, we may have to abandon development of such program and our business, results of operations and financial condition could be adversely affected.
The licensing and acquisition of third-party intellectual property rights is a highly competitive area, and companies, which may be more established or have greater resources than we do, also may be pursuing strategies to license or acquire third-party intellectual property rights that we consider necessary or attractive in order to commercialize our product candidates. More established companies may have a competitive advantage over us due to their size, cash resources and greater clinical development and commercialization capabilities. There can be no assurance that we will be able to successfully complete such negotiations and ultimately acquire the rights to the intellectual property surrounding the additional product candidates that we may seek to acquire.
Our product candidates licensed from various third parties may be subject to retained rights.
Our licensors may retain certain rights under the relevant agreements with us, including the right to use the underlying product candidates for academic and research use, to publish general scientific findings from research related to the product candidates, to make customary scientific and scholarly disclosures of information relating to the product candidates, or to develop or commercialize the licensed product candidates in certain regions. In particular, under the NIH Agreements the NIH reserves, on behalf of the United States federal government and certain third parties, an irrevocable, nonexclusive, worldwide, royalty-free license to practice all of the inventions licensed under such agreements, and the NIH also reserves the right to grant third parties research licenses on reasonable terms. Under the Intellia Agreement, Intellia is granted an irrevocable, nonexclusive, worldwide, royalty-free license to fully exploit certain Intellia-developed products that are not directed to CD19 or other B-cell antigens and which are not intended for treatment or prevention of autoimmune or inflammatory diseases or conditions and not for humoral rejection for solid organ transplantation.
In addition, the United States federal government retains certain rights in inventions produced with its financial assistance under the Patent and Trademark Law Amendments Act, or the Bayh-Dole Act. The federal government retains a “nonexclusive, nontransferable, irrevocable, paid-up license” for its own benefit. The Bayh-Dole Act also provides federal agencies with “march-in rights.” March-in rights allow the government, in specified circumstances, to require the contractor or successors in title to the patent to grant a “nonexclusive, partially exclusive, or exclusive license” to a “responsible applicant or applicants.” If the patent owner refuses to do so, the government may grant the license itself. We may at times choose to collaborate with academic institutions to accelerate our preclinical research or development.
We may not identify relevant third-party patents or may incorrectly interpret the relevance, scope or expiration of a third-party patent, which might adversely affect our ability to develop and market our product candidates. We may infringe the intellectual property rights of others, which may prevent or delay our drug development efforts and prevent us from commercializing or increase the costs of commercializing our products.
As the biopharmaceutical industry expands and more patents are issued, the risk increases that our product candidates may be subject to claims of infringement of the patent rights of third parties. There can be no assurance that our operations do not, or will not in the future, infringe, misappropriate or otherwise violate existing or future third-party patents or other intellectual property rights. Identification of third-party patent rights that may be relevant to our operations is difficult
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because patent searching is imperfect due to differences in terminology among patents, incomplete databases and the difficulty in assessing the meaning of patent claims. We cannot guarantee that any of our patent searches or analyses, including the identification of relevant patents, the scope of patent claims or the expiration of relevant patents, are complete or thorough, nor can we be certain that we have identified each and every third-party patent and pending application in the United States and abroad that is relevant to or necessary for the commercialization of our product candidates in any jurisdiction.
Numerous U.S. and foreign patents and pending patent applications exist in our market that are owned by third parties. Our competitors in both the United States and abroad, some of which have substantially greater resources and have made substantial investments in patent portfolios and competing technologies, may have applied for or obtained or may in the future apply for and obtain, patents that will prevent, limit or otherwise interfere with our ability to make, use and sell our product candidates. We do not always conduct independent reviews of pending patent applications of and patents issued to third parties. Patent applications in the United States and elsewhere are typically published approximately 18 months after the earliest filing for which priority is claimed, with such earliest filing date being commonly referred to as the priority date. Certain U.S. applications that will not be filed outside the United States can remain confidential until patents issue. In addition, patent applications in the United States and elsewhere can be pending for many years before issuance, or unintentionally abandoned patents or applications can be revived. Furthermore, pending patent applications that have been published can, subject to certain limitations, be later amended in a manner that could cover our technologies, product candidates or the use of our product candidates. As such, there may be applications of others now pending or recently revived patents of which we are unaware. These patent applications may later result in issued patents, or the revival of previously abandoned patents, that may be infringed by the manufacture, use or sale of our technologies or product candidates or will prevent, limit or otherwise interfere with our ability to make, use or sell our technologies and product candidates.
The scope of a patent claim is determined by an interpretation of the law, the written disclosure in a patent and the patent’s prosecution history. Our interpretation of the relevance or the scope of a patent or a pending application may be incorrect. For example, we may incorrectly determine that our product candidates are not covered by a third-party patent or may incorrectly predict whether a third party’s pending application will issue with claims of relevant scope. Our determination of the expiration date of any patent in the United States or abroad that we consider relevant may be incorrect. Our failure to identify and correctly interpret relevant patents may negatively impact our ability to develop and market our product candidates.
Our commercial success depends significantly on our ability to operate without infringing the patents and other intellectual property rights of third parties. We are aware of third-party U.S. and European patents related to CAR T cells for use in treating autoimmune diseases, which may be relevant to our product candidates. If these patent rights were enforced against us, we believe that we have defenses against any such action, including that these patents are not valid. There could be additional issued patents of which we are not aware that our current or potential future product candidates infringe. There also could be patents that we believe we do not infringe, but that we may ultimately be found to infringe. Competitors may file continuing patent applications claiming priority to already issued patents in the form of continuation, divisional or continuation-in-part applications, in order to maintain the pendency of a patent family and attempt to cover our product candidates.
Third parties may assert that we are employing their proprietary technology without authorization and may sue us for patent or other intellectual property infringement. These lawsuits are costly and could adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations and divert the attention of managerial and scientific personnel. If we are sued for patent infringement, we would need to demonstrate that our product candidates, potential products or methods either do not infringe the claims of the relevant patent or that the patent claims are invalid, and we may not be able to do this. Proving invalidity is difficult. For example, in the United States, proving invalidity requires a showing of clear and convincing evidence to overcome the presumption of validity enjoyed by issued patents. Even if we are successful in these proceedings, we may incur substantial costs and the time and attention of our management and scientific personnel could be diverted in pursuing these proceedings, which could have a material adverse effect on us. In addition, we may not have sufficient resources to bring these actions to a successful conclusion. If a court holds that any third-party patents are valid, enforceable and cover our products or their use, the holders of any of these patents may be able to block our ability to commercialize our products unless we acquire or obtain a license under the applicable patents or until the patents expire.
We cannot provide any assurances that no valid third-party patents and other intellectual property rights can be enforced against our current technology, including our research programs, product candidates, their respective methods of use, manufacture and formulations thereof. If we are sued for infringing intellectual property rights of third parties, such litigation could result in either an injunction prohibiting our manufacture or future sales, or, with respect to our future sales,
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an obligation on our part to pay royalties and/or other forms of compensation to third parties, which could be significant. We may not be able to enter into licensing arrangements or make other arrangements at a reasonable cost or on reasonable terms. Any inability to secure licenses or alternative technology could result in delays in the introduction of our products or lead to prohibition of the manufacture or sale of products by us. Even if we are able to obtain a license, it may be non-exclusive, thereby giving our competitors access to the same technologies licensed to us. We could be forced, including by court order, to cease commercializing the infringing technology or product. In addition, in any such proceeding or litigation, we could be found liable for monetary damages, including treble damages and attorneys’ fees, if we are found to have willfully infringed a patent. A finding of infringement could prevent us from commercializing our product candidates or force us to cease some of our business operations, which could materially and adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations. Any claims by third parties that we have misappropriated their confidential information or trade secrets could have a similar material and adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations. In addition, any uncertainties resulting from the initiation and continuation of any litigation could have a material adverse effect on our ability to raise the funds necessary to continue our operations.
We may be involved in lawsuits to protect or enforce our patents or other intellectual property, which could be expensive, time-consuming and unsuccessful.
Competitors or other third parties may infringe our patents, trademarks or other intellectual property. To counter infringement or unauthorized use, we or one of our licensing partners may be required to file infringement claims, which can be expensive and time-consuming and divert the time and attention of our management and scientific personnel. Our or our licensors’ pending patent applications cannot be enforced against third parties practicing the technology claimed in such applications unless and until a patent is issued from such applications. Any claims we assert against perceived infringers could provoke these parties to assert counterclaims against us alleging that we infringe their patents, in addition to counterclaims asserting that our patents or our licensors’ patents are invalid or unenforceable, or both. In patent litigation in the United States, defendant counterclaims alleging invalidity and/or unenforceability are commonplace. Grounds for a validity challenge could be an alleged failure to meet any of several statutory requirements, including lack of novelty, obviousness, non-enablement, insufficient written description or failure to claim patent-eligible subject matter. Grounds for an unenforceability assertion could be an allegation that someone connected with prosecution of the patent withheld relevant information from the USPTO or made a misleading statement during prosecution. The outcome following legal assertions of invalidity and unenforceability is unpredictable. In any patent infringement proceeding, there is a risk that a court will decide that a patent of ours or our licensors is invalid or unenforceable, in whole or in part, and that we do not have the right to stop the other party from using the invention at issue. There is also a risk that, even if the validity of such patents is upheld, the court will construe the patent’s claims narrowly or decide that we do not have the right to stop the other party from using the invention at issue on the grounds that our or our licensors’ patent claims do not cover the invention, or decide that the other party’s use of our or our licensors’ patented technology falls under the safe harbor to patent infringement under 35 U.S.C. §271(e)(1). In addition, the U.S. Supreme Court has changed some legal principles that affect patent applications, granted patents and assessment of the eligibility or validity of these patents. As a consequence, issued patents may be found to contain invalid claims according to the newly revised eligibility and validity standards. Some of our owned or in-licensed patents may be subject to challenge and subsequent invalidation or significant narrowing of claim scope in proceedings before the USPTO, or during litigation, under the revised criteria, which also could make it more difficult to obtain patents. An adverse outcome in a litigation or proceeding involving our or our licensors’ patents could limit our ability to assert our or our licensors’ patents against those parties or other competitors and may curtail or preclude our ability to exclude third parties from making and selling similar or competitive products. Any of these occurrences could adversely affect our competitive position, and our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects. Similarly, if we assert trademark infringement claims, a court may determine that the marks we have asserted are invalid or unenforceable, or that the party against whom we have asserted trademark infringement has superior rights to the marks in question. In this case, we could ultimately be forced to cease use of such trademarks.
Even if we establish infringement, the court may decide not to grant an injunction against further infringing activity and instead award only monetary damages, which may or may not be an adequate remedy. Furthermore, because of the substantial amount of discovery required in connection with intellectual property litigation, there is a risk that some of our confidential information could be compromised by disclosure during litigation. There could also be public announcements of the results of hearings, motions or other interim proceedings or developments. If securities analysts or investors perceive these results to be negative, it could adversely affect the price of shares of our common stock. Moreover, we cannot assure you that we will have sufficient financial or other resources to file and pursue such infringement claims, which typically last for years before they are concluded.
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We, or our licensors, may not be able to detect infringement against our owned or in-licensed patents, as the case may be, which may be especially difficult for manufacturing processes or formulation patents. Even if we or our licensors detect infringement by a third party of our owned or in-licensed patents, we or our licensors, as the case may be, may choose not to pursue litigation against or settlement with the third party. If we, or our licensors, later sue such third party for patent infringement, the third party may have certain legal defenses available to it, which otherwise would not be available except for the delay between when the infringement was first detected and when the suit was brought. Such legal defenses may make it impossible for us or our licensors to enforce our owned or in-licensed patents, as the case may be, against such third party.
If another party questions the patentability of any of our claims in our owned or in-licensed U.S. patents, the third party can request that the USPTO review the patent claims such as in an inter partes review, ex parte re-exam or post-grant review proceedings. These proceedings are expensive and may result in a loss of scope of some claims or a loss of the entire patent. In addition to potential USPTO review proceedings, we may become a party to patent opposition proceedings at the EPO or similar proceedings in other foreign patent offices, where either our owned or in-licensed foreign patents are challenged.
In the future, we may be involved in similar proceedings challenging the patent rights of others, and the outcome of such proceedings is highly uncertain. An adverse determination in any such proceeding may result in our inability to manufacture or commercialize products without infringing third-party patent rights. The costs of these opposition or similar proceedings could be substantial, and may result in a loss of scope of some claims or a loss of the entire patent. Even if we ultimately prevail in any such claims or proceedings, the monetary cost of such litigation and the diversion of the attention of our management and scientific personnel could outweigh any benefit we receive as a result of the claims or proceedings.
We may become subject to claims challenging the inventorship or ownership of our or our licensors’ patents and other intellectual property or claims asserting that our employees, consultants or advisors have wrongfully used or disclosed alleged trade secrets of their current or former employers.
We may be subject to claims that former employees, collaborators or other third parties have an interest in our or our licensors’ patents or other intellectual property as an inventor or co-inventor. The failure to name the proper inventors on a patent application can result in the patents issuing thereon being unenforceable. Inventorship disputes may arise from conflicting views regarding the contributions of different individuals named as inventors, the effects of foreign laws where foreign nationals are involved in the development of the subject matter of the patent, conflicting obligations of third parties involved in developing our product candidates or as a result of questions regarding co-ownership of potential joint inventions. Litigation may be necessary to resolve these and other claims challenging inventorship or ownership. Alternatively, or additionally, we may enter into agreements to clarify the scope of our rights in such intellectual property. If we fail in defending any such claims, in addition to paying monetary damages, we may lose valuable intellectual property rights, such as exclusive ownership of, or right to use, valuable intellectual property. Such an outcome could adversely affect our business. Even if we are successful in defending against such claims, litigation could result in substantial costs and be a distraction to management and other employees.
Certain of our employees, consultants or advisors have in the past and may in the future be employed at universities or other biotechnology or pharmaceutical companies, including our competitors or potential competitors and we may in the future be subject to claims that our former employees, consultants, or other third parties have an interest in our patents or other intellectual property as an inventor, co-inventor, or owner of trade secrets. Although it is our policy to require our employees and consultants who may be involved in the conception or development of intellectual property to execute agreements assigning that intellectual property to us, we may be unsuccessful in executing such an agreement with each party who conceives or develops intellectual property that we regard as our own or such party may breach the assignment agreement, or we may be subject to claims that these individuals or we have used or disclosed intellectual property, including trade secrets or other proprietary information, of any such individual’s current or former employer. Litigation may be necessary to defend against these claims. If we fail in defending any such claims, in addition to paying monetary damages, we may lose valuable intellectual property rights. Even if we are successful in defending against such claims, litigation could result in substantial costs and be a distraction to management.
In addition, while it is our policy to require our employees and contractors who may be involved in the conception or development of intellectual property to execute agreements assigning such intellectual property to us, we may be unsuccessful in executing such an agreement with each party who, in fact, conceives or develops intellectual property that we regard as our own. The assignment of intellectual property rights may not be self-executing, or the assignment agreements may be breached, and we may be forced to bring claims against third parties, or defend claims that they may bring against us,
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to determine the ownership of what we regard as our intellectual property. Such claims could adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.
Patent terms may be inadequate to protect our competitive position on products or product candidates for an adequate amount of time. If we do not obtain patent term extension for our product candidates, our business may be materially harmed.
Patents have a limited lifespan. In the United States, if all maintenance fees are timely paid, the natural expiration of a patent is generally 20 years from its earliest U.S. non-provisional or international patent application filing date. Various extensions may be available, but the life of a patent, and the protection it affords, is limited. Even if patents covering our products or product candidates are obtained, once the patent life has expired, we may be open to competition from competitive products, including generics or biosimilars. Given the amount of time required for the development, testing and regulatory review of products or new product candidates, patents protecting such products or candidates might expire before or shortly after such products or candidates are commercialized. As a result, our owned and licensed patent portfolio may not provide us with sufficient and continuing rights to exclude others from commercializing products similar or identical to ours.
Depending upon the timing, duration and specifics of any FDA marketing approval of any of our product candidates, one or more of our or our licensors’ issued U.S. patents or issued U.S. patents that we may own in the future may be eligible for limited patent term extension under the Drug Price Competition and Patent Term Restoration Action of 1984, or the Hatch-Waxman Amendments. The Hatch-Waxman Amendments permit a patent extension term, or PTE, of up to five years as compensation for patent term lost during the FDA regulatory review process. A patent term extension cannot extend the remaining term of a patent beyond a total of 14 years from the date of product approval, only one patent may be extended and only those claims covering the approved drug, a method for using it or a method for manufacturing it may be extended. Similar patent term restoration provisions to compensate for commercialization delay caused by regulatory review are also available in certain foreign jurisdictions, such as in Europe under Supplemental Protection Certificate, or SPC. However, we may not be granted any extensions for which we apply because of, for example, failing to exercise due diligence during the testing phase or regulatory review process, failing to apply within applicable deadlines, failing to apply prior to expiration of relevant patents, or otherwise failing to satisfy applicable requirements. In addition, to the extent we wish to pursue patent term extension based on a patent that we in-license from a third party, we would need the cooperation of that third party. Moreover, the applicable time period or the scope of patent protection afforded could be less than we request. If we are unable to obtain patent term extension, or the term of any such extension is less than we request, our competitors may obtain approval of competing products following our patent expiration, and our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects could be materially harmed.
Changes in patent law in the United States and other jurisdictions could diminish the value of patents in general, thereby impairing our ability to protect our product candidates.
As is the case with other biopharmaceutical companies, our success is heavily dependent on intellectual property, particularly patents. Obtaining, defending, maintaining and enforcing patents in the biopharmaceutical industry involves both technological and legal complexity and is therefore costly, time-consuming and inherently uncertain. Changes in either the patent laws or interpretation of the patent laws in the United States could increase the uncertainties and costs surrounding the prosecution of patent applications and the enforcement or defense of issued patents, and may diminish our ability to protect our inventions, obtain, maintain, enforce and protect our intellectual property rights and, more generally, could affect the value of our intellectual property or narrow the scope of our future owned and licensed patents. Patent reform legislation in the United States and other countries, including the Leahy-Smith America Invents Act, or the Leahy-Smith Act, signed into law on September 16, 2011, could increase those uncertainties and costs surrounding the prosecution of our patent applications and the enforcement or defense of our future issued patents. The Leahy-Smith Act includes a number of significant changes to U.S. patent law. These include provisions that affect the way patent applications are prosecuted, redefine prior art and provide more efficient and cost-effective avenues for competitors to challenge the validity of patents. These include allowing third-party submission of prior art to the USPTO during patent prosecution and additional procedures to attack the validity of a patent by USPTO administered post-grant proceedings, including post-grant review, inter partes review, and derivation proceedings.
In addition, the patent positions of companies in the development and commercialization of pharmaceuticals are particularly uncertain. The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled on several patent cases in recent years, either narrowing the scope of patent protection available in certain circumstances or weakening the rights of patent owners in certain situations. Depending on future actions by the U.S. Congress, the U.S. courts, the USPTO and the relevant law-making bodies in other countries, the laws and regulations governing patents could change in unpredictable ways that would weaken our or our
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licensors’ ability to obtain new patents and patents that we or our licensors might obtain in the future. We cannot predict how future decisions by the courts, the U.S. Congress or the USPTO may impact the value of our patents. Any similar adverse change in the patent laws of other jurisdictions could also adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.
Similarly, changes in patent law and regulations in other countries or jurisdictions or changes in the governmental bodies that enforce them or changes in how the relevant governmental authority enforces patent laws or regulations may weaken our ability to obtain new patents or to enforce patents that we have licensed or that we may obtain in the future. For example, the complexity and uncertainty of European patent laws have also increased in recent years. In Europe, in June 2023, a new unitary patent system was introduced, which significantly impacts European patents, including those granted before the introduction of the system. Under the unitary patent system, after a European patent is granted, the patent proprietor can request unitary effect, thereby getting a European patent with unitary Effect, or a Unitary Patent. Each Unitary Patent is subject to the jurisdiction of the Unitary Patent Court, or UPC. As the UPC is a new court system, there is no precedent for the court, increasing the uncertainty of any litigation. Patents granted before the implementation of the UPC will have the option of opting out of the jurisdiction of the UPC and remaining as national patents in the UPC countries. Patents that remain under the jurisdiction of the UPC may be potentially vulnerable to a single UPC-based revocation challenge that, if successful, could invalidate the patent in all countries who are signatories to the UPC. We cannot predict with certainty the long-term effects of the new unitary patent system.
If we are unable to protect the confidentiality of our trade secrets, our business and competitive position would be harmed.
In addition to the protection afforded by patents, we rely on trade secret protection and confidentiality agreements to protect proprietary know-how that is not patentable or that we elect not to patent, processes for which patents are difficult to enforce and any other elements of our discovery and development processes that involve proprietary know-how, information or technology that is not covered by patents. We may also rely on trade secret protection as temporary protection for concepts that may be included in a future patent filing. However, trade secret protection will not protect us from innovations that a competitor develops independently of our proprietary know how. If a competitor independently develops a technology that we protect as a trade secret and files a patent application on that technology, then we may not be able to patent that technology in the future, may require a license from the competitor to use our own know-how, and if the license is not available on commercially viable terms, then we may not be able to launch our product candidate. Additionally, trade secrets can be difficult to protect and some courts inside and outside the United States are less willing or unwilling to protect trade secrets. Although we require all of our employees to assign their inventions to us, and require all of our employees, consultants, advisors and any third parties who have access to our proprietary know-how, information or technology to enter into confidentiality agreements, we cannot be certain that our trade secrets and other confidential proprietary information will not be disclosed or that competitors will not otherwise gain access to our trade secrets. If our trade secrets are not adequately protected, our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects could be adversely affected.
If our trademarks and trade names are not adequately protected, then we may not be able to build name recognition in our markets of interest and our business may be adversely affected.
Our registered or unregistered trademarks or trade names may be challenged, infringed, circumvented or declared merely descriptive, generic or determined to be infringing on other marks. The use of our registered and unregistered marks is also limited by certain agreements with third parties. During trademark registration proceedings, we may receive rejections of our applications by the USPTO or in other foreign jurisdictions. Although we are given an opportunity to respond to such rejections, we may be unable to overcome them. In addition, in the USPTO and in comparable agencies in many foreign jurisdictions, third parties are given an opportunity to oppose pending trademark applications and to seek to cancel registered trademarks. In the USPTO, cancellation proceedings may be filed against our trademarks, once registered, which may not survive such proceedings. In foreign jurisdictions, opposition or cancellation proceedings may be filed against our trademarks, which may not survive such proceedings. Moreover, any name we have proposed to use with our product candidate in the United States must be approved by the FDA, regardless of whether we have registered it, or applied to register it, as a trademark. Similar requirements exist in Europe. The FDA typically conducts a review of proposed product names, including an evaluation of potential for confusion with other product names.
If the FDA or an equivalent administrative body in a foreign jurisdiction objects to any of our proposed proprietary product names, we may be required to expend significant additional resources in an effort to identify a suitable substitute name that would qualify under applicable trademark laws, not infringe the existing rights of third parties and be acceptable to the FDA. Furthermore, in many countries, owning and maintaining a trademark registration may not provide an adequate defense against a subsequent infringement claim asserted by the owner of a senior trademark.
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We may not be able to protect our rights to these trademarks and trade names, which we need to build name recognition among potential partners or customers in our markets of interest. At times, competitors or other third parties may adopt trade names or trademarks similar to ours, thereby impeding our ability to build brand identity and possibly leading to market confusion. In addition, there could be potential trade name or trademark infringement claims brought by owners of other registered trademarks or trademarks that incorporate variations of our registered or unregistered trademarks or trade names. Over the long term, if we are unable to establish name recognition based on our trademarks and trade names, then we may not be able to compete effectively and our business may be adversely affected. Our efforts to enforce or protect our proprietary rights related to trademarks, trade names, domain names, social media handles or other intellectual property may be ineffective and could result in substantial costs and diversion of resources and could adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.
We have limited foreign intellectual property rights and may not be able to protect our intellectual property rights throughout the world.
We have limited intellectual property rights outside the United States. Filing, prosecuting and defending patents on product candidates in all countries throughout the world would be prohibitively expensive, and our intellectual property rights in some countries outside the United States can have a different scope and strength than those in the United States. Moreover, obtaining such protection in a timely manner, or at all, may be affected by factors or events beyond our control, such as a prolonged economic downturn, or global financial or political crises. In addition, the laws of some foreign countries do not protect intellectual property rights to the same extent as federal and state laws in the United States. Consequently, we may not be able to prevent third parties from practicing our inventions in all countries outside the United States, or from selling or importing products made using our inventions in and into the United States or other jurisdictions. Competitors may use our technologies in jurisdictions where we have not obtained patent protection to develop their own products and, further, may export otherwise infringing products to territories where we have patent protection but where enforcement is not as strong as that in the United States. These products may compete with our products in jurisdictions where we do not have any issued patents and our patent claims or other intellectual property rights may not be effective or sufficient to prevent them from competing.
Many companies have encountered significant problems in protecting and defending intellectual property rights in foreign jurisdictions. The legal systems of certain countries, particularly certain developing countries, do not favor the enforcement of patents, trade secrets and other intellectual property protection, particularly those relating to biopharmaceutical products, which could make it difficult for us to stop the infringement of our patents or marketing of competing products against third parties in violation of our proprietary rights generally. The initiation of proceedings by third parties to challenge the scope or validity of our patent rights in foreign jurisdictions could result in substantial cost and divert our efforts and attention from other aspects of our business. Proceedings to enforce our patent and other intellectual property rights in foreign jurisdictions could result in substantial costs and divert our efforts and attention from other aspects of our business, could put our patents at risk of being invalidated or interpreted narrowly and our patent applications at risk of not issuing and could provoke third parties to assert claims against us. We may not prevail in any lawsuits that we initiate and the damages or other remedies awarded, if any, may not be commercially meaningful. Similarly, if our trade secrets are disclosed in a foreign jurisdiction, competitors worldwide could have access to our proprietary information and we may be without satisfactory recourse. Such disclosure could have a material adverse effect on our business. In addition, certain countries outside of the United States have compulsory licensing laws under which a patent owner may be compelled to grant licenses to third parties. In those countries, we and our licensors may have limited remedies if patents are infringed or if we or our licensors are compelled to grant a license to a third party, which could materially diminish the value of those patents. In addition, many countries limit the enforceability of patents against government authorities or government contractors. This could limit our potential revenue opportunities. Accordingly, our efforts to enforce our intellectual property rights around the world may be inadequate to obtain a significant commercial advantage from the intellectual property that we develop or license.
Risks Related to Government Regulation
If we fail to comply with environmental, health and safety laws and regulations, we could become subject to fines or penalties or incur costs that could adversely affect our business, results of operations and financial condition.
We are subject to numerous environmental, health and safety laws and regulations, including those governing laboratory procedures and the handling, use, storage, treatment and disposal of hazardous materials and wastes. Our research and development activities involve the use of biological and hazardous materials and produce hazardous waste products. We generally contract with third parties for the disposal of these materials and wastes. We cannot eliminate the risk of contamination or injury from these materials, which could cause an interruption of our future commercialization efforts,
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research and development efforts and business operations, environmental damage resulting in costly clean-up and liabilities under applicable laws and regulations governing the use, storage, handling and disposal of these materials and specified waste products. Although we believe that the safety procedures utilized by our third-party manufacturers for handling and disposing of these materials generally comply with the standards prescribed by these laws and regulations, this may not be the case and we may not eliminate the risk of accidental contamination or injury from these materials. In such an event, we may be held liable for any resulting damages and such liability could exceed our resources and state, federal or other applicable authorities may curtail our use of certain materials and/or interrupt our business operations. Furthermore, environmental laws and regulations are complex, change frequently and have tended to become more stringent. We cannot predict the impact of such changes or our future compliance. In addition, we may incur substantial costs in order to comply with current or future environmental, health and safety laws and regulations. These current or future laws and regulations may impair our research, development or production efforts. Failure to comply with these laws and regulations also may result in substantial fines, penalties or other sanctions.
Although we maintain workers’ compensation insurance to cover us for costs and expenses we may incur due to injuries to our employees resulting from the use of hazardous materials or other work-related injuries, this insurance may not provide adequate coverage against potential liabilities. Although we have environmental liability insurance for our California facility as required by the related lease agreement, we do not currently carry specific biological waste or hazardous waste insurance coverage, workers compensation or property and casualty and general liability insurance policies that include coverage for criminal damages and fines arising from biological or hazardous waste exposure or contamination.
We have conducted, are currently conducting, and may in the future conduct clinical trials for our product candidates outside the United States, and the FDA and comparable foreign regulatory authorities may not accept data from such trials.
We have conducted, are currently conducting, and may in the future conduct one or more clinical trials of our current or future product candidates outside the United States. The acceptance of study data from clinical trials conducted outside the United States or another jurisdiction by the FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authority may be subject to certain conditions or may not be accepted at all. In cases where data from foreign clinical trials are intended to serve as the basis for marketing approval in the United States, the FDA will generally not approve the application on the basis of foreign data alone unless (i) the data are applicable to the U.S. population and U.S. medical practice; (ii) the trials were performed by clinical investigators of recognized competence; and (iii) the data may be considered valid without the need for an on-site inspection by the FDA or, if the FDA considers such as inspection to be necessary, the FDA is able to validate the data through an on-site inspection or other appropriate means. Additionally, the FDA’s clinical trial requirements, including sufficient size of patient populations and statistical power, must be met. Many foreign regulatory authorities have similar approval requirements. In addition, such foreign trials would be subject to the applicable local laws of the foreign jurisdictions where the trials are conducted. There can be no assurance that the FDA or any comparable foreign regulatory authority will accept data from trials conducted outside of the United States or the applicable jurisdiction. If the FDA or any comparable foreign regulatory authority does not accept such data, we would need to conduct additional trials, which could be costly and time-consuming.
Even if we receive marketing approval for our current or future product candidates in the United States, we may never receive regulatory approval to market outside of the United States.
We plan to seek regulatory approval of our current or future product candidates outside of the United States and are currently conducting certain clinical trials internationally, including in Europe. In order to market any product outside of the United States, however, we must establish and comply with the numerous and varying safety, efficacy and other regulatory requirements of other applicable countries. Approval procedures vary among countries and can involve additional product candidate testing and additional administrative review periods. The time required to obtain approvals in other countries might differ substantially from that required to obtain FDA approval. The marketing approval processes in other countries generally implicate all of the risks detailed above regarding FDA approval in the United States as well as other risks. In particular, in many countries outside of the United States, products must receive pricing and reimbursement approval before the product can be commercialized. Obtaining foreign regulatory approvals and compliance with foreign regulatory requirements could result in significant delays, difficulties and costs for us and could delay or prevent the introduction of any of our product candidates in certain countries. Regulatory and marketing approval in one country does not ensure regulatory and marketing approval in another, but a failure or delay in obtaining regulatory and marketing approval in one country may have a negative effect on the regulatory process in others and would impair our ability to market our current or future product candidates in such foreign markets. Any such impairment would reduce the size of our potential market, which could adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.
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The regulatory approval processes of the FDA and comparable foreign authorities are lengthy, time-consuming and inherently unpredictable, and if we are ultimately unable to obtain regulatory approval for our product candidates, our business will be substantially harmed.
Any of our product candidates and any future product candidates are subject to extensive governmental regulations relating to, among other things, research, testing, development, manufacturing, approval, recordkeeping, reporting, labeling, storage, packaging, advertising and promotion, pricing, post-approval monitoring, marketing and distribution of products. Rigorous preclinical studies, clinical trials, and an extensive regulatory approval process are required to be completed successfully in the United States and in many foreign jurisdictions before a new product can be marketed. Satisfaction of these and other regulatory requirements is costly, time-consuming, uncertain and subject to unanticipated delays. It is possible that none of our product candidates will obtain the regulatory approvals necessary for us to begin selling them.
The time required to obtain approval by the FDA and comparable foreign authorities is unpredictable but typically takes many years following the commencement of clinical trials and depends upon numerous factors, including the discretion of the regulatory authorities. In addition, approval policies, regulations or the type and amount of clinical data necessary to gain approval may change during the course of a product candidate’s clinical development and may vary among jurisdictions. We have not obtained regulatory approval for any product candidate and it is possible that any product candidates we may seek to develop in the future will never obtain regulatory approval. Neither we nor any future collaborator is permitted to market any of our product candidates in the United States until we receive regulatory approval of our product candidates through a new drug application, or NDA, or biologics license application, or BLA, from the FDA. The FDA and other regulatory authorities may delay, limit or deny approval of our product candidates for many reasons, including:
In addition, any of these regulatory authorities may change requirements for the approval of a product candidate even after reviewing and providing comments or advice on a protocol for a clinical trial. The FDA or other regulatory authorities may require that we conduct additional clinical, preclinical, manufacturing validation or drug product quality studies and submit those data before considering or reconsidering the application. Depending on the extent of these or any other studies, approval of any applications that we submit may be delayed by several years or may require us to expend more resources
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than we have available. It is also possible that additional studies, if performed and completed, may not be considered sufficient by the FDA or other regulatory authorities for obtaining approval.
In addition, the FDA or other regulatory authorities may approve a product candidate for fewer or more limited indications than we request, may impose significant limitations related to use restrictions for certain age groups, warnings, precautions or contraindications or may grant approval contingent on the performance of costly post-marketing clinical trials or risk mitigation requirements, such as the implementation of a REMS or comparable foreign risk management approaches. The FDA or other regulatory authorities may not accept the labeling claims that we believe would be necessary or desirable for the successful commercialization of our product candidates.
Further, the FDA and its foreign counterparts may respond to any BLA or NDA that we may submit by defining requirements that we do not anticipate. Such responses could delay clinical development of any of our product candidates or any future product candidates.
On November 28, 2023, the FDA issued a statement that it is investigating serious risk of T-cell malignancy following BCMA-directed or CD19-directed autologous chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cell immunotherapies, such as KYV-101. While the FDA noted that it currently believes that the overall benefits of these products continue to outweigh their potential risks for their approved uses, the FDA stated that it is investigating the identified risk of T-cell malignancy with serious outcomes, including hospitalization and death, and is evaluating the need for regulatory action. In January 2024, the FDA notified the manufacturers of the six FDA-approved BCMA-directed and CD19-directed chimeric CAR genetically modified autologous T-cell therapies that their products’ safety information must be updated to include a boxed warning that T-cell malignancies have occurred following treatment with BCMA-directed and CD19-directed genetically modified autologous T-cell immunotherapies. In April 2024, the FDA issued a public safety statement announcing its initiation of the class labeling changes and noting that patients and clinical trial participants receiving treatment with these products should be monitored life-long for secondary malignancies. Because all currently approved CAR T-cell immunotherapies are in oncology indications, however, there can be no assurance that the FDA will reach the same risk-benefit analysis in other indications, such as autoimmune. Given that the autoimmune diseases we are seeking to treat are different indications from the approved oncology indications, the FDA and other regulatory authorities may apply a different benefit-risk assessment threshold such that even if our product candidate demonstrated a similar safety profile as current CAR T therapies, the FDA could ultimately determine that the harmful side effects outweigh the benefits and require us to cease clinical trials or deny approval of our product candidates. The FDA’s investigation may impact the FDA’s review of product candidates that we are developing, or that we may seek to develop in the future, which may, among other things, result in additional regulatory scrutiny of our product candidates, delay the timing for receiving any regulatory approvals, require us to include a boxed warning on any of our product candidates that receive regulatory approval or impose additional post-approval requirements on any of our product candidates that receive regulatory approval.
Any delay or failure in obtaining required approvals could adversely affect our ability to generate revenue from the particular product candidate for which we are seeking approval. Furthermore, any regulatory approval to market a product may be subject to limitations on the approved uses for which we may market the product or on the labeling or other restrictions.
We are also subject to or may in the future become subject to numerous foreign regulatory requirements governing, among other things, the conduct of clinical trials, manufacturing and marketing authorization, pricing and third-party reimbursement. The foreign regulatory approval process varies among countries and may include all of the risks associated with the FDA approval process described above, as well as risks attributable to the satisfaction of local regulations in foreign jurisdictions. Moreover, the time required to obtain approval may differ from that required to obtain FDA approval. FDA approval does not ensure approval by regulatory authorities outside the United States and vice versa. Any delay or failure to obtain U.S. or foreign regulatory approval for a product candidate could have a material and adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.
Even if we commercialize any product candidates, alone or with our partners, such product may become subject to unfavorable pricing regulations, third-party reimbursement practices or healthcare reform initiatives, which could harm our business.
The regulations that govern marketing approvals, pricing and reimbursement for new drug products vary widely from country to country. Current and future legislation may significantly change the approval requirements in ways that could involve additional costs and cause delays in obtaining approvals. Some countries require approval of the sale price of a drug before it can be marketed. In many countries, the pricing review period begins after marketing or product licensing approval
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is granted. In some foreign markets, prescription pharmaceutical pricing remains subject to continuing governmental control even after initial approval is granted. As a result, we might obtain marketing approval for a product in a particular country, but then be subject to price regulations that delay or limit our commercial launch of the product, possibly for lengthy time periods, which could negatively impact the revenue we generate from the sale of the product in that particular country. Adverse pricing limitations may hinder our ability to recoup our investment in one or more product candidates, even if our product candidates obtain marketing approval.
*Coverage and reimbursement may be limited or unavailable in certain market segments for our product candidates, if approved, which could make it difficult for us to sell any product candidates profitably.
The success of our product candidates, if approved, depends on the availability of coverage and adequate reimbursement from third-party payors. We cannot be certain that coverage and reimbursement will be available for, or accurately estimate the potential revenue from, our product candidates or assure that coverage and reimbursement will continue to be available for any product that we may develop that receives coverage and adequate reimbursement from one or more third-party payors. Patients who are provided medical treatment for their conditions generally rely on third-party payors to reimburse all or part of the costs associated with their treatment. Accordingly, coverage and adequate reimbursement from governmental healthcare programs, such as Medicare and Medicaid, and commercial payors is critical to new product acceptance.
Government authorities and third-party payors, such as private health insurers and health maintenance organizations, decide which drugs and treatments they will cover and the amount of reimbursement. These groups have attempted to control costs by limiting coverage and the amount of reimbursement for particular medications. Coverage and reimbursement by a third-party payor may depend upon a number of factors, including the third-party payor’s determination that use of a product is:
In the United States, no uniform policy of coverage and reimbursement for products exists among third-party payors. As a result, obtaining coverage and reimbursement approval of a product from a government or other third-party payor is a time-consuming and costly process that could require us to provide to each payor supporting scientific, clinical and cost-effectiveness data for the use of our products on a payor-by-payor basis, with no assurance that coverage and adequate reimbursement will be obtained. Even if we obtain coverage for a given product, the resulting reimbursement payment rates might not be adequate for us to achieve or sustain profitability or may require co-payments that patients find unacceptably high. Additionally, third-party payors may not cover, or provide adequate reimbursement for, long-term follow-up evaluations required following the use of product candidates. Patients are unlikely to use our product candidates unless coverage is provided and reimbursement is adequate to cover a significant portion of the cost of our product candidates. There is significant uncertainty related to third-party payor coverage and reimbursement of newly approved products. It is difficult to predict at this time what third-party payors will decide with respect to the coverage and reimbursement for our product candidates. In addition, companion diagnostic tests require coverage and reimbursement separate and apart from the coverage and reimbursement for their companion pharmaceutical or biological products. Similar challenges to obtaining coverage and reimbursement, applicable to pharmaceutical or biological products, will apply to companion diagnostics.
Moreover, increasing efforts by governmental and third-party payors in the United States and abroad to cap or reduce healthcare costs may cause such organizations to limit both coverage and the level of reimbursement for newly approved products and, as a result, they may not cover or provide adequate payment for our product candidates. There has been increasing legislative and enforcement interest in the United States with respect to specialty drug pricing practices. Specifically, there have been several U.S. congressional inquiries and proposed and enacted federal and state legislation designed to, among other things, bring more transparency to drug pricing, reduce the cost of prescription drugs under Medicare, review the relationship between pricing and manufacturer patient programs, and reform government program reimbursement methodologies for drugs. In addition, the IRA, among other things, (i) directs the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, or HHS, to negotiate the price of certain high-expenditure, single-source drugs and biologics covered under Medicare, and subject drug manufacturers to civil monetary penalties and a potential excise tax by offering a price that
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is not equal to or less than the negotiated “maximum fair price” for such drugs and biologics under the law, and (ii) imposes rebates with respect to certain drugs and biologics covered under Medicare Part B or Medicare Part D to penalize price increases that outpace inflation. The IRA permits HHS to implement many of these provisions through guidance, as opposed to regulation, for the initial years. HHS has and will continue to issue and update guidance as these programs are implemented. These provisions took effect progressively starting in fiscal year 2023. On August 15, 2024, HHS announced the agreed-upon reimbursement prices of the first ten drugs that were subject to price negotiations, although the Medicare drug price negotiation program is currently subject to legal challenges. On January 17, 2025, CMS announced its selection of 15 additional drugs covered by Part D for the second cycle of negotiations. While there had been some questions about the current U.S. administration’s position on this program, CMS issued a public statement on January 29, 2025, declaring that lowering the cost of prescription drugs is a top priority of the new administration and CMS is committed to considering opportunities to bring greater transparency in the negotiation program. The second cycle of negotiations with participating drug companies will occur during 2025, and any negotiated prices for this second set of drugs will be effective starting January 1, 2027. Several pharmaceutical companies, as well as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America have filed lawsuits against HHS and CMS asserting that, among other things, the IRA’s drug price negotiation program for Medicare constitutes an uncompensated taking in violation of the Fifth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution and is otherwise unlawful. HHS has generally won the substantive disputes in these cases, and several federal district court judges have expressed skepticism regarding the merits of the legal arguments being pursued by the pharmaceutical industry. Certain of these cases are now on appeal. On December 8, 2023, the National Institute of Standards and Technology published for comment a Draft Interagency Guidance Framework for Considering the Exercise of March-In Rights which for the first time includes the price of a product as one factor an agency can use when deciding to exercise march-in rights. While march-in rights have not previously been exercised, it is uncertain whether that will continue under the new framework. It is unclear whether or how much such rights may be exercised.
In addition, on July 4, 2025, legislation commonly referred to as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act was signed into law, which reduces funding to federal healthcare programs and imposes additional requirements to be eligible for healthcare, which may result in decreased access to healthcare, particularly in Medicaid programs.
At the state level, legislatures have increasingly passed legislation and implemented regulations designed to control pharmaceutical and biological product pricing, including price or patient reimbursement constraints, discounts, restrictions on certain product access and marketing cost disclosure and transparency measures, and, in some cases, designed to encourage importation from other countries and bulk purchasing. For example, on January 5, 2024, the FDA approved Florida’s Section 804 Importation Program, or SIP, proposal to import certain drugs from Canada for specific state healthcare programs. It is unclear how this program will be implemented, including which drugs will be chosen, and whether it will be subject to legal challenges in the United States or Canada. Other states have also submitted SIP proposals that are pending review by the FDA.
Additionally, there may be significant delays in obtaining coverage and reimbursement for newly approved drugs, and coverage may be more limited than the purposes for which the drug is approved by the FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authorities. Moreover, eligibility for coverage and reimbursement does not imply that a drug will be paid for in all cases or at a rate that covers our costs, including research, development, manufacture, sale and distribution. Interim reimbursement levels for new drugs, if applicable, may also not be sufficient to cover our costs and may only be temporary. Reimbursement rates may vary according to the use of the drug and the clinical setting in which it is used, may be based on reimbursement levels already set for lower cost drugs and may be incorporated into existing payments for other services.
We expect to experience pricing pressures in connection with the sale of all of our product candidates due to the trend toward managed healthcare, the increasing influence of health maintenance organizations, cost containment initiatives and additional legislative changes. Net prices for drugs may be reduced by mandatory discounts or rebates required by government healthcare programs or third-party payors and by any future relaxation of laws that presently restrict imports of drugs from countries where they may be sold at lower prices than in the United States. Our inability to promptly obtain coverage and profitable reimbursement rates from both government-funded and private payors for any approved products that we develop could have a material adverse effect on our operating results, our ability to raise capital needed to commercialize products and our overall financial condition.
Our relationships with healthcare providers and physicians and third-party payors may be subject to applicable anti-kickback, fraud and abuse and other healthcare laws and regulations, which could expose us to criminal sanctions, civil penalties, contractual damages, reputational harm and diminished profits and future earnings.
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Healthcare providers, physicians and third-party payors in the United States and elsewhere play a primary role in the recommendation and prescription of pharmaceutical products. Our current and future arrangements with healthcare providers, third-party payors and customers can expose us to broadly applicable fraud and abuse and other healthcare laws and regulations, which may constrain the business or financial arrangements and relationships through which we research and, if approved, sell, market and distribute our products. In particular, the research of our product candidates, as well as the promotion, sales, marketing and business arrangements of our product candidates, is subject to extensive laws designed to prevent fraud, misconduct, kickbacks, self-dealing and other abusive practices. These laws and regulations may restrict or prohibit a wide range of pricing, discounting, marketing and promotion, sales commission(s), certain customer incentive programs and other business arrangements generally. Activities subject to these laws also involve the improper use of information obtained in the course of patient recruitment for clinical trials, which could result in regulatory sanctions and serious harm to our reputation. The applicable federal, state and foreign healthcare laws and regulations laws that may affect our ability to operate include, but are not limited to:
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The distribution of pharmaceutical products is subject to additional requirements and regulations, including extensive record keeping, licensing, storage and security requirements intended to prevent the unauthorized sale of pharmaceutical products.
The scope and enforcement of each of these laws is uncertain and subject to rapid change in the current environment of healthcare reform. Federal, state and foreign enforcement bodies have continued to increase their scrutiny of interactions between healthcare companies and healthcare providers, which has led to a number of investigations, prosecutions, convictions, significant fines and penalties and settlements in the healthcare industry. Ensuring that business arrangements comply with applicable healthcare laws, as well as responding to possible investigations by government authorities, can be time-and resource-consuming and may divert our management’s attention from the operation of our business.
It is possible that governmental and enforcement authorities will conclude that our business practices may not comply with current or future statutes, regulations or case law interpreting applicable fraud and abuse or other healthcare laws and regulations. If any such actions are instituted against us, and we are not successful in defending ourselves or asserting our rights, those actions could have a significant impact on our business, including the imposition of significant civil, criminal and administrative penalties, damages, fines, disgorgement, individual imprisonment, possible exclusion from participation in federal and state funded healthcare programs, contractual damages and the curtailment or restricting of our operations, as well as additional reporting obligations and oversight if we become subject to a corporate integrity agreement or other agreement to resolve allegations of non-compliance with these laws. Any action for violation of these laws, even if successfully defended, could cause us to incur significant legal expenses and divert management’s attention from the operation of our business. Prohibitions or restrictions on sales or withdrawal of future marketed products could adversely affect our business, results of operations and financial condition.
We may attempt to seek approval from the FDA for one or more of our product candidates through the use of the accelerated approval pathway. If we are unable to obtain such approval, we may be required to conduct additional clinical trials beyond those that we contemplate, which could increase the expense of obtaining, and delay the receipt of, necessary marketing approvals. Even if we receive accelerated approval from the FDA, if our confirmatory trials do not verify clinical benefit, or if we do not comply with rigorous post-marketing requirements, the FDA may seek to withdraw any accelerated approval we have obtained.
We may in the future seek an accelerated approval for one or more of our product candidates. Under the accelerated approval pathway, the FDA may grant accelerated approval to a product candidate designed to treat a serious or life-threatening condition that provides meaningful therapeutic benefit over available therapies, upon a determination that the product candidate has an effect on a surrogate endpoint or intermediate clinical endpoint that is reasonably likely to predict clinical benefit. The FDA considers a clinical benefit to be a positive therapeutic effect that is clinically meaningful in the context of a given disease, such as irreversible morbidity or mortality. For the purposes of accelerated approval, a surrogate endpoint is a marker, such as a laboratory measurement, radiographic image, physical sign, or other measure that is thought to predict clinical benefit, but is not itself a measure of clinical benefit. An intermediate clinical endpoint is a clinical endpoint that can be measured earlier than an effect on irreversible morbidity or mortality that is reasonably likely to predict an effect on irreversible morbidity or mortality or other clinical benefit. The accelerated approval pathway may be used in cases in which the advantage of a new drug over available therapy may not be a direct therapeutic advantage, but is a clinically important improvement from a patient and public health perspective. If granted, accelerated approval is usually contingent on the sponsor’s agreement to conduct, in a diligent manner, additional post-approval confirmatory studies to verify and describe the drug’s clinical benefit and, under the Food and Drug Omnibus Reform Act of 2022, or FDORA, the FDA is permitted to require, as appropriate, that such studies be underway prior to approval or within a specified time period after the date accelerated approval is granted. The FDA has issued draft guidance that proposes criteria it will evaluate to determine if a trial is underway, including whether enrollment in the trial has been initiated. FDORA also requires sponsors to send updates to the FDA every 180 days on the status of such studies, including progress toward enrollment targets, and the FDA must promptly post this information publicly. In addition, FDORA gives the FDA increased authority to withdraw accelerated approval on an expedited basis if, for example, the sponsor fails to conduct such studies in a timely manner, such studies fail to confirm the drug’s clinical benefit or the sponsor fails to send the necessary updates to the FDA. The FDA is empowered to take action against companies that fail to conduct with due diligence any post-approval confirmatory study or submit timely reports to the agency on their progress. In addition, the FDA generally requires, unless otherwise informed by
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the agency, pre-approval of promotional materials for products receiving accelerated approval, which could adversely impact the timing of the commercial launch of the product.
Prior to seeking accelerated approval for any of our product candidates, we intend to seek feedback from the FDA and will otherwise evaluate our ability to seek and receive accelerated approval. There can be no assurance that after our evaluation of the feedback and other factors we will decide to pursue or submit an NDA seeking accelerated approval or any other form of expedited development, review or approval. Similarly, there can be no assurance that after subsequent FDA feedback we will continue to pursue or apply for accelerated approval or any other form of expedited development, review or approval, even if we initially decide to do so. Furthermore, if we decide to submit an application for accelerated approval for our product candidates, there can be no assurance that such submission or application will be accepted or that any expedited development, review or approval will be granted on a timely basis, or at all. The FDA or other comparable foreign regulatory authorities could also require us to conduct further studies prior to considering our application or granting approval of any type. A failure to obtain accelerated approval or any other form of expedited development, review or approval for our product candidates would result in a longer time period to commercialization of such product candidate, if any, could increase the cost of development of such product candidate and could harm our competitive position in the marketplace.
We may not be successful in pursuing or maintaining Fast Track or other regulatory designations for our product candidates, and such designations may not actually lead to a faster development or regulatory approval process.
Although we received Fast Track designation for KYV-101 for the treatment of patients with refractory lupus nephritis in May 2023, for KYV-101 for the treatment of patients with myasthenia gravis, or MG, in December 2023 and for KYV-101 for the treatment of patients with multiple sclerosis in January 2024 and RMAT designation for KYV-101 for the treatment of SPS in July 2024 and for the treatment of MG in August 2024, these designations do not assure that we will experience a faster development process, regulatory review or regulatory approval process compared to conventional FDA procedures. In addition, the FDA may withdraw a Fast Track or other accelerated review designation if it believes that the designation is no longer supported by data from our clinical development program. Additionally, qualification for any expedited review procedure does not ensure that we will ultimately obtain regulatory approval for such product candidate. Access to an expedited program may expedite the development or approval process, but it does not change the standards for approval.
Furthermore, although we may pursue additional opportunities to accelerate the development of certain of our product candidates through one or more of the FDA’s expedited program designations, we cannot be assured that any of our product candidates will qualify for such programs. The FDA may determine that our proposed target indication or other aspects of our clinical development plans do not qualify for such expedited program.
We may not be able to obtain orphan drug designation or orphan drug exclusivity for our product candidates.
Regulatory authorities in some jurisdictions, including the United States and Europe, may designate drugs for relatively small patient populations as orphan drugs. Under the Orphan Drug Act, the FDA may grant orphan designation to a drug or biological product intended to treat a rare disease or condition, which is generally a disease or condition that affects fewer than 200,000 individuals in the United States, or more than 200,000 individuals in the United States and for which there is no reasonable expectation that the cost of developing and making the product available in the United States for this type of disease or condition will be recovered from sales of the product. Orphan drug designation neither shortens the development time or regulatory review time of a product candidate, nor gives the product candidate any advantage in the regulatory review or approval process. We received orphan drug designation from the FDA for KYV-101 for the treatment of MG in April 2024, for the treatment of SPS in August 2024, and for the treatment of SSc in September 2024, but we may not be granted orphan drug designations for our product candidates in other indications in the U.S. or in other jurisdictions.
Even if we obtain orphan drug designation for a product candidate, we may not be able to obtain orphan drug exclusivity for that product candidate. If a product that has orphan drug designation subsequently receives the first FDA approval for the disease or condition for which it has such designation, the product is entitled to orphan drug exclusivity, which means that the FDA may not approve any other applications to market the same drug or biologic for the same indication for seven years from the date of such approval, except in limited circumstances, such as a showing of clinical superiority to the product with orphan exclusivity on the basis of greater effectiveness or safety or providing a major contribution to patient care or in instances of drug supply issues. Competitors, however, may receive approval of either a different product for the same indication or the same product for a different indication but that could be used off-label in the orphan indication. Orphan drug exclusivity also could block the approval of one of our products for seven years if a competitor obtains approval before we do for the same product, as defined by the FDA, for the same indication we are seeking approval, or if our product is determined to be contained within the scope of the competitor’s product for the same indication or disease. If we pursue marketing approval for an indication broader than the orphan drug designation we have
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received, we may not be entitled to orphan drug exclusivity. Orphan drug status in the European Union has similar, but not identical, requirements and benefits. Orphan drug exclusivity may be lost if the FDA or the EMA determines that the request for designation was materially defective or if the manufacturer is unable to assure sufficient quantity of the drug to meet the needs of patients with the rare disease or condition.
Finally, even if we obtain orphan drug exclusivity for a product, that exclusivity may not effectively protect the product from competition because the FDA has taken the position that, under certain circumstances, another drug with the same active moiety can be approved for the same condition. Specifically, the FDA’s regulations provide that it can approve another drug with the same active moiety for the same condition if the FDA concludes that the later drug is clinically superior in that it is shown to be safer, more effective or makes a major contribution to patient care.
We have received Regenerative Medicine Advanced Therapy, or RMAT, designation for KYV-101 for the treatment of stiff-person syndrome, or SPS, and for the treatment of myasthenia gravis, or MG. This designation may not lead to a faster development or regulatory review or approval process, and will not increase the likelihood that such product candidates will receive marketing approval.
We received Regenerative Medicine Advanced Therapy designation for KYV-101 for the treatment of SPS in July 2024 and for the treatment of MG in August 2024.
A company may request RMAT designation of its product candidate, which designation may be granted if the product meets the following criteria: (i) it is a cell therapy, therapeutic tissue engineering product, human cell and tissue product, or any combination product using such therapies or products, with limited exceptions; (ii) it is intended to treat, modify, reverse, or cure a serious or life-threatening disease or condition; and (iii) preliminary clinical evidence indicates that the drug has the potential to address unmet medical needs for such a disease or condition. RMAT designation provides potential benefits that include more frequent meetings with FDA to discuss the development plan for the product candidate, and potential eligibility for rolling review and priority review. Products granted RMAT designation may also be eligible for accelerated approval on the basis of a surrogate or intermediate endpoint reasonably likely to predict long-term clinical benefit, or reliance upon data obtained from a meaningful number of sites, including through expansion to additional sites post-approval, if appropriate. RMAT-designated products that receive accelerated approval may, as appropriate, fulfill their post-approval requirements through the submission of clinical evidence, clinical studies, patient registries, or other sources of real world evidence (such as electronic health records); through the collection of larger confirmatory data sets; or via post-approval monitoring of all patients treated with such therapy prior to approval of the therapy.
RMAT designation does not change the standards for product approval, and there is no assurance that any such designation or eligibility will result in expedited review or approval or that the approved indication will not be narrower than the indication covered by the RMAT designation. Additionally, RMAT designation can be revoked if the criteria for eligibility cease to be met as clinical data emerges.
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Recently enacted legislation, future legislation and other healthcare reform measures may increase the difficulty and cost for us to obtain marketing approval for and commercialize our product candidates and may affect the prices we may set.
In the United States and some foreign jurisdictions, there have been, and we expect there will continue to be, a number of legislative and regulatory changes to the healthcare system, including cost-containment measures
that may reduce or limit coverage and reimbursement for newly approved drugs and affect our ability to profitably sell any product candidates for which we obtain marketing approval. In particular, there have been and continue to be a number of initiatives at the U.S. federal and state levels that seek to reduce healthcare costs and improve the quality of healthcare.
For example, in March 2010, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, as amended by the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act, or, collectively, the ACA, was enacted in the United States, which substantially changed the way healthcare is financed by both governmental and private insurers in the United States and significantly affected the pharmaceutical industry. The ACA, among other things, subjected biologic products to potential competition by lower-cost biosimilars, addressed a new methodology by which rebates owed by manufacturers under the Medicaid Drug Rebate Program, or MDRP, are calculated for drugs and biologics that are inhaled, infused, instilled, implanted or injected, increased the minimum Medicaid rebates owed by manufacturers under the MDRP, extended manufacturer Medicaid rebate obligations to utilization by individuals enrolled in Medicaid managed care organizations, established annual fees and taxes on manufacturers of certain branded prescription drugs and biologics, and established a new Medicare Part D coverage gap discount program. Since its enactment, there have been judicial, congressional, and executive branch challenges to the ACA, which have resulted in delays in the implementation of, and action taken to repeal or replace, certain aspects of the ACA. On June 17, 2021, the U.S. Supreme Court dismissed a challenge on procedural grounds that argued the ACA is unconstitutional in its entirety because the “individual mandate” was repealed by Congress. In addition, there have been a number of health reform initiatives by the Biden administration that have impacted the ACA. For example, on August 16, 2022, former President Biden signed the IRA into law, which, among other things, extends enhanced subsidies for individuals purchasing health insurance coverage in ACA marketplaces through plan year 2025. The IRA also eliminates the “donut hole” under the Medicare Part D program beginning in 2025 by significantly lowering the beneficiary maximum out-of-pocket cost and through a newly established manufacturer discount program. It is possible that the ACA will be subject to judicial or congressional challenges in the future. It is unclear how other such challenges, and any healthcare reform measures of the current U.S. administration, will impact the ACA and our business.
In addition, other legislative changes have been proposed and adopted since the ACA was enacted. For example, on August 2, 2011, the Budget Control Act of 2011 was signed into law, which, among other things, resulted in reductions to Medicare payments to providers of 2% per fiscal year, which went into effect on April 1, 2013, and, due to subsequent legislative amendments to the statute, will remain in effect through 2031. Under current legislation, the actual reduction in Medicare payments will vary from 1% in 2022 to up to 4% in the final fiscal year of this sequester. In addition, in certain countries outside the United States, reimbursement for products that have not yet received marketing authorization may be provided through national managed access programs.
We expect that the ACA, the IRA, and any other healthcare reform measures that may be adopted in the future may result in additional reductions in Medicare and other healthcare funding, more rigorous coverage criteria, new payment methodologies and additional downward pressure on the price that we receive for any approved product. Any reduction in reimbursement from Medicare or other government programs may result in a similar reduction in payments from private payors. The implementation of cost containment measures or other healthcare reforms may prevent us from being able to generate revenue, attain profitability or commercialize our product candidates, if approved.
Changing regulatory environments could negatively impact our business.
Third-party payors, whether domestic or foreign, or governmental or commercial, are developing increasingly sophisticated methods of controlling healthcare costs. The United States and many foreign jurisdictions have enacted or proposed legislative and regulatory changes affecting the healthcare system that could prevent or delay marketing approval of our product candidates, restrict or regulate post-approval activities and affect our ability to profitably sell any product for which we obtain marketing approval.
There have been, and likely will continue to be, legislative and regulatory proposals at the foreign, federal and state levels directed at broadening the availability of healthcare and containing or lowering the cost of healthcare. The implementation of cost containment measures or other healthcare reforms may prevent us from being able to generate revenue, attain profitability, or commercialize our products. Such reforms could have an adverse effect on anticipated
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revenue from product candidates that we may successfully develop and for which we may obtain regulatory approval and may affect our overall financial condition and ability to develop product candidates.
Many EU Member States periodically review their reimbursement procedures for medicinal products, which could have an adverse impact on reimbursement status. We expect that legislators, policymakers and healthcare insurance funds in the EU Member States will continue to propose and implement cost-containing measures, such as lower maximum prices, lower or lack of reimbursement coverage and incentives to use cheaper, usually generic, products as an alternative to branded products, and/or branded products available through parallel import to keep healthcare costs down. Moreover, in order to obtain reimbursement for our products in some European countries, including some EU Member States, we may be required to compile additional data comparing the cost-effectiveness of our products to other available therapies. Health Technology Assessment, or HTA, of medicinal products is becoming an increasingly common part of the pricing and reimbursement procedures in some EU Member States, including those representing the larger markets. The HTA process is the procedure to assess the therapeutic, economic and societal impact of a given medicinal product in the national healthcare systems of the individual country. The outcome of an HTA will often influence the pricing and reimbursement status granted to these medicinal products by the competent authorities of individual EU Member States. The extent to which pricing and reimbursement decisions are influenced by the HTA of the specific medicinal product currently varies between EU Member States.
In December 2021, Regulation No. 2021/2282 on HTA, amending Directive 2011/24/EU, was adopted in the European Union. This Regulation, which went into effect in January 2022 and took effect as of January 2025, is intended to boost cooperation among EU Member States in assessing health technologies, including new medicinal products, and providing the basis for cooperation at European Union level for joint clinical assessments in these areas. The Regulation foresees a three-year transitional period and will permit EU Member States to use common HTA tools, methodologies, and procedures across the European Union, working together in four main areas, including joint clinical assessment of the innovative health technologies with the most potential impact for patients, joint scientific consultations whereby developers can seek advice from HTA authorities, identification of emerging health technologies to identify promising technologies early, and continuing voluntary cooperation in other areas. Individual EU Member States will continue to be responsible for assessing non-clinical (e.g., economic, social, ethical) aspects of health technologies, and making decisions on pricing and reimbursement. If we are unable to maintain favorable pricing and reimbursement status in EU Member States for product candidates that we may successfully develop and for which we may obtain regulatory approval, any anticipated revenue from and growth prospects for those products in the European Union could be negatively affected.
Legislators, policymakers and healthcare insurance funds in the European Union may continue to propose and implement cost-containing measures to keep healthcare costs down. These measures could include limitations on the prices we would be able to charge for product candidates that we may successfully develop and for which we may obtain regulatory approval or the level of reimbursement available for these products from governmental authorities or third-party payors. Further, an increasing number of European Union and other foreign countries use prices for medicinal products established in other countries as “reference prices” to help determine the price of the product in their own territory. Consequently, a downward trend in prices of medicinal products in some countries could contribute to similar downward trends elsewhere.
The U.S. Supreme Court’s June 2024 decision in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo overturned the longstanding Chevron doctrine, under which courts were required to give deference to regulatory agencies’ reasonable interpretations of ambiguous federal statutes. The Loper decision could result in additional legal challenges to regulations and guidance issued by federal agencies, including the FDA, on which we rely. Any such legal challenges, if successful, could have a material impact on our business. Additionally, the Loper decision may result in increased regulatory uncertainty, inconsistent judicial interpretations, and other impacts to the agency rule-making process, any of which could adversely impact our business and operations. We cannot predict the likelihood, nature or extent of government regulation that may arise from future legislation or administrative action or as a result of legal challenges, either in the United States or abroad. If we are slow or unable to adapt to changes in existing requirements or the adoption of new requirements or policies, or if we are not able to maintain regulatory compliance, our business could be materially harmed.
*Our business may be impacted by actions of the current U.S. administration, including executive orders, policies, new legislation and judicial decisions.
Actions of the current U.S. administration may cause us to change our business operations, with an unknown impact to our stakeholders, including patients, healthcare providers and employees. Failure to comply with new administration actions
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could expose us to litigation or other government actions. There can be no assurance that our compliance with new administration actions will provide sufficient mitigation.
Our ability to effectively monitor and respond to the rapid and evolving developments and expectations relating to sustainability, including the environmental, social and governance matters, may impose unexpected costs or results in reputational or other harm that could have a material adverse effect on our business.
There is an increasing focus from certain investors, employees, regulators, listing exchanges and other stakeholders concerning corporate responsibility and sustainability matters, including with regard to environmental, social and governance factors. Some investors and investor groups may use these factors—either positively or negatively—to guide their investment strategies and, in some cases, investors may choose not to invest in our company if they believe our policies or practices relating to corporate responsibility and sustainability do not align with their expectations. Currently, a number of third-party providers of corporate responsibility and sustainability ratings measure the performance of companies on such topics, and the results of these assessments are widely publicized. Investors, particularly institutional investors, use these ratings to benchmark companies against their peers, and some major institutional investors have publicly emphasized the importance of these measures to their investment decisions. Topics taken into account in such assessments include, among others, companies’ efforts and impacts on climate change, human rights, business ethics and compliance, and the role of companies’ board of directors in overseeing various sustainability-related issues. In light of investors’ increased focus on these matters, if we are, for example, perceived as lagging in taking steps with respect to these initiatives, certain investors may seek to engage with us on improving our corporate responsibility and sustainability disclosures or performance. They may also make voting decisions or take other actions to hold us and our board of directors accountable.
In addition, there are rapidly evolving developments and changing expectations relating to sustainability matters. As a result, the criteria by which our corporate responsibility and sustainability practices are assessed may change, which could cause us to undertake costly initiatives or actions to satisfy new demands. If we elect not to or are unable to adequately recognize and respond to such developments and changing governmental, societal, investor and/or consumer expectations relating to sustainability matters, we may miss corporate opportunities, become subject to additional scrutiny or incur unexpected costs. We may face risk of litigation or reputational damage in the event that our sustainability policies or practices do not meet the standards set by various constituencies.
We may also face reputational damage in the event our corporate responsibility initiatives or objectives do not meet the standards set by our investors, stockholders, lawmakers, listing exchanges or other constituencies, or if we are unable to achieve an acceptable sustainability rating from third-party rating services. A low sustainability rating by a third-party rating service could also result in the exclusion of our common stock from consideration by certain investors who may elect to invest with our competitors instead. Ongoing focus on corporate responsibility and sustainability matters by investors and other stakeholders as described above may impose additional costs or expose us to new risks. Any failure or perceived failure by us in this regard could have a material adverse effect on our reputation and on our business, financial condition or results of operations, including the sustainability of our business over time, and could cause the market value of our common stock to decline.
We are subject to certain U.S. and foreign anti-corruption, anti-money laundering, export control, sanctions, and other trade laws and regulations. We can face serious consequences for violations.
Among other matters, U.S. and foreign anti-corruption, anti-money laundering, export control, sanctions, and other trade laws and regulations, which are collectively referred to as Trade Laws, prohibit companies and their employees, agents, clinical research organizations, legal counsel, accountants, consultants, contractors, and other partners from authorizing, promising, offering, providing, soliciting, or receiving, directly or indirectly, corrupt or improper payments or anything else of value to or from recipients in the public or private sector. Violations of Trade Laws can result in substantial criminal fines and civil penalties, imprisonment, the loss of trade privileges, debarment, tax reassessments, breach of contract and fraud litigation, reputational harm, and other consequences. We have direct or indirect interactions with officials and employees of government authorities or government-affiliated hospitals, universities, and other organizations.
We also expect our non-U.S. activities to increase over time. We plan to engage third parties for clinical trials and/or to obtain necessary permits, licenses, patent registrations, and other regulatory approvals, and we can be held liable for the corrupt or other illegal activities of our personnel, agents, or partners, even if we do not explicitly authorize or have prior knowledge of such activities. If we further expand our operations outside of the United States, we must dedicate additional resources to comply with numerous laws and regulations in each jurisdiction in which we plan to operate. The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, or the FCPA, prohibits any U.S. individual or business from paying, offering, authorizing payment or
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offering of anything of value, directly or indirectly, to any foreign official, political party or candidate and other related parties for the purpose of influencing any act or decision of the foreign entity in order to assist the individual or business in obtaining or retaining business. The FCPA also obligates companies whose securities are listed in the United States to comply with certain accounting provisions requiring the company to maintain books and records that accurately and fairly reflect all transactions of the corporation, including international subsidiaries, and to devise and maintain an adequate system of internal accounting controls for international operations.
Compliance with the FCPA is expensive and difficult, particularly in countries in which corruption is a recognized problem. In addition, the FCPA presents particular challenges in the pharmaceutical industry, because, in many countries, hospitals are operated by the government, and doctors and other hospital employees are considered foreign officials. Certain payments to hospitals in connection with clinical trials and other work have been deemed to be improper payments to government officials and have led to FCPA enforcement actions.
Various laws, regulations and executive orders also restrict the use and dissemination outside of the United States, or the sharing with certain non-U.S. nationals, of information classified for national security purposes, as well as certain products and technical data relating to those products. If we expand our presence outside of the United States, it will require us to dedicate additional resources to comply with these laws, and these laws may preclude us from developing, manufacturing, or selling certain products and product candidates outside of the United States, which could limit our growth potential and increase our research and development costs.
The failure to comply with laws governing international business practices may result in substantial civil and criminal penalties and suspension or debarment from government contracting. The SEC also may suspend or bar issuers from trading securities on U.S. exchanges for violations of the FCPA’s accounting provisions.
*Disruptions at the FDA, the SEC and other government agencies, including from government shutdowns, or funding changes, or other disruptions to these agencies’ operations, could hinder their ability to hire and retain key leadership and other personnel, prevent new products and services from being developed or commercialized in a timely manner or otherwise prevent those agencies from performing normal business functions on which the operation of our business may rely, which could negatively impact our business.
Currently, federal agencies in the U.S. are operating under a continuing resolution that is set to expire on September 30, 2025. The ability of the FDA to review and approve new products, to provide feedback on clinical trials and development programs, to meet with sponsors and to otherwise review regulatory submissions can be affected by a variety of factors, including government budget and funding levels, reductions in workforce, ability to hire and retain key personnel and accept the payment of user fees, substantial changes in leadership and shifting policy priorities as a result of changes in the presidential administration and its appointees tasked to oversee the agency, and statutory, regulatory, and policy changes. In the past, average review times at the agency have fluctuated, and this may continue in the future. In addition, government funding of other agencies on which our operations may rely is subject to the political process, which is inherently fluid and unpredictable. In addition, government shutdowns, if prolonged, could significantly impact the ability of government agencies upon which rely (such as the FDA and SEC) to timely review and process our regulatory submissions, which could have a material adverse effect on our business.
Disruptions at the FDA and other agencies, including as a result of reductions in force, significant organizational changes, substantial leadership departures, and policy changes, may slow the time necessary for new product candidates to be reviewed and/or approved by necessary government agencies, which would adversely affect our business. For example, the current U.S. administration has discussed several changes to the reach and oversight of the FDA, which could affect its relationship with the pharmaceutical industry, transparency in decision making and ultimately the cost and availability of prescription drugs. Additionally, over the past decade, the U.S. government has shut down several times, and certain regulatory agencies, such as the FDA and the SEC, have had to furlough critical employees and stop critical activities. The current U.S. administration also recently announced plans to reduce the number of federal employees by establishing voluntary termination programs, by position eliminations or by involuntary terminations. If funding for the FDA is reduced, if the FDA workforce is reduced, or if a prolonged government shutdown occurs, it could significantly impact the ability of the FDA to timely review and process our regulatory submissions, which could have a material adverse effect on our business. Further, future government shutdowns could impact our ability to access the public markets and obtain necessary capital in order to properly capitalize and continue to fund our operations.
There remains substantial uncertainty as to how the current administration will seek to or continue to modify or revise the requirements and policies of the FDA and other regulatory agencies with jurisdiction over our product candidates. This
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uncertainty could present new challenges or potential opportunities as we navigate the clinical development and approval process for our product candidates. If we or our collaborators experience delays in obtaining approval or if we or they fail to obtain approval of our product candidates, the commercial prospects for our product candidates may be harmed and our ability to generate revenue will be materially impaired.
Risks Related to Data and Privacy
If our internal information technology systems, or those used by our CROs, CMOs, clinical sites or other contractors or consultants upon which we rely, are or were compromised, become unavailable or suffer security breaches, loss or leakage of data or other disruptions, we could suffer material adverse consequences resulting from such compromise, including, but not limited to, operational or service interruption, harm to our reputation, litigation, fines, penalties and liability, compromise of sensitive information related to our business, and other adverse consequences.
In the ordinary course of our business, we, and the third parties upon which we rely, process sensitive data and, as a result, we and the third parties upon which we rely face a variety of evolving threats which could cause security incidents.
Our internal information technology systems and those of our CROs, CMOs, clinical sites and other contractors and consultants upon which we rely are vulnerable to cyberattacks, computer viruses, bugs, worms, or other malicious codes, malware (including as a result of advanced persistent threat intrusions), and other attacks by computer hackers, cracking, application security attacks, social engineering (including through phishing attacks), supply chain attacks and vulnerabilities through our third-party service providers, denial-of-service attacks (such as credential stuffing), credential harvesting, personnel misconduct or error, supply-chain attacks, software bugs, server malfunctions, software or hardware failures, loss of data or other information technology assets, adware, telecommunications failures, earthquakes, fires, floods, and other similar threats.
Such threats are prevalent and continue to rise, are increasingly difficult to detect, and come from a variety of sources, including traditional computer “hackers,” threat actors, “hacktivists,” organized criminal threat actors, personnel (such as through theft or misuse), sophisticated nation-states, and nation-state-supported actors. In particular, ransomware attacks, including those from organized criminal threat actors, nation-states and nation-state-supported actors, are becoming increasingly prevalent and severe and can lead to significant interruptions, delays, or outages in our operations, loss of data (including sensitive customer information), loss of income, significant extra expenses to restore data or systems, reputational loss and the diversion of funds. To alleviate the negative impact of a ransomware attack, it may be preferable to make extortion payments, but we may be unwilling or unable to do so (including, for example, if applicable laws or regulations prohibit such payments).
Some actors also now engage and are expected to continue to engage in cyberattacks, including without limitation nation-state actors, for geopolitical reasons and in conjunction with military conflicts and defense activities. During times of war and other major conflicts, we, the third parties upon which we rely, and our customers may be vulnerable to a heightened risk of these attacks, including retaliatory cyberattacks, that could materially disrupt our systems and operations, supply chain, and ability to produce, sell and distribute our products, if approved. In addition to experiencing a security incident, third parties may gather, collect, or infer sensitive information about us from public sources, data brokers, or other means that reveals competitively sensitive details about our organization and could be used to undermine our competitive advantage or market position.
Additionally, remote work has become more common and has increased risks to our information technology systems and data, as more of our employees utilize network connections, computers and devices outside our premises or network, including working at home, while in transit and in public locations.
Furthermore, future business transactions (such as acquisitions or integrations) could expose us to additional cybersecurity risks and vulnerabilities, as our systems could be negatively affected by vulnerabilities present in acquired or integrated entities’ systems and technologies. Additionally, we may discover security issues that were not found during due diligence of such acquired or integrated entities, and it may be difficult to integrate companies into our information technology environment and security program.
While we take steps to detect and remediate vulnerabilities, we may not be able to detect and remediate all vulnerabilities because the threats and techniques used to exploit such vulnerabilities change frequently and are often sophisticated in nature. Therefore, such vulnerabilities could be exploited but may not be detected until after a security incident has occurred. Further, we may experience delays in developing and deploying remedial measures designed to address any such identified vulnerabilities.
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We rely on third-party service providers and technologies to operate critical business systems to process sensitive information in a variety of contexts, including, without limitation, cloud-based infrastructure, encryption and authentication technology, employee email, and other functions. We also rely on third-party service providers to assist with our clinical trials, provide other products or services, or otherwise to operate our business. Our ability to monitor these third parties’ information security practices is limited, and these third parties may not have adequate information security measures in place. If our third-party service providers experience a security incident or other interruption, we could experience adverse consequences. While we may be entitled to damages if our third-party service providers fail to satisfy their privacy or security-related obligations to us, any award may be insufficient to cover our damages, or we may be unable to recover such award. In addition, supply-chain attacks have increased in frequency and severity, and we cannot guarantee that third parties and infrastructure in our supply chain or our third-party partners’ supply chains have not been compromised or that they do not contain exploitable defects or bugs that could result in a breach of or disruption to our information technology systems (including our services) or the third-party information technology systems that support us and our services.
Any of the previously identified or similar threats could cause a security incident or other interruption that could result in unauthorized, unlawful, or accidental acquisition, modification, destruction, loss, alteration, encryption, disclosure of, or access to our sensitive data or our information technology systems, or those of the third parties upon whom we rely. A security incident or other interruption could disrupt our ability (and that of third parties upon whom we rely) to provide our services including clinical trials.
The costs related to significant security breaches or disruptions could be material and cause us to incur significant expenses. If the information technology systems of our CROs, CMOs, clinical sites and other contractors and consultants become subject to disruptions or security incidents, we may have insufficient recourse against such third parties and we may have to expend significant resources to mitigate the impact of such an event, and to develop and implement protections to prevent future events of this nature from occurring.
If any such incidents were to occur and cause interruptions in our operations, it could result in a disruption of our business and development programs. For example, the loss of clinical trial data from completed or ongoing clinical trials for a product candidate could result in delays in our regulatory approval efforts and significantly increase our costs to recover or reproduce the data. To the extent that any disruption or security incident were to result in the loss of or damage to our data or applications, or inappropriate disclosure of personal, confidential or proprietary information, we could incur liability and the further development of any product candidates could be delayed. Applicable data privacy and security obligations may require us to notify relevant stakeholders of security incidents. Such disclosures are costly, and the disclosure or the failure to comply with such requirements could lead to adverse consequences. Any such event could also result in legal claims or proceedings, liability under laws that protect the privacy of personal information and significant regulatory penalties, and damage to our reputation and a loss of confidence in us and our ability to conduct clinical trials, which could delay the clinical development of our product candidates.
Failure to comply with data privacy and security laws, regulations and other obligations could lead to government enforcement actions (which could include civil or criminal penalties), private litigation, negative publicity, and/or other adverse consequences that could negatively affect our operating results and business.
We and our partners may be subject to federal, state, and foreign data protection laws and regulations (i.e., laws and regulations that address privacy and data security). In the United States, numerous federal and state laws and regulations, including state data breach notification laws, state health information privacy laws, and federal and state consumer protection laws and regulations that govern the collection, use, disclosure, and protection of health-related and other personal information, could apply to our operations or the operations of our partners. In addition, we may obtain health information from third parties (including research institutions from which we obtain clinical trial data) that are subject to privacy and security requirements under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, or HIPAA. Depending on the facts and circumstances, we could be subject to penalties if we violate HIPAA.
Even when HIPAA does not apply, according to the Federal Trade Commission, or the FTC, failing to take appropriate steps to keep consumers’ personal information secure may constitute unfair acts or practices in or affecting commerce in violation of the Federal Trade Commission Act. The FTC expects a company’s data security measures to be reasonable and appropriate in light of the sensitivity and volume of consumer information it holds, the size and complexity of its business, and the cost of available tools to improve security and reduce vulnerabilities. Individually identifiable health information is considered sensitive data that merits stronger safeguards. Additionally, in 2024, the FTC finalized updates to the Health Breach Notification Rule that, among other things, clarified its applicability to health apps and other similar technologies and
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expanded the information the breach notification requirements for entities subject to the rule which may add additional complexity to compliance obligations going forward.
In addition, certain state laws govern the privacy and security of health-related and other personal information in certain circumstances, some of which may be more stringent, broader in scope or offer greater individual rights with respect to protected health information than HIPAA, many of which may differ from each other, thus complicating compliance efforts. Failure to comply with these laws, where applicable, can result in the imposition of significant civil and/or criminal penalties and private litigation. For example, California enacted the California Consumer Privacy Act, or the CCPA, which creates new individual privacy rights for California consumers (as defined in the law), including the right to opt out of certain disclosures of their information, and places increased privacy and security obligations on entities handling certain personal data of consumers or households. The CCPA also creates a private right of action with statutory damages for certain data breaches, thereby potentially increasing risks associated with a data breach. As currently written, the CCPA may impact our business activities and exemplifies the vulnerability of our business to the evolving regulatory environment related to personal data and protected health information. Further, the California Privacy Rights Act, or the CPRA amended the CCPA. The changes introduced by the CPRA impose additional data protection obligations on covered businesses, including additional consumer rights processes, limitations on data uses, new audit requirements for higher risk data, and opt-outs for certain uses of sensitive data. The amendments ushered in by the CPRA also create a new California data protection agency authorized to issue substantive regulations and could result in increased privacy and information security enforcement. Additional compliance investment and potential business process changes may be required.
Some observers have noted that the CCPA could mark the beginning of a trend toward more stringent privacy legislation in the United States, which could increase our potential liability and adversely affect our business. New consumer privacy laws entered into force in Connecticut, Colorado, Montana, Oregon, Texas, Virginia and Utah in 2023 and 2024. Additionally, Delaware, Florida, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Maryland, Minnesota, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Rhode Island, Tennessee and others have adopted privacy laws, which took or will take effect from January 1, 2025 through 2026. Some state laws also minimize what data can be collected from consumers and how businesses may use and disclose it. These state privacy laws also require businesses to make disclosures to consumers about data collection, use and sharing practices. In addition, some of these laws (including the CPRA), along with other standalone health privacy laws, subject health-related information to additional safeguards and disclosures and some specifically regulate consumer health data, such as the Washington My Health My Data Act, which became effective in 2024, Nevada’s Consumer Health Data Privacy Law, which became effective in 2024, and Connecticut’s amendments to its privacy law to address health data, which became effective in 2023. In addition, a number of other states have proposed new privacy laws, some of which are similar to the above-discussed recently passed laws. Such proposed legislation, if enacted, may add additional complexity, variation in requirements, restrictions and potential legal risk, require additional investment of resources in compliance programs, impact strategies and the availability of previously useful data and could result in increased compliance costs and/or changes in business practices and policies. The existence of comprehensive privacy laws in different states in the country would make our compliance obligations more complex and costly and may increase the likelihood that we may be subject to enforcement actions or otherwise incur liability for noncompliance.
*Foreign data protection laws, including the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation, or the EU GDPR, and the UK equivalent of the same, or UK GDPR, together with the EU GDPR, the GDPR, may also apply to our processing of health-related and other personal data regardless of where the processing in question is carried out.
The GDPR imposes stringent requirements for controllers and processors of personal data of individuals within the European Economic Area, or EEA, or the United Kingdom. The GDPR applies to any company established in the EEA or United Kingdom as well as to those outside the EEA or United Kingdom if they collect and use personal data in connection with the offering of goods or services to individuals in the EEA or United Kingdom or the monitoring of their behavior. The GDPR, together with national legislation, regulations and guidelines of the EEA Member States and the United Kingdom governing the processing of personal data, imposes strict obligations and restrictions on the ability to collect, analyze and transfer personal data, including health data from clinical trials and adverse event reporting and access to certain data such as the European Health Data Space Regulation. In particular, these obligations and restrictions concern the consent of the individuals to whom the personal data relates, the information provided to the individuals, the transfer of personal data out of the EEA or the United Kingdom, security breach notifications, security and confidentiality of the personal data and imposition of substantial potential fines for breaches of the data protection obligations. Companies that must comply with the GDPR face increased compliance obligations and risk, including more robust regulatory enforcement of data protection requirements and potential fines for noncompliance of up to €20 million (£17.5 million) or 4% of the annual global revenues of the noncompliant company, whichever is greater. In addition, on June 19, 2025, the UK’s Data (Use and Access) Act 2025, or the DUAA, was granted Royal Assent, implementing various measures concerning data usage in the UK and
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reforming data protection laws. The provisions within the DUAA will come into force through 2026, and it remains too soon to tell how the DUAA will be implemented and what impact it will have on our international activities.
In the EEA, the NIS 2 Directive, or NIS 2, is replacing the cybersecurity legal framework under the current NIS framework, aiming to ensure a high level of cybersecurity in the region. NIS 2 brings new medium and large organizations providing services in the EEA within scope of the legal framework. It extends to additional sectors and expands the list of in-scope healthcare organizations, including to certain providers engaged in research and development of medicinal products. The new regime imposes direct obligations on management in respect of an in-scope organization's compliance with NIS 2, requires covered organizations to put in place certain cyber risk management measures, strengthens incident reporting requirements and provides supervisory authorities with greater oversight. The majority of obligations will come into force when national legislation implementing NIS 2 becomes effective in the relevant EU Member State. EU Member States had until October 17, 2024 to transpose NIS 2 into national legislation, although many countries have still not completed the transposition. As such, the cybersecurity regulatory landscape in the EU is currently fragmented and uncertain. To the extent that we become subject to NIS 2 in the future, we may require additional investment of our resources in compliance programs. Under NIS 2, companies may be subject to administrative fines of up to the higher amount of €10 million or 2% of worldwide turnover.
Implementing mechanisms to endeavor to ensure compliance with the GDPR and relevant local legislation in EEA Member States and the United Kingdom may be onerous and may interrupt or delay our development activities, and adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects. In addition to the foregoing, a breach of the GDPR or other applicable privacy and data protection laws and regulations could result in regulatory investigations, reputational damage, and orders to cease/change our use of data, enforcement notices, or potential civil claims including class-action-type litigation. While we have taken steps to comply with the GDPR where applicable, including by reviewing our security procedures, engaging data protection personnel, and entering into data processing agreements with relevant contractors, our efforts to achieve and remain in compliance may not be fully successful.
Compliance with U.S. and foreign privacy and security laws, rules and regulations could require us to take on more onerous obligations in our contracts, require us to engage in costly compliance exercises, restrict our ability to collect, use and disclose data, or, in some cases, impact our or our partners’ or suppliers’ ability to operate in certain jurisdictions. Each of these constantly evolving laws can be subject to varying interpretations. Failure to comply with U.S. and foreign data protection laws and regulations could result in government investigations and enforcement actions (which could include civil or criminal penalties), fines, private litigation, and/or adverse publicity and could negatively affect our operating results and business. Moreover, patients about whom we or our partners obtain information, as well as the providers who share this information with us, may contractually limit our ability to use and disclose the information. Claims that we have violated individuals’ privacy rights, failed to comply with data protection laws, or breached our contractual obligations, even if we are not found liable, could be expensive and time-consuming to defend and could result in adverse publicity that could harm our business.
Artificial intelligence presents risks and challenges that can impact our business, including by posing security risks to our confidential information, proprietary information and personal data.
Issues in the development and use of artificial intelligence, combined with an uncertain regulatory environment, may result in reputational harm, liability, or other adverse consequences to our business operations. As with many technological innovations, artificial intelligence presents risks and challenges that could impact our business. We may adopt and integrate generative artificial intelligence tools into our systems for specific use cases reviewed by legal and information security. Our vendors may incorporate generative artificial intelligence tools into their offerings without disclosing this use to us, and the providers of these generative artificial intelligence tools may not meet existing or rapidly evolving regulatory or industry standards with respect to privacy and data protection and may inhibit our or our vendors’ ability to maintain an adequate level of service and experience. If we, our vendors, or our third-party partners experience an actual or perceived breach or privacy or security incident because of the use of generative artificial intelligence, we may lose valuable intellectual property and confidential information and our reputation and the public perception of the effectiveness of our security measures could be harmed. Further, bad actors around the world use increasingly sophisticated methods, including the use of artificial intelligence, to engage in illegal activities involving the theft and misuse of personal information, confidential information, and intellectual property. Any of these outcomes could damage our reputation, result in the loss of valuable property and information, and have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.
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Risks Related to Our Reliance on Third Parties
We have relied and expect to continue to rely on third parties to conduct our preclinical studies and clinical trials, as well as investigator initiated trials. If those third parties do not perform as contractually required, fail to satisfy legal or regulatory requirements, miss expected deadlines or terminate the relationship, our development programs could be delayed, or become more costly or unsuccessful, and we may never be able to seek or obtain regulatory approval for or commercialize our product candidates.
We rely and intend to rely in the future on third-party clinical investigators, CROs, and clinical data management organizations to conduct, supervise and monitor preclinical studies and clinical trials of our current or future product candidates. In addition, third parties are conducting and we expect will continue to conduct investigator initiated trials with our product candidates. Because we currently rely and intend to continue to rely on these third parties, we will have less control over the timing, quality and other aspects of preclinical studies and clinical trials than we would have had we conducted them independently. These parties are not, and will not be, our employees and we will have limited control over the amount of time and resources that they dedicate to our programs. Additionally, such parties may have contractual relationships with other entities, some of which may be our competitors, which may draw time and resources from our programs.
We have no experience as a company in filing and supporting the applications necessary to gain marketing approvals. Securing marketing approval requires the submission of extensive preclinical and clinical data and supporting information to regulatory authorities for each indication to establish the product candidate’s safety or efficacy for that indication. Securing marketing approval also requires the submission of information about the product manufacturing process to, and inspection of manufacturing facilities and clinical trial sites by, applicable regulatory authorities.
Large-scale clinical trials require significant financial and management resources, and reliance on third-party clinical investigators, CROs, partners or consultants. Relying on third-party clinical investigators or CROs may force us to encounter delays and challenges that are outside of our control. We may not be able to demonstrate sufficient comparability between products manufactured at different facilities to allow for inclusion of the clinical results from participants treated with products from these different facilities, in our product registrations. Further, our third-party clinical manufacturers may not be able to manufacture our product candidates or otherwise fulfill their obligations to us because of interruptions to their business, including the loss of their key staff or interruptions to their raw material supply.
Our reliance on these third parties for development activities will reduce our control over these activities. Nevertheless, we are responsible for ensuring that each of our clinical trials is conducted in accordance with the applicable trial protocol and legal, regulatory and scientific standards, and our reliance on the CROs, clinical trial sites, and other third parties does not relieve us of these responsibilities. For example, we will remain responsible for ensuring that each of our preclinical studies is conducted in accordance with good laboratory practices, or GLPs, and clinical trials are conducted in accordance with GCPs. Moreover, the FDA and comparable foreign regulatory authorities require us to comply with GCPs for conducting, recording and reporting the results of clinical trials to assure that data and reported results are credible and accurate and that the rights, integrity and confidentiality of trial participants are protected. Regulatory authorities enforce these requirements through periodic inspections (including pre-approval inspections once an NDA or BLA is submitted to the FDA) of trial sponsors, clinical investigators, trial sites and certain third parties including CROs. If we, our CROs, clinical trial sites, or other third parties fail to comply with applicable GCP or other regulatory requirements, we or they may be subject to enforcement or other legal actions, the clinical data generated in our clinical trials may be deemed unreliable and the FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authorities may require us to perform additional clinical trials. We cannot assure you that upon inspection by a given regulatory authority, such regulatory authority will determine that any of our clinical trials complies with GCP regulations. Moreover, our business may be significantly impacted if our CROs, clinical investigators or other third parties violate federal or state healthcare fraud and abuse or false claims laws and regulations or healthcare privacy and security laws.
In the event we need to repeat, extend, delay or terminate our clinical trials because these third parties do not successfully carry out their contractual duties, meet expected deadlines or conduct our clinical trials in accordance with regulatory requirements or our stated protocols, our clinical trials may need to be repeated, extended, delayed or terminated and we may not be able to obtain, or may be delayed in obtaining, marketing approvals for our product candidates, and we will not be able to, or may be delayed in our efforts to, successfully commercialize our product candidates or we or they may be subject to regulatory enforcement actions. As a result, our results of operations and the commercial prospects for our product candidates would be harmed, our costs could increase and our ability to generate revenue could be delayed. To the extent we are unable to successfully identify and manage the performance of third-party service providers in the future, our business may be materially and adversely affected.
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If any of our relationships with these third parties terminate, we may not be able to enter into alternative arrangements or do so on commercially reasonable terms. Switching or adding additional contractors involves additional cost and time and requires management time and focus. In addition, there is a natural transition period when a new third party commences work. As a result, delays could occur, which could compromise our ability to meet our desired development timelines. In addition, if an agreement with any of our collaborators terminates, our access to technology and intellectual property licensed to us by that collaborator may be restricted or terminate entirely, which may delay our continued development of our product candidates utilizing the collaborator’s technology or intellectual property or require us to stop development of those product candidates completely.
In addition, principal investigators for our clinical trials may serve as scientific advisors or consultants to us from time to time and receive compensation in connection with such services. Under certain circumstances, we may be required to report some of these relationships to the FDA. The FDA may conclude that a financial relationship between us and/or a principal investigator has created a conflict of interest or otherwise affected interpretation of the study. The FDA may therefore question the integrity of the data generated at the applicable clinical trial site and the utility of the clinical trial itself may be jeopardized. This could result in a delay in approval, or rejection, of our marketing applications by the FDA and may ultimately lead to the denial of regulatory approval of one or more of our product candidates.
We rely on third-party manufacturers and suppliers to supply our product candidates. The loss of our third-party manufacturers or suppliers, or their failure to comply with applicable regulatory requirements or to supply sufficient quantities at acceptable quality levels or prices, within acceptable timeframes, or at all, would materially and adversely affect our business.
We do not own or operate facilities for drug manufacturing, storage, distribution or quality testing. We currently rely, and expect to continue to rely, on third-party contract developers and manufacturers to manufacture bulk drug substances, drug products, raw materials, samples, components, and other materials for our product candidates. For example, under the MAT Agreement, MAT provides us certain with certain customized cell manufacturing, release and testing services for our KYV-101 product candidate; under the Elevate Agreement we engaged Elevate in November 2024 to provide us with cell manufacturing, release and testing-services for our KYV-101 product candidate; and pursuant to the Oxford Agreement, we engaged Oxford to undertake lentiviral vector process development services, with the intention for Oxford to ultimately manufacture and supply to us lentiviral vectors for research and development purposes and for use in connection with our clinical trials.
Reliance on third-party manufacturers may expose us to different risks than if we were to manufacture product candidates ourselves. There can be no assurance that our preclinical and clinical development product supplies will not be limited, interrupted, terminated or will be of satisfactory quality or be available at acceptable prices. In addition, any replacement of our manufacturer could require significant effort and time because there may be a limited number of qualified replacements.
The manufacturing process for our product candidates is subject to the FDA, EMA and foreign regulatory authority review. We, and our suppliers and manufacturers must meet applicable manufacturing requirements and undergo rigorous facility and process validation tests required by regulatory authorities in order to comply with regulatory standards, such as cGMPs, and, in certain cases, current good tissue practice, or cGTP, requirements. Securing marketing approval also requires the submission of information about the product manufacturing process to, and inspection of manufacturing facilities by, the FDA, EMA and foreign regulatory authorities. If our CMOs cannot successfully manufacture material that conforms to our specifications and the strict regulatory requirements of the FDA, EMA or comparable foreign regulatory authorities, we may not be able to rely on their facilities for the manufacture of elements of our product candidates. Moreover, we do not conduct the manufacturing process ourselves and are dependent on our CMOs for manufacturing in compliance with current regulatory requirements. In the event that any of our manufacturers fails to comply with such requirements or to perform its obligations in relation to quality, timing or otherwise, or if our projected manufacturing capacity or supply of materials becomes limited, delayed, interrupted, or more costly than anticipated, we may be forced to enter into an agreement with another third party, which we may not be able to do timely or on reasonable terms, if at all. In some cases, the technical skills or technology required to manufacture our product candidates may be unique or proprietary to the original manufacturer and we may have difficulty transferring such to another third party.
These factors would increase our reliance on such manufacturer or require us to obtain a license from such manufacturer in order to enable us to manufacture, or to have another third party manufacture, our product candidates. If we are required to change manufacturers for any reason, we will be required to verify that the new manufacturer maintains facilities and procedures that comply with applicable quality standards and regulations and guidelines; and we may be
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required to repeat some of the development program. The delays and costs associated with the verification of a new manufacturer could negatively affect our ability to develop product candidates in a timely manner or within budget.
We expect to continue to rely on third-party manufacturers if we receive regulatory approval for any product candidate. To the extent that we have existing, or enter into future, manufacturing arrangements with third parties, we will depend on these third parties to perform their obligations in a timely manner consistent with contractual and regulatory requirements, including those related to quality control and assurance. Any manufacturing facilities used to produce our product candidates will be subject to periodic review and inspection by the FDA and foreign regulatory authorities, including for continued compliance with cGMP requirements, quality control, quality assurance and corresponding maintenance of records and documents. If we are unable to obtain or maintain third-party manufacturing for product candidates, or to do so on commercially reasonable terms, we may not be able to develop and commercialize our product candidates successfully. Our or a third party’s failure to execute on our manufacturing requirements, comply with cGMPs and cGTPs, or maintain a compliance status acceptable to the FDA, EMA or foreign regulatory authorities could adversely affect our business in a number of ways, including:
Additionally, our CMOs may experience difficulties due to resource constraints or as a result of labor disputes or unstable political environments. If our CMOs were to encounter any of these difficulties, our ability to provide our product candidates to participants in preclinical and clinical trials, or to provide product for treatment of participants if approved, would be jeopardized. For example, the current U.S. administration has substantially altered prior U.S. government international trade policy and has commenced activities to renegotiate, or potentially terminate, certain existing bilateral or multi-lateral trade agreements and treaties with foreign countries. In addition, the current U.S. administration has initiated, and continuing to consider imposing additional, tariffs on certain foreign goods. Related to this action, certain foreign governments, including China, have instituted or are considering imposing reciprocal tariffs on certain U.S. goods. It remains unclear what the current U.S. administration or foreign governments will or will not do with respect to tariffs or other international trade agreements and policies. A trade war or other governmental action related to tariffs or international trade agreements or policies has the potential to disrupt our research activities, affect our suppliers and increase the cost of materials purchased to manufacture our product candidates.
We depend on limited source suppliers for certain drug substances, drug products, raw materials, samples, components, and other materials used in our product candidates. If we are unable to source these supplies on a timely basis, or establish longer-term contracts with our CMOs, we will not be able to complete our clinical trials on time and the development of our product candidates may be delayed.
We depend on limited source suppliers for certain drug substances, drug products, raw materials, samples, components, and other materials used in our product candidates. For example, MAT and Elevate are currently our only providers of customized cell manufacturing, release and testing services for our KYV-101 product candidate. We do not currently have long-term supply contracts with all of our CMOs and they are not obligated to supply drug products to us for any period, in any specified quantity or at any certain price beyond the delivery contemplated by the relevant purchase orders. As a result, our suppliers could stop selling to us at commercially reasonable prices, or at all. While we intend to enter into long-term master supply agreements with certain of our CMOs in the future as we advance our clinical trials or commercialization plans, we may not be successful in negotiating such agreements on favorable terms or at all. If we do enter into such long-term master supply agreements, or enter into such agreements on less favorable terms than we currently have with such manufacturers, we could be subject to binding long-term purchase obligations that may be harmful to our business, including
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in the event that we do not conduct our trials on planned timelines or utilize the drug products that we are required to purchase. Any change in our relationships with our CMOs or changes to contractual terms of our agreements with them could adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.
Furthermore, any of the sole source and limited source suppliers upon whom we rely could stop producing our supplies, produce insufficient quantities of our supplies or otherwise fail to meet contractual requirements, experience financial difficulties, cease operations, face business disruptions or be acquired by, or enter into exclusive arrangements with, our competitors. In addition, geopolitical tensions may impact our CMOs.
Establishing additional or replacement suppliers for these supplies, and obtaining regulatory clearance or approvals that may result from adding or replacing suppliers, could take a substantial amount of time, result in increased costs and impair our ability to produce our products, which would adversely impact our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects. Any such interruption or delay may force us to seek similar supplies from alternative sources, which may not be available at reasonable prices, or at all. Any interruption in the supply of sole source or limited source components for our product candidates would adversely affect our ability to meet scheduled timelines and budget for the development and commercialization of our product candidates, could result in higher expenses and would harm our business. Although we have not experienced any significant disruption as a result of our reliance on limited or sole source suppliers, we have a limited operating history and cannot assure you that we will not experience disruptions in our supply chain in the future as a result of such reliance or otherwise.
The operations of our suppliers, some of which are located outside of the United States, are subject to additional risks that are beyond our control and that could harm our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.
Currently, some of our suppliers are located outside of the United States. As a result of our global suppliers, we are subject to risks associated with doing business abroad, including:
These and other factors beyond our control could interrupt our suppliers’ production, influence the ability of our suppliers to export our clinical supplies cost-effectively or at all, and inhibit our suppliers’ ability to procure certain materials, any of which could harm our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.
We may form or seek collaborations or strategic alliances or enter into additional licensing arrangements in the future, which may be important to our business. If we are unable to enter into new collaborations, or if these or any of our current collaborations are not successful and we fail to realize the benefits of such collaborations or licensing arrangements, our business, results of operations and financial condition could be adversely affected.
A part of our strategy is to strategically evaluate and, as we deem appropriate, enter into additional partnerships in the future, including potentially with major biotechnology or pharmaceutical companies. We have limited capabilities for product development and do not yet have any capability for commercialization. Accordingly, we may continue to enter into collaborations with other companies in the future to provide us with important technologies and funding for our programs and
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technology. Any future collaborations that we enter into may not be successful. The success of our collaboration arrangements will depend heavily on the efforts and activities of our collaborators.
Our current collaborations and any future collaborations we enter into may pose a number of risks, including the following:
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If our collaborations do not result in the successful discovery, development and future commercialization of product candidates, if approved, or if one of our collaborators terminates its agreement with us, we may not receive any future research funding or milestone or royalty payments under such collaboration. All of the risks relating to product development, regulatory approval and future commercialization described in this “Risk Factors” section and elsewhere in this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q also apply to the activities of our therapeutic collaborators. Additionally, if one of our collaborators terminates its agreement with us, we may find it more difficult to attract new collaborators and our perception in the business and financial communities could be adversely affected.
We face significant competition in seeking appropriate partners for our product candidates, and the negotiation process is time-consuming and complex. In order for us to successfully partner with our product candidates, potential partners must view these product candidates as economically valuable in markets they determine to be attractive in light of the terms that we are seeking and other available products for licensing by other companies.
Collaborations are complex, expensive and time-consuming to negotiate and document. In addition, there have been a significant number of recent business combinations among large pharmaceutical companies that have resulted in a reduced number of potential future collaborators. Our ability to reach a definitive agreement for a collaboration will depend, among other things, upon our assessment of the collaborator’s resources and expertise, the terms and conditions of the proposed collaboration and the proposed collaborator’s evaluation of a number of factors. Additionally, our collaboration agreements may contain non-competition provisions that could limit our ability to enter into strategic collaborations with future collaborators or restrict our ability to commercialize products on our own, if approved.
If we are unable to reach agreements with suitable collaborators on a timely basis, on acceptable terms, or at all, we may have to curtail the development of a product candidate, reduce or delay its development program or one or more of our other development programs, delay its potential commercialization, if approved, or reduce the scope of any sales or marketing activities, or increase our expenditures and undertake development or future commercialization activities at our own expense. If we elect to increase our expenditures to fund development or future commercialization activities on our own, we may need to obtain additional expertise and additional capital, which may not be available to us on acceptable terms, or at all. If we fail to enter into collaborations or do not have sufficient funds or expertise to undertake the necessary development and future commercialization activities, we may not be able to further develop our product candidates, bring them to market, if approved, and generate revenue from sales of drugs or continue to develop our technology, and our business, results of operations and financial condition could be adversely affected. Even if we are successful in our efforts to establish new strategic partnerships, the terms that we agree upon may not be favorable to us, and we may not be able to maintain such strategic partnerships if, for example, development or approval of a product candidate is delayed or sales of any approved product are disappointing. Any delay in entering into new strategic partnership agreements related to our product candidates could delay the development and future commercialization of our product candidates, if approved, and reduce their competitiveness even if they reach the market.
Risks Related to Ownership of Our Common Stock
Our stock price may be volatile.
The market price of our common stock is likely to be volatile and could fluctuate widely in response to many factors, including but not limited to:
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In recent years, the stock market in general, and the market for pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies in particular, has experienced significant price and volume fluctuations that have often been unrelated or disproportionate to changes in the operating performance of the companies whose stock is experiencing those price and volume fluctuations. Broad market and industry factors may seriously affect the market price of our common stock, regardless of our actual operating performance.
When the market price of a stock has been volatile, as our stock price may be, holders of that stock have occasionally brought securities class action litigation claims against the company that issued the stock. If any of our stockholders were to bring a lawsuit of this type against us, even if the lawsuit were without merit, we could incur substantial costs defending the lawsuit. The lawsuit could also divert the time and attention of our management. See the risk factor under the heading “We or our directors or officers may be subject to securities litigation, which is expensive and could divert management attention” above for a discussion of a recently filed securities class action complaint in which we are currently named as a defendant.
Our quarterly and annual operating results may fluctuate significantly or may fall below the expectations of investors or securities analysts or any guidance we may publicly provide, each of which may cause our stock price to fluctuate or decline.
We expect our operating results to be subject to quarterly and annual fluctuations which may, in turn, cause the price of our common stock to fluctuate substantially. Our net loss and other operating results will be affected by numerous factors, including:
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If our quarterly or annual operating results fall below the expectations of investors or securities analysts or any forecasts or guidance we may provide to the market, the price of our common stock could decline substantially. Such a stock price decline could occur even when we have met any previously publicly stated guidance we may provide. We believe that quarterly or annual comparisons of our financial results are not necessarily meaningful and should not be relied upon as an indication of our future performance.
The market opportunities for our product candidates and forecasts of market growth may not be accurate, and the actual market for our products may be smaller than we estimate, and even if the markets in which we compete achieve the forecasted growth, our business may not grow at similar rates, or at all.
The precise incidence and prevalence for all the conditions we aim to address with our product candidates are unknown. Our estimates of both the number of people who have these diseases, as well as the subset of people with these diseases who have the potential to benefit from treatment with our product candidates, are based on our beliefs and estimates. These estimates have been derived from a variety of sources, including sales of our competitors, scientific literature, surveys of clinics, patient foundations or market research, and may prove to be incorrect in general, or as to their applicability to our company. Further, new trials may change the estimated incidence or prevalence of these diseases. Even if the markets in which we compete meet our size estimates and growth forecasts, our business may not grow at similar rates, or at all. The total addressable market across all of our product candidates will ultimately depend upon, among other things, the diagnosis criteria included in the final label for each of our product candidates approved for sale for these indications, the ability of our product candidates to improve on the safety, convenience, cost and efficacy of competing therapies or therapies in development, acceptance by the medical community and patients, drug pricing and reimbursement. The number of patients in the United States, other major markets and elsewhere may turn out to be lower than expected, patients may not be otherwise amenable to treatment with our product candidates or new patients may become increasingly difficult to identify or gain access to, all of which would adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects. Further, even if we obtain significant market share for our product candidates, because some of our potential target populations are very small, we may never achieve profitability despite obtaining such significant market share.
Because we do not anticipate paying any dividends on our capital stock in the foreseeable future, capital appreciation, if any, will be your sole source of gain.
We have never declared nor paid dividends on our capital stock. We currently intend to retain all of our future earnings, if any, to finance the growth and development, operation and expansion of our business and we do not anticipate declaring or paying any dividends in the foreseeable future. As a result, capital appreciation of our common stock, which may never occur, will be your sole source of gain on your investment for the foreseeable future.
The future issuance of equity or of debt securities that are convertible into equity would dilute our share capital.
We may choose to raise additional capital in the future, depending on market conditions, strategic considerations and operational requirements. To the extent that additional capital is raised through the issuance of shares or other securities convertible into shares, our stockholders will be diluted. Future issuances of our common stock or other equity securities, or the perception that such sales may occur, could adversely affect the trading price of our common stock and impair our ability to raise capital through future offerings of shares or equity securities. No prediction can be made as to the effect, if any, that future sales of common stock or other equity securities or the availability of common stock for future sales will have on the trading price of our common stock.
Pursuant to our 2024 Equity Incentive Plan, or our 2024 Plan, our management is authorized to grant stock options to our employees, directors and consultants. As of June 30, 2025, we had 2,804,687 shares of common stock available for future issuance under our 2024 Plan. Additionally, the number of shares of our common stock reserved for issuance under the 2024 Plan will automatically increase on January 1st of each year, beginning on January 1, 2025 and continuing through and
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including January 1, 2034, by 5% of the total number of shares of our capital stock outstanding on December 31 of the preceding calendar year, or a lesser number of shares determined by our board of directors. Additionally, pursuant to our 2024 Inducement Equity Incentive Plan, or our Inducement Plan, our management is authorized to grant equity-based awards in the form of stock options, stock appreciation rights, restricted stock, restricted stock units, performance units and performance shares solely to our prospective employees provided that certain criteria are met. As of June 30, 2025, we had 195,741 shares of common stock available for future issuance under our Inducement Plan. Unless our board of directors or a committee thereof elects not to increase the number of shares available for future grant each year under the 2024 Plan or Inducement Plan, our stockholders may experience additional dilution, which could cause our stock price to fall.
Our board of directors is authorized to issue and designate shares of our preferred stock without stockholder approval.
Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation authorizes our board of directors, without the approval of our stockholders, to issue shares of preferred stock, subject to limitations prescribed by applicable law, rules and regulations and the provisions of our amended and restated certificate of incorporation, and to establish from time to time the number of shares of preferred stock to be included in each such series and to fix the designation, powers, preferences and rights of the shares of each such series and the qualifications, limitations or restrictions thereof. The powers, preferences and rights of these additional series of convertible preferred stock may be senior to or on parity with our common stock, which may reduce our common stock’s value.
We may acquire other businesses, form joint ventures or make investments in other companies or technologies that could negatively affect our operating results, dilute our stockholders’ ownership, increase our debt or cause us to incur significant expense.
As part of our business strategy, we may pursue acquisitions of assets or licenses of assets, including preclinical, clinical or commercial stage products or product candidates, businesses, strategic alliances, joint ventures and collaborations, to expand our existing technologies and operations.
Any potential acquisition or strategic partnership may entail numerous risks, including:
In the future, we may not be able to find suitable partners or acquisition candidates, and we may not be able to complete such transactions on favorable terms, if at all. If we make any acquisitions, we may not be able to integrate these acquisitions successfully into our existing business, and we could assume unknown or contingent liabilities. Any future acquisitions also could result in the incurrence of debt, contingent liabilities or future write-offs of intangible assets or goodwill, any of which could have a negative impact on our cash flows, financial condition and results of operations. Integration of an acquired company also may disrupt ongoing operations and require management resources that we would otherwise focus on developing our existing business. We may experience losses related to investments in other companies, which could harm our financial condition and results of operations. We may not identify or complete these transactions in a timely manner, on a cost-effective basis or at all, and we may not realize the anticipated benefits of any acquisition, license, strategic alliance or joint venture.
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To finance such a transaction, we may issue dilutive securities, assume or incur debt obligations, incur large one-time expenses and acquire intangible assets that could result in significant amortization expense. If the price of our common stock is low or volatile, we may not be able to acquire other companies or fund a joint venture project using our stock as consideration. Alternatively, it may be necessary for us to raise additional funds for these activities through public or private financings or through the issuance of debt. Additional funds may not be available on terms that are favorable to the Company, or at all, and any debt financing may involve covenants limiting or restricting our ability to take certain actions.
*Sales of a substantial number of shares of our common stock by our existing stockholders in the public market could cause our stock price to fall.
On March 27, 2025, we filed a shelf Registration Statement on Form S-3 (File No. 333-286180) that became effective on April 15, 2025, which allows us to undertake various equity and debt offerings up to $250.0 million. In addition, on March 27, 2025, we entered into an Open Market Sale AgreementSM with Jefferies, LLC, or the Agent, pursuant to which we may offer and sell from time to time through the Agent up to $50.0 million in shares of our common stock, or the ATM Facility. As of June 30, 2025, we had not yet sold any shares of common stock under the ATM Facility.
Sales of a substantial number of shares of our common stock in the public market or the perception that these sales might occur could significantly reduce the market price of our common stock and impair our ability to raise adequate capital through the sale of additional equity securities.
In addition, the shares of our common stock that are subject to outstanding options under our equity incentive plans are eligible for sale in the public market, to the extent permitted by the provisions of various vesting schedules, the lock-up agreements (and the exceptions thereto) and Rule 144 and Rule 701 under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, or the Securities Act. If these additional shares of our common stock are sold, or if it is perceived that they will be sold, in the public market, the trading price of our common stock could decline.
Conflicts of interest may arise because some members of our board of directors are representatives of our principal stockholders.
Certain of our principal stockholders or their affiliates are venture capital funds or other investment vehicles that could invest in entities that directly or indirectly compete with us. As a result of these relationships, when conflicts arise between the interests of the principal stockholders or their affiliates and the interests of other stockholders, members of our board of directors that are representatives of the principal stockholders may not be disinterested.
Our principal stockholders and management own a significant percentage of our common stock and will be able to control matters subject to stockholder approval.
As of June 30, 2025, our executive officers, directors and holders of 5% or more of our capital stock beneficially owned approximately 52.0% of our outstanding common stock. The interests of these stockholders may not be the same as or may even conflict with your interests. For example, these stockholders could delay or prevent a change of control of our company, even if such a change of control would benefit our other stockholders, which could deprive our stockholders of an opportunity to receive a premium for their common stock as part of a sale of our company or our assets and might affect the prevailing market price of our common stock. The significant concentration of stock ownership may adversely affect the trading price of our common stock due to investors’ perception that conflicts of interest may exist or arise.
We are an “emerging growth company” and a “smaller reporting company” and our election of reduced reporting requirements applicable to emerging growth companies and smaller reporting companies may make our common stock less attractive to investors.
We are an “emerging growth company” as defined in the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act, or the JOBS Act. For as long as we continue to be an emerging growth company, we may take advantage of exemptions from various reporting requirements that are applicable to other public companies that are not emerging growth companies, including not being required to comply with the auditor attestation requirements of Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, or Section 404, reduced disclosure obligations regarding executive compensation in our Annual Reports on Form 10-K and our other periodic reports and proxy statements and exemptions from the requirements of holding a nonbinding advisory vote on executive compensation and stockholder approval of any golden parachute payments not previously approved. In addition, as an emerging growth company, we are only required to provide two years of audited financial statements. We could be an emerging growth company for up to five years following the completion of our initial public offering, although circumstances could cause us to lose that status earlier, including if we are deemed to be a “large accelerated filer,” which occurs when the market value of our common stock that is held by non-affiliates exceeds $700 million as of the prior June 30, or if we have
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total annual gross revenue of $1.235 billion or more during any fiscal year before that time, in which cases we would no longer be an emerging growth company as of the following December 31, or if we issue more than $1.0 billion in non-convertible debt during any three-year period before that time, in which case we would no longer be an emerging growth company immediately. Even after we no longer qualify as an emerging growth company, we could still qualify as a “smaller reporting company,” which would allow us to take advantage of many of the same exemptions from disclosure requirements including not being required to comply with the auditor attestation requirements of Section 404 and reduced disclosure obligations regarding executive compensation in our Annual Reports on Form 10-K and our other periodic reports and proxy statements. We cannot predict if investors will find our common stock less attractive because we may rely on these exemptions. If some investors find our common stock less attractive as a result, there may be a less active trading market for our common stock and our share price may be more volatile.
In addition, the JOBS Act provides that an emerging growth company can take advantage of an extended transition period for complying with new or revised accounting standards until such time as those standards apply to private companies. We have elected to avail ourselves of this exemption from new or revised accounting standards, and therefore we will not be subject to the same requirements to adopt new or revised accounting standards as other public companies that are not emerging growth companies.
We are also a “smaller reporting company” as defined in the Exchange Act. We may continue to be a smaller reporting company even after we are no longer an emerging growth company. We may take advantage of certain of the scaled disclosures available to smaller reporting companies and will be able to take advantage of these scaled disclosures for so long as our common stock held by non-affiliates is less than $250.0 million measured on the last business day of our second fiscal quarter, or our annual revenue is less than $100.0 million during the most recently completed fiscal year and our common stock held by non-affiliates is less than $700.0 million measured on the last business day of our second fiscal quarter.
Our failure to meet Nasdaq’s continued listing requirements could result in a delisting of our common stock.
If we fail to satisfy the continued listing requirements of Nasdaq, such as the corporate governance requirements or the minimum closing bid price requirement, Nasdaq may take steps to delist our common stock. Such a delisting would likely have a negative effect on the price of our common stock and would impair your ability to sell or purchase our common stock when you wish to do so. In the event of a delisting, we can provide no assurance that any action taken by us to restore compliance with listing requirements would allow our common stock to become listed again, stabilize the market price or improve the liquidity of our common stock, prevent our common stock from dropping below the Nasdaq minimum bid price requirement or prevent future non-compliance with the listing requirements of Nasdaq.
Anti-takeover provisions in our charter documents and under Delaware law could prevent or delay an acquisition of us that may be beneficial to our stockholders, and may prevent attempts by our stockholders to replace or remove our current management.
Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation and our amended and restated bylaws contain provisions that could delay or prevent a change in control of our company. These provisions could also make it difficult for stockholders to elect directors who are not nominated by current members of our board of directors or take other corporate actions, including effecting changes in our management. These provisions:
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In addition, Section 203 of General Corporation Law of the State of Delaware, or the DGCL, may discourage, delay or prevent a change in control of our company. Section 203 imposes certain restrictions on mergers, business combinations and other transactions between us and holders of 15% or more of our common stock.
Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation provides that the Court of Chancery of the State of Delaware is the exclusive forum for substantially all disputes between us and our stockholders, which could limit our stockholders’ ability to obtain a favorable judicial forum for disputes with us or our directors, officers or employees.
Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation provides that, to the fullest extent permitted by law, unless we consent in writing to the selection of an alternative forum, the Court of Chancery of the State of Delaware (or another state court or the federal court located within the State of Delaware if the Court of Chancery does not have or declines to accept jurisdiction) shall be the sole and exclusive forum, in all cases subject to the court’s having jurisdiction over indispensable parties named as defendants, for: (i) any derivative action or proceeding brought on our behalf; (ii) any action asserting a breach of fiduciary duty owed to us or our stockholders by any director, officer or other employee; (iii) any action asserting a claim against us or any director, officer or other employee arising pursuant to the DGCL; (iv) any action to interpret, apply, enforce or determine the validity of our amended and restated certificate of incorporation or amended and restated bylaws; or (v) any other action asserting a claim that is governed by the internal affairs doctrine. In addition, our amended and restated certificate of incorporation provides that the federal district courts of the United States are the exclusive forum for resolving any complaint asserting a cause of action arising under the Securities Act but that the exclusive forum provision does not apply to claims brought to enforce a duty or liability created by the Exchange Act.
Although we believe these provisions benefit us by providing increased consistency in the application of Delaware law for the specified types of actions and proceedings, the provisions may result in increased costs to stockholders to bring a claim for any such dispute and may have the effect of discouraging lawsuits against us or our directors and officers. Alternatively, if a court were to find the choice of forum provision contained in our amended and restated certificate of incorporation to be inapplicable or unenforceable in an action, we may incur additional costs associated with resolving such action in other jurisdictions, which could harm our business, financial condition and operating results. For example, under the Securities Act, federal courts have concurrent jurisdiction over all suits brought to enforce any duty or liability created by the Securities Act, and investors cannot waive compliance with the federal securities laws and the rules and regulations thereunder. Any person or entity purchasing or otherwise acquiring any interest in shares of our capital stock shall be deemed to have notice of and consented to this exclusive forum provision, but will not be deemed to have waived our compliance with the federal securities laws and the rules and regulations thereunder.
If securities or industry analysts do not publish research or reports about our business, or if they publish inaccurate or unfavorable research about our business, our stock price and trading volume could decline.
The trading market for our common stock will be influenced in part by the research and reports that industry or securities analysts publish about us or our business. We do not have any control over the industry or securities analysts, or the content and opinions included in their reports and may never obtain research coverage by securities and industry analysts. If no or few securities or industry analysts commence coverage of us, or if analysts cease coverage of us, we could lose visibility in the financial markets, and the trading price for our common stock could be impacted negatively. If any of the analysts who cover us publish inaccurate or unfavorable research or opinions regarding us, our business model, our intellectual property or our stock performance, or if our preclinical studies and clinical trials and operating results fail to meet the expectations of analysts, our stock price would likely decline.
Techniques employed by short sellers may drive down the market price of our common stock.
Short selling is the practice of selling securities that the seller does not own, but rather has borrowed from a third-party with the intention of buying identical securities back at a later date to return to the lender. The short seller hopes to profit from a decline in the value of the securities between the sale of the borrowed securities and the purchase of the replacement shares, as the short seller expects to pay less in that purchase than it received in the sale. As it is in the short seller’s best
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interests for the price of the stock to decline, many short sellers publish, or arrange for the publication of, negative opinions regarding the relevant issuer and its business prospects in order to create negative market momentum and generate profits for themselves after selling a stock short. These short attacks have, in the past, led to selling of shares in the market. While we would strongly defend against any such short seller attacks, we may be constrained in the manner in which we can proceed against the relevant short seller by applicable state law or issues of commercial confidentiality. Such a situation could be costly and time-consuming, and could be distracting for our management team. Additionally, such allegations against us could negatively impact our business operations and stockholders' equity, and the value of any investment in our stock could be reduced.
Item 2. Unregistered Sales of Equity Securities and Use of Proceeds.
(a) Unregistered Sales of Equity Securities
None.
(b) Use of Proceeds
On February 7, 2024, our Registration Statement on Form S-1 (File No. 333-276523) was declared effective by the SEC for our IPO. At the closing of the IPO on February 12, 2024, we sold 16,675,000 shares of common stock, which included the exercise in full by the underwriters of their option to purchase 2,175,000 additional shares, at an initial public offering price of $22.00 per share and received gross proceeds of $366.9 million, which resulted in net proceeds to us of $336.2 million, after deducting underwriting discounts and commissions and other offering costs totaling $30.7 million. None of the expenses associated with the IPO were paid to directors, officers, persons owning ten percent or more of any class of equity securities, or to their associates, or to our affiliates, other than payments from our net proceeds in the ordinary course of business to officers for salaries and to non-employee directors as compensation for service on the board of directors or committees of the board of directors and less than $0.1 million in consulting fees related to the IPO to one of the board members. J.P. Morgan Securities LLC, Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC, Leerink Partners LLC and Wells Fargo Securities, LLC acted as joint book-running managers for the IPO.
The net proceeds from our IPO have been invested according to our approved investment policy in a mix of money market funds and high-quality, fixed income securities. There has been no material change in the planned use of IPO proceeds from that described in our final prospectus filed pursuant to Rule 424(b)(4) under the Securities Act with the SEC on February 8, 2024.
(c) Issuer Repurchases of Equity Securities
None.
Item 3. Defaults Upon Senior Securities.
Not applicable.
Item 4. Mine Safety Disclosures.
Not applicable.
Item 5. Other Information.
During the fiscal quarter ended June 30, 2025, none of our directors or officers (as defined in Section 16 of the Exchange Act)
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Item 6. Exhibits.
Exhibit Number |
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Description |
3.1 |
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3.2 |
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4.1 |
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10.1*# |
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10.2*# |
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31.1* |
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31.2* |
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32.1** |
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32.2** |
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101.INS |
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Inline XBRL Instance Document – the instance document does not appear in the Interactive Data File because XBRL tags are embedded within the Inline XBRL document. |
101.SCH |
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Inline XBRL Taxonomy Extension Schema With Embedded Linkbase Documents. |
104 |
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Cover Page Interactive Data File (embedded within the Inline XBRL document). |
* Filed herewith.
# Indicates management contract or compensatory plan or arrangement.
** Furnished herewith.
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SIGNATURES
Pursuant to the requirements of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, the registrant has duly caused this report to be signed on its behalf by the undersigned thereunto duly authorized.
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KYVERNA THERAPEUTICS, INC. |
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Date: August 12, 2025 |
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By: |
/s/ Warner Biddle |
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Warner Biddle |
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Chief Executive Officer (Principal Executive Officer) |
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Date: August 12, 2025 |
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By: |
/s/ Marc Grasso, M.D. |
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Marc Grasso, M.D. |
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Chief Financial Officer (Principal Financial and Accounting Officer) |
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Exhibit 31.1
CERTIFICATION PURSUANT TO
RULES 13a-14(a) AND 15d-14(a) UNDER THE SECURITIES EXCHANGE ACT OF 1934,
AS ADOPTED PURSUANT TO SECTION 302 OF THE SARBANES-OXLEY ACT OF 2002
I, Warner Biddle, hereby certify that:
Date: August 12, 2025 |
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By: |
/s/ Warner Biddle |
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Warner Biddle |
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Chief Executive Officer (Principal Executive Officer) |
Exhibit 31.2
CERTIFICATION PURSUANT TO
RULES 13a-14(a) AND 15d-14(a) UNDER THE SECURITIES EXCHANGE ACT OF 1934,
AS ADOPTED PURSUANT TO SECTION 302 OF THE SARBANES-OXLEY ACT OF 2002
I, Marc Grasso, hereby certify that:
Date: August 12, 2025 |
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By: |
/s/ Marc Grasso, M.D. |
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Marc Grasso, M.D. |
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Chief Financial Officer (Principal Financial Officer) |
Exhibit 32.1
CERTIFICATION PURSUANT TO
18 U.S.C. SECTION 1350, AS ADOPTED PURSUANT TO
SECTION 906 OF THE SARBANES-OXLEY ACT OF 2002
In connection with the Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q of Kyverna Therapeutics, Inc. (the “Company”) for the period ended June 30, 2025 as filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on the date hereof (the “Report”), I certify, pursuant to 18 U.S.C. § 1350, as adopted pursuant to § 906 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, to my knowledge that:
Date: August 12, 2025 |
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By: |
/s/ Warner Biddle |
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Warner Biddle |
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Chief Executive Officer (Principal Executive Officer) |
A signed original of this written statement required by Section 906 has been provided to the Company and will be retained by the Company and furnished to the Securities and Exchange Commission or its staff upon request.
This certification accompanies the Report, is not deemed filed for purposes of Section 18 of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended (the “Exchange Act”), or otherwise subject to the liability of that section, nor shall it be deemed incorporated by reference into any filing under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, or the Exchange Act (whether made before or after the date of the Report), irrespective of any general incorporation language contained in such filing.
Exhibit 32.2
CERTIFICATION PURSUANT TO
18 U.S.C. SECTION 1350, AS ADOPTED PURSUANT TO
SECTION 906 OF THE SARBANES-OXLEY ACT OF 2002
In connection with the Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q of Kyverna Therapeutics, Inc. (the “Company”) for the period ended June 30, 2025 as filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on the date hereof (the “Report”), I certify, pursuant to 18 U.S.C. § 1350, as adopted pursuant to § 906 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, to my knowledge that:
Date: August 12, 2025 |
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By: |
/s/ Marc Grasso, M.D. |
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Marc Grasso, M.D. |
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Chief Financial Officer (Principal Financial Officer) |
A signed original of this written statement required by Section 906 has been provided to the Company and will be retained by the Company and furnished to the Securities and Exchange Commission or its staff upon request.
This certification accompanies the Report, is not deemed filed for purposes of Section 18 of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended (the “Exchange Act”), or otherwise subject to the liability of that section, nor shall it be deemed incorporated by reference into any filing under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, or the Exchange Act (whether made before or after the date of the Report), irrespective of any general incorporation language contained in such filing.