Earnings Call Transcript - LFCR Q1 2023

Operator, Operator

Good morning, and thank you for joining Landec's Fiscal 2023 First Quarter Earnings Call. I will now hand the call over to Jeff Sonnek from Investor Relations at ICR. Please proceed.

Jeff Sonnek, Investor Relations

Good morning, and thank you for joining us today to discuss Landec Corporation's First Quarter Fiscal 2023 Earnings Results. On the call today from the company are Jim Hall, Chief Executive Officer and President of Lifecore; and John Morberg, Chief Financial Officer. Before we begin today, you should have received a copy of our earnings release, which is also available on the company's website, where we also post our investors presentation. In addition, we'd like to remind everyone of the safe harbor statement. Certain statements made in the course of this conference call contain forward-looking statements. It is important to note that the company's actual results could differ materially from those projected in such forward-looking statements. Additional information concerning risk factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements is contained from time to time in the company's filings with the SEC, including, but not limited to, the company's Form 10-K for fiscal year 2022. Copies of those filings may be obtained from the company's website. And with that, I'd like to turn the call over to Jim Hall, Chief Executive Officer.

James Hall, CEO

Thank you, Jeff. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us. I'll begin the day with a brief update on our strategic initiative that we unveiled just 8 weeks ago to transform the focus of the company to a stand-alone Lifecore business. In terms of the formal timing of the transition to the Lifecore corporate branding and ticker switch, we are working through those legal processes and are targeting November for the formal change. When we have greater precision, we will be sure to update the market accordingly so everyone is prepared. With respect to our efforts to monetize the remaining Curation Foods assets, those activities are well underway. However, we are not in a position yet to communicate any potential outcomes. That said, I want to continue to emphasize the importance of this work by our team and our commitment to getting this done as soon as possible. With that, I'll provide a summary of Lifecore's fiscal '23 first quarter performance, provide some additional updates on our business and commercial efforts, and then pass the call to John to discuss the financials and the fiscal '23 outlook, which we are reiterating today. In the fiscal '23 first quarter, Lifecore grew revenue by 8% to $23.7 million, generating an increase of 8.1%, and adjusted EBITDA to $2.5 million, both of which were consistent with our plan and the cadence that we disclosed at the beginning of the fiscal year. As a reminder, the first quarter is our seasonally lowest quarter of the year in terms of revenues and EBITDA due to the idling of our manufacturing lines for annual required clean room certification and facility maintenance. Nonetheless, we're off to a solid start for the year and remain excited about the business development activity that we are generating, which I'll cover in a moment. Our business remains very well positioned as a fully integrated CDMO, with highly differentiated capabilities for the development, fill and finish of complex, sterile, injectable-grade pharmaceutical products. These technical capabilities have been honed from our more than 40 years of experience in building a premier pharmaceutical injectable grade hyaluronic acid manufacturing platform with a focus on complex and highly regulated products. Our unique expertise, coupled with the ongoing industry trends towards outsourcing of new drug development, means Lifecore is ideally positioned as a preferred partner to provide CDMO services for new injectable drug applications. In fact, Lifecore is the only manufacturer of pharmaceutical injectable-grade HA, with injectable CDMO expertise in the market today. Approximately 55% of all new drug applications are injectables and prefilled syringe demand is growing at an estimated 13% compound annual rate. Given the industry's limited injectable drug manufacturing capacity, we will continue to take full advantage of this incredible opportunity and deliver much-needed capacity that we've been investing in during the past few years. On the development front, our project portfolio remains robust, with 24 active projects from 21 different customers. These 24 projects are dispersed across various stages of our portfolio as follows: early phase clinical development with 5 projects, Phase I and II clinical development with 11 projects, and Phase III clinical development and scale up commercial validation activity with 8 projects. We continue to work closely with all of our customers in progressing their products through the various stages of development and eventual FDA approval. These efforts are now paying off. Three of the late-phase projects are nearing FDA approval, one is a drug with a PDUFA date before the end of calendar 2022, and the other 2 are medical device programs, both of which have anticipated approvals within this calendar year. As I mentioned last quarter, we are preparing for preapproval inspections to support these projects and are working closely with these customers to support their product launch plans. As it pertains to the forecasted value of the projects in our active portfolio, we currently believe the revenue potential from the development activity is in the range of $50 million to $80 million in development revenue over the life cycle of the projects, which we expect will continue to grow as we expand our active development project portfolio. Looking at the potential commercial value for the 8 late-stage projects in our active portfolio, we believe that the commercial revenue opportunity is in the range of $45 million to $120 million annually as these products receive FDA approval and are successfully transferred to contracted commercial supply agreements. CDMO activities represented nearly 80% of our revenue mix this past fiscal year 2022, with the balance of our revenue generated from HA raw material sales. HA remains a critical component of our business and is the foundation by which we've developed our CDMO expertise in complex and highly viscous products over the past 40 years. Approximately 50% of the revenue produced in our CDMO business is generated from products utilizing HA, and within our current active project portfolio, that mix is approximately 70%. HA is viewed as an ideal excipient for injectable therapies and that it is a naturally occurring substance in the human body and its highly viscous characteristics allow for optimized targeted drug development. Thus, we continue to see meaningful activity among the biopharma community in utilizing HA, and nearly 40% of our prospective project opportunities are utilizing HA, which is a good segue to updating you on our commercial strategy to convert new potential engagements. We now have the complete team in place that we set out to establish from our investments in people that we announced last year. Our team is doing an impressive job ramping up our commercial presence in the market, and we are seeing immediate returns on our investment in people, which spans marketing, sales, business operations, and process development. In the fiscal first quarter, we added 14 new prospective opportunities to our development opportunity funnel for a total of 63 projects that are in various stages of diligence and discussion. These opportunities span multiple end markets, classes of drugs, and medical devices and with an assortment of companies, both large and small, which we believe speaks to the attractive CDMO capabilities within Lifecore's growing expertise that the pharma industry is actively seeking in a CDMO partner. While the number of potential projects will shift over time as we convert some and dismiss others, we aren't seeing any slowdown in the number of opportunities. On the contrary, we continue to believe that our expanded commercial strategy will support an increasing trend well into the future. On the operational front, our company continues to prepare for a multiyear acceleration of growth. As I mentioned, it is imperative that we continue to push our organization forward with the implementation of best practices and new capabilities. Our team is in place, and they are diligently working to raise our profile. We bolstered our marketing approach, which is supported by enhanced branding awareness and greater reach to communicate Lifecore's differentiated capability to the market. Last fiscal year, we made great advancements in optimizing our facilities in anticipation of adding new capacity in the coming years. With this complete, we are now focused on creating operational efficiencies across the entire company. We are modernizing systems and automating wherever possible. For instance, our laboratory information management system, or LIMS, has been integrated, and we've qualified our first product on LIMS in late June, with a series of other products transitioning to LIMS in the coming months. This platform provides rapid visibility to data and enhances analytics that replaces manual and inefficient processes. We are also isolating additional areas of savings and efficiency through our focus on pharmaceutical elegance. These opportunities include enhancing our sustainability and energy management, our supply chain, and working capital requirements. Further, our team is laser focused on resource planning across our entire organization to prepare us to add new manufacturing lines and shifts and to do so with an efficient workforce as capacity and demand requires. In fact, we just recently added an additional weekend shift to support increased manufacturing activity across our organization. While there is always more to do, Lifecore is very well prepared for anticipated robust growth. Looking ahead, our future expansion continues to be driven by our strong development project portfolio, expansion of our prospective development pipeline, and conversion of these projects into our active development portfolio. We remain focused on driving towards a multiyear acceleration of annual revenue growth into the mid- to high teens based upon our current project portfolio characteristics and favorable industry tailwinds. While we continue to concentrate on maximizing the revenue-generating capacity of our current infrastructure, we also must balance the known future capacity requirements within our project portfolio with the multiyear lead times on the specialized equipment that is manufactured to our specifications that must also undergo rigorous testing, customer acceptance, and regulatory approval. Our four decades of experience in creating a world-class quality management system provides us the confidence to directly meet these challenges as we plan to deliver this multiyear acceleration in our revenue growth trajectory, which is supported by known projects within our existing project portfolio and will be further enhanced by new opportunities with the prospective projects in our development pipeline. Now I would like to turn the call to John for his financial review.

John Morberg, CFO

Thank you, Jim. I'll start with a review of Lifecore's financial performance and our fiscal '23 outlook before shifting to some updates around the financial aspects of the transition plan that we shared in August. As a reminder, our first quarter is our seasonally lowest quarter in terms of revenues. The seasonality results from idling our manufacturing lines for annual required clean room certification and facility maintenance. This slows shipment volumes and causes the first quarter to be our lightest quarter of the year. For the first quarter of fiscal '23, Lifecore total revenues increased 8% to $23.7 million, consistent with our expectation for the first quarter growth to be in the single-digit range. This growth was driven by a 31% increase in our HA raw material manufacturing business and a 3% increase in our CDMO business. The increase in the HA business is primarily due to reduced shipments in the prior year period due to excess channel inventory during the global pandemic and its impact on elective procedures. Lifecore gross profit increased 6% to $6.1 million for the first quarter of '23, representing a gross margin of 25.7%, which compares to 26.3% in the prior year period. The 60-basis-point variance versus prior year was primarily due to higher depreciation, partially offset by improved revenue mix. Lifecore adjusted EBITDA increased 8.1% to $2.5 million for the first quarter of '23, with an adjusted EBITDA margin of 10.4%, which was consistent with the prior year. Shifting to our fiscal '23 outlook for our Lifecore segment. We are reiterating revenue guidance in the range of $122 million to $126 million, which implies growth in the range of 12% to 15%, and adjusted EBITDA guidance in the range of $31 million to $32.5 million, which implies growth in the range of 7% to 12%. While we are no longer providing formal guidance on our Curation Foods segment, due to our strategic actions to monetize those remaining assets, for modeling purposes, we are assuming no contribution from Curation Foods for the full fiscal year. Additionally, we are reiterating our full year guidance for our other segment, which reflects the ongoing corporate costs of the organization, which we continue to expect in the range of $7 million to $7.5 million. On this point, I'd remind everyone that while our intent is to formally transition to Lifecore, our organization is in the process of establishing the corporate infrastructure that we carry at Landec. As this transition progresses, we will be making those changes, but in the near term, we think it's most appropriate to expect those expenses to continue. Longer term, we believe there will be some modest savings as we manage the smaller and less complex Lifecore organization. So on a consolidated basis, we expect adjusted EBITDA, net of corporate costs, and assuming no contribution from Curation Foods, to be in the range of $23.5 million to $25.5 million for the full year fiscal '23. With respect to Lifecore, there are a few modeling considerations of note. We continue to anticipate gross margins to decline by approximately 100 basis points in fiscal '23 to approximately 39%, which is very consistent with fiscal year '20 and fiscal year '21 performance. This is due to an expected mix shift towards higher commercial revenues which, on a relative basis, have lower margins than our other revenue streams. Additionally, we will continue to invest in the sales and marketing functions as we drive an acceleration of top line growth, taking advantage of the favorable industry tailwinds. As a result, we anticipate a similar to slightly higher level of operating expenses versus prior year, perhaps by approximately 50 basis points as a percentage of revenues for the full year. In terms of Lifecore's quarterly cadence, we continue to expect sequential revenue growth from first to second quarter and second to third quarter and then similar revenue in both third and fourth quarters. And as a reminder, third quarter of fiscal '22 revenues were higher than expected due to shipment timing, therefore, we would expect this year's third quarter to be approximately flat with the prior year. Adjusted EBITDA is expected to increase sequentially from the first through the third quarters, but then flatten out in fiscal fourth quarter, which is expected to be similar in size to that of the third quarter. Now turning to Landec's balance sheet, which still reflects our remaining Curation Foods assets and liabilities and the impact of the segment's cash flows. Net bank debt on a reported basis for the fiscal quarter ended August 28, '22, was $138.3 million, which was essentially flat with the net bank debt at the end of fiscal '22 of $136.5 million. In fiscal '23 first quarter, Lifecore spent $2.9 million in capital expenditures, which is consistent with our fiscal year '23 CapEx guidance of $34 million to $38 million, which is earmarked for 2 multi-use isolator fillers and the associated formulation and process support equipment, which will be ready for acceptance testing next summer. As a reminder, included in this estimate is approximately $3.4 million of CapEx carryover from fiscal '22. This keeps us on track to expand our operational filling capacity from our current 10 million units to 22 million units and beyond to meet expected growth and capacity demand driven by projected growth in our base commercial business and commercialization of products in the late phases of development and our active project portfolio.

Operator, Operator

The first question is from Jacob Johnson of Stephens.

Jacob Johnson, Analyst

Congrats on a nice start to the year at Lifecore. Maybe kicking off with a higher-level question. Jim, you talked a little bit about the state of the fill/finish market, but maybe just to flush it out some more. Can you just talk about kind of where fill/finish supply and demand is for the industry? It sounds like capacity is still tight there. And then just a follow-up there, maybe just a couple of comments on how you differentiate yourself versus other fill/finish providers?

James Hall, CEO

Sure, Jacob. Based on the activity we see in the field and feedback from our sales teams, there are abundant opportunities coming our way. We have increased our evaluation of opportunities by 14 projects, and I expect even more to come in. A lot of this is due to our ability to provide additional capacity, which will be available over the next few years. There's limited unused capacity out there, and people are actively seeking it. Additionally, our specialization in complex product formulations and Lifecore's HA manufacturing capability is crucial to our business and contributes to the interest we are receiving, particularly since much of what's coming involves HA. Regarding the funding landscape in biotech, while it seems true that some funding has decreased, it seems that earlier phase projects, which would typically not receive funding, are the ones being affected. However, we are not experiencing a slowdown; instead, limited capacity continues to create opportunities for Lifecore. Our targeted marketing and sales strategies are beginning to yield results, and our current focus is on converting these opportunities into active projects to propel our progress forward.

Jacob Johnson, Analyst

Got it. And that leads to my next question. You have a funnel of 63 projects and conversations happening. Can you discuss how selective you are about the partners you choose to work with and the decision-making process involved in turning those leads into active projects?

James Hall, CEO

Yes, sure. Listen, Lifecore has got a very experienced and amazing team that's got a lot of industry experience and really has a lot of experience and works hard to evaluate and identify low probability projects and drives us to eliminate those sooner rather than later. And really, it's one of our core competencies that's been driven by our 40 years of experience trying to identify what we should and shouldn't work with. And what really sparked that is, historically, Lifecore didn't have a lot of capacity, and we wanted to make sure we pick the right projects that had a high probability of success to get there. So that's really what we bank on as we pick and work through the ideas to get through the funnel. The other thing is we're spending a lot of time on our new marketing effort, getting Lifecore's unique capabilities out to the marketplace. For the first time ever, we've upgraded our website, doing Google ads, updating our social media content, and enhancing our trade show presence. But really, what's more important is we're paying attention to what that's telling us, and where we need to go target to get more opportunities into the pipeline. So there's still more work to do there. The opportunities are showing up. Now it's a matter of getting them onboarded as quickly as possible, and that's what we're doing now with the organization to make sure we're set up and can get these things onboarded because several are out for proposal, and it's just a matter of working it through the process.

Jacob Johnson, Analyst

Got it. And then just last one for me. Jim, you mentioned, I think, some kind of operational initiatives. And I think last quarter, you talked a little bit about Lifecore University, and I think a bunch of Lean and Six Sigma people have been kind of educated on those. Can you just talk about the key areas for operational improvements? And then if John wants to chime in on how we should think about that from a financial perspective, that would be great too.

James Hall, CEO

Yes, sure. Jacob, it's actually across the entire organization and impacts every corner of the company, right? Obviously, we want to optimize and get the most out of our processes as we can. So we look for efficiencies and there's a lot of lean projects centered around that as well as our business operations, processing to help get things identified and onboarded and making sure that the organization is set up not only from a project management and business operations standpoint, but from a development and manufacturing standpoint to support the increased manufacturing capacity. So LIMS is another example, our laboratory information management system, to allow us to manage data and look at it quicker and get it out to our partners quicker as well. And so it's across the entire organization and something that is ingrained in our culture at Lifecore. And one of the reasons that we implemented, what we call, Lifecore University to get people onboarded, our employees onboarded and operational as quickly as possible. John, anything you want to add?

John Morberg, CFO

Okay. Jacob, from a financial perspective, really impacts 2 areas, our gross profit margins and operating leverage and operating expenses. And so all these things that Jim is talking about, we want to be able to keep our gross profit margin in that high 30s to low 40s. And then, secondly, over time, leverage the operating expense to drive EBITDA margins. So that's where we're very focused on these efforts.

Operator, Operator

The next question is coming from Mark Smith of Lake Street Capital Markets.

Mark Smith, Analyst

Just wanted to look at the pipeline, just a little bit more. Can you just talk about kind of conversion from prospects into projects, kind of generally how you feel about your pipeline and then really that conversion process?

James Hall, CEO

Sure, Mark. Obviously, we have a lot of things in the pipeline that we're analyzing, 63 that we're in discussion with now. And the way we look at those is how they run through the funnel is what converts to leads. And then we monitor qualified leads and then they get to the proposal stage. And not all of them are going to make it into that process. We have a lot of experience and a pretty good set of criteria we look at to gauge opportunities before we would even consider them part of that funnel or part of the 63 projects. So I don't have a set percentage of how many of those will be onboarded over the next period of time. A lot of it depends on what phase they're in, and how it fits into our niche of capabilities. But our track record and historical rate is pretty high. Will that continue as more come through? It's our intent to have as many of those come through as we can. But it's difficult to judge how many of those. The one thing I can tell you is the majority of those 63 fit what we look for. Now it's just going to be picking the best ones that utilize our skill set and we can provide the most value to.

Mark Smith, Analyst

Okay. And then a couple of kind of model questions maybe for John. Just cadence of the revenue guidance. It sounds like you guys are looking for a really solid growth here in Q2. Is some of that just a function of seasonality, and then just how well Q3 was, how solid Q3 was last year that really drives that higher year-over-year growth here in Q2?

John Morberg, CFO

Yes, Mark, I think what we're really seeing is the back half of the year is probably where the biggest growth is going to be occurring. And again, it's just kind of the lineup of projects that are out there and timing of orders from customers. So we actually see a bigger growth in the back half of the year, not just similar to last year actually as well.

Mark Smith, Analyst

Okay. And then similarly, just as we think about CapEx, very little spend here in Q1, these projects that are coming online. What's kind of the cadence or expected timing of this larger spend in CapEx?

James Hall, CEO

Yes. I'll start, and I'll ask John to weigh in a little bit as well. But listen, Lifecore works very hard to be good stewards of our capital. This is a timing and within what we expected Q1 will be, and really focuses on progress payments for a lot of the capacity-related spend we have. It's obviously going to pick up through the rest of the year. We're still maintaining the spend guidance that we gave earlier. And so nothing really to call out here other than this is the timing. Q1 was light as we projected, and Lifecore is going to do whatever it can to manage the spend and not spend until we need to.

John Morberg, CFO

Yes. I would like to add that most of our capital expenditures, about 85%, are growth-related and mainly concentrated on the filler isolator equipment, which we expect to receive next summer. Consequently, this leads to a delay in many of the progress payments until later in the year or the second half of the year.

Operator, Operator

The next question is coming from Mike Petusky of Barrington Research.

Michael Petusky, Analyst

That was a great segue into the question I wanted to ask. One of the most common inquiries I receive about Landec pertains to capital expenditures in terms of what a longer-term normalized figure would be. Could you elaborate on what a normalized amount or range might look like after we move past what seems to be a period of increased investment?

James Hall, CEO

Yes, John, do you want to take that?

John Morberg, CFO

Yes, Mike. As we've mentioned several times, our capital expenditure needs can be somewhat uneven and not always linear. However, we are assessing our capacity requirements and need to order filling equipment, which can take a couple of years to arrive followed by time for validation before it starts generating revenue. This is a significant aspect of our capital expenditure considerations. Primarily, I would emphasize that most of our capital expenditure will be growth-oriented, with over 85% of our spending directed toward that rather than maintenance. Additionally, it's evident that we are transitioning into a growth company. For at least the next couple of years, we plan to reinvest our EBITDA back into capital expenditures as we focus on expanding our future EBITDA. We believe that these investments, ranging from $34 million to $38 million, will allow us to generate an extra $5 million to $10 million in EBITDA each year. Consequently, this results in a strong return on investment when we consider the valuation multiples in the CDMO sector.

Michael Petusky, Analyst

So is it then fair to say that maybe this really isn't an elevated range going forward, maybe this is more like a normal range going forward?

John Morberg, CFO

Yes. We're just not in a position yet today to probably give guidance on that other than what we've given guidance on for this year. But again, I would think that we would be trying to reinvest for the most part our EBITDA back into CapEx going forward.

Michael Petusky, Analyst

And by the way, once you get through a couple of years of that, you eventually turn around to a pretty nice free cash flowing business. But in the short term here, the focus is on being a growth company. And I know you don't want to comment a lot about the Curation assets. But is there an expectation that sort of that process of monetization will be complete either by calendar year-end or fiscal year-end? I mean can you sort of speak to that?

John Morberg, CFO

Yes, we are in the process of selling those assets and have engaged advisers to assist us. Jim and I have set a personal goal to complete the sale by the end of the year. We are committed to making progress while being realistic about the time required for such a process. We understand our shareholders want this to happen quickly, and we share that desire. However, we are navigating unique challenges such as the pandemic, high inflation, and labor shortages, which complicate the sale of each asset. We are dedicated to this effort and work on it daily, recognizing its importance for the company. We aim to complete the sale as quickly as possible and will provide updates to the market when we can.

Michael Petusky, Analyst

Okay. All right. Great. And I just wanted to confirm that I heard one thing, I think that Jim said earlier, PDUFA date before the end of the year and 2 devices likely approved before the end of the calendar year, correct?

James Hall, CEO

That's correct, Mike.

Operator, Operator

Our final question today is going to be coming from Mitch Pinheiro of Sturdivant & Company.

Mitchell Pinheiro, Analyst

One thing I want to understand is that you mentioned tight capacity in the syringe fill/finish area in the industry. Isn't that capacity somewhat constrained from company to company, especially since new drugs and therapies usually have their manufacturers integrated into the process from the start? I'm not clear on why there seems to be a lack of capacity for immediate use. Wouldn't you need to go through the entire FDA process again to get approved for that new therapy? Could you elaborate on that a bit?

James Hall, CEO

Yes, Mitch, I think there might be a misunderstanding regarding your question. To clarify, if a company is looking to switch from one approved Contract Development and Manufacturing Organization (CDMO) to another, that would necessitate going through the entire qualification process again. We see a lot of drug development happening currently, with a significant portion being outsourced. Companies are actively seeking CDMOs that have the capacity to grow alongside them. They often have a product platform and multiple products, and they estimate their capacity needs for the next few years to secure a partnership with a CDMO that can scale with them. This qualification is essential in the drug development process, such as filing a New Drug Application (NDA), where Lifecore would be qualified as they progress with product and process development. Many of the companies in our pipeline are looking for available capacity and are focused on locking in that capacity to meet their anticipated future demand.

Mitchell Pinheiro, Analyst

When discussing your plans to grow your capacity over the next few years, I assumed that this capacity would primarily be allocated to companies you're already associated with. Is that accurate? If not, will we see an increase in capital expenditures to boost your potential capacity?

James Hall, CEO

We have a significant portion of our capacity allocated to projects we are currently engaged in. Additionally, we are preparing for extra capacity to exceed our anticipated needs because, in the injectable grade CDMO sector, there is a unique opportunity for growth and expansion, which we are pursuing. Not all of our planned capacity is currently filled, and we are actively seeking to sell more of it. Eventually, Lifecore will need to grow beyond the two extra fill lines we have discussed. We are continuously assessing the capacity required to support our pipeline and will ensure that our investment aligns appropriately when the time comes to secure that capacity. I wouldn’t expect an immediate increase in capital expenditure; we need to assess our timing for that. As mentioned, implementing a fill line now takes over three years. The key challenge is to determine the necessary capacity and to invest at the right time. Additionally, we've noted that there is interest from potential partners seeking future capacity, who are willing to invest, and this is something we are considering as well.

Mitchell Pinheiro, Analyst

Yes, it must be challenging to determine your capacity needs since most of the 24 projects in your pipeline, due to the nature of drug approval, are likely to fail. It is difficult to assess your capacity requirements in relation to the chances of successful drug development. It appears to be quite a challenge.

James Hall, CEO

It is indeed a challenge, and you're correct that not everything will succeed. Once a project enters the late phase and we start to see promising data from Phase III trials, we usually have greater confidence that it's a matter of when, not if, an approval will occur. However, not every project will complete the Phase III trial successfully. This is why we closely monitor the late-phase projects and the eight initiatives that are essential for meeting our commercial capacity needs over the next three to four years. Another important factor we analyze is the clinical capacity we will require to support this portfolio as it advances, including qualification and validation batches. This is more than just a commercial volume issue. Our team excels at navigating these complexities and collaborating with our partners to ensure we have everything in place to support them as we progress towards fulfilling our commercial contracts.

Mitchell Pinheiro, Analyst

Okay, one more question regarding leverage. You are a growth company, but one with high leverage is less appealing than other options. Currently, you have a leverage of 5x. I understand there will be asset sales in the future, but as you move forward, these sales need to factor into your capital spending plans for Lifecore. It's important not to emerge as Lifecore Biomedical with a heavily leveraged balance sheet, especially if you can't achieve the asset sale pricing you desire. How do you view this situation? Are you confident that your asset sales will maintain what you consider a reasonable level of leverage, or could this impact your capital spending plans? Can you elaborate on that?

John Morberg, CFO

Yes, improving our capital structure has been a focus of Project SWIFT since we launched it a few years ago. It's clear that our current leverage level is unsustainable, which underscores our efforts to conserve cash, optimize assets, and create value. As you've noticed, we have been using that cash to pay down debt, and we remain committed to strengthening our balance sheet. While I can't predict our future stand-alone leverage, I can say that we aim to improve it. We plan to do this in two ways: by continuing to sell assets and through our EBITDA growth, which will also help reduce debt. We maintain strong communication with our banks and are always exploring potential banking opportunities for when we operate as a stand-alone Lifecore business. We believe there is a clear path forward to achieve our growth objectives.

Mitchell Pinheiro, Analyst

And I know, as you look forward, I mean, is there a leverage target that you think Lifecore Biomedical can operate comfortably? Is it 3x? Is it 2x? Any idea?

John Morberg, CFO

Yes. I mean. My personal sense is I'd love to be in the 3x range. And we recognize for a short period of time, we might have to be above that. But ultimately, we think we can be more comfortable in that type of range. We look kind of mid-range time frames.

Operator, Operator

At this time, I'd like to turn the floor back over to Mr. Hall for any additional or closing comments.

James Hall, CEO

Thanks everyone for your interest. These are very exciting times for Lifecore. We'll look forward to talking with you again when we release our fiscal second quarter results. So thank you, and have a good day.

Operator, Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for your participation. This concludes today's event. You may disconnect your lines or log off the webcast at this time and enjoy the rest of your day.