Viking Therapeutics, Inc. (VKTX) Q1 2026 Earnings Call Transcript

Welcome to the Viking Therapeutics First Quarter 2026 Financial Results Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in the listen-only mode. Following managing prepared remarks, we will hold a Q&A session. To ask a question at this time, please press the star key followed by one on your touchstone phone. If anyone has difficulty hearing the conference, please press star zero for operator assistance. As a reminder, this conference call is being recorded today, April 29, 2026. I would now like to turn the conference over to Vikings Manager of Investor Relations, Stephanie Dyers. Thank you, and over to you.

Hello, and thank you all for participating in today's call. Joining me today is Brian Lian, Vikings President and CEO, and Greg Zante, Vikings CFO. Before we begin, I'd like to caution that comments made during this conference call, today, April 29, 2026, will contain forward-looking statements under the safe harbor provisions of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, including statements about Viking's expectations regarding its development activities, timelines, and milestones. Forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially and adversely, and reported results should not be considered as an indication of future performance. These forward-looking statements speak only as of today's date, and the company undertakes no obligation to revise or update any statement made today. I encourage you to review all of the company's filings of the Securities and Exchange Commission concerning these and other matters. I'll now turn to call over to Brian Land for his initial comments.

Thanks, Stephanie, and good afternoon to everyone listening in by phone or on the webcast. Today, we'll review our financial results for the first quarter ended March 31, 2026, and review recent progress with our pipeline programs and operations. During the first quarter, we made significant progress with our obesity franchise, highlighted by our lead compound, VK2735, a dual agonist of the GLP-1 and GIP receptors. As we have previously reported, in June 2025, following the positive results from our Phase II Venture Study, Viking initiated its Phase III Vanquish clinical program, evaluating VK2735 dosed as a weekly subcutaneous injection. The Phase III Vanquish program includes two studies, Vanquish I, evaluating the treatment of adults with obesity, and Vanquish II, evaluating the treatment of adults with obesity and type 2 diabetes. Enrollment in the Vanquish I trial was completed in the fourth quarter of last year. And during the first quarter of 2026, we were pleased to announce the completion of enrollment in the Vanquish II trial. Both studies continued to proceed on track. Also in the first quarter, the company made progress with its oral VK2735 program. Following an end of Phase II meeting with the FDA, and based on the positive top-line results reported in our Phase II Venture Oral Dosing study, the company elected to advance oral VK2735 into Phase III clinical development, which we plan to initiate later this year. Concurrent with the planning and execution of our subcutaneous and oral registration programs, in October 2025, Viking initiated a maintenance dosing study with VK2735 to assess the effect of various maintenance regimens, including monthly, every other week, or weekly dosing. This trial has advanced rapidly, with enrollment completed in the first quarter of this year, less than three months after initiation. We expect to report the results of this study in the third quarter. Finally, in the first quarter, we filed an IMD with our novel amylin receptor agonist and pending clearance are on track to initiate the clinical development of this compound later this quarter. I'll have additional comments on our operations and development activities following a review of our financial results for the first quarter ended March 31st. For that, I'll turn the call over to Greg Zante, Vikings Chief Financial Officer.

Greg Zante Thanks, Brian. In conjunction with my comments, I'd like to recommend that participants refer to Vikings Form 10-Q filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, which we expect to file shortly. I'll now go over our results for the first quarter ended March 31, 2026. Research and development expenses were $115.2 million for the three months ended March 31, January 1st, 2026, compared to $41.4 million for the same period in 2025. The increase was primarily due to increased expenses related to clinical studies, manufacturing for our drug candidates, consultants, salaries and benefits, and preclinical studies, partially upset by a decrease in expenses related to stock-based compensation. General and administrative expenses were $14 million for the three months ended March 31, 2026, compared to $14.1 million for the same period in 2025. The decrease was primarily due to decreased expenses related to legal and patent services and stock-based compensation, partially offset by increased expenses related to consulting, salaries and benefits, and scientific and disease education. For the three months ended March 31, 2026, Viking reported a net loss of $158.3 million or $1.37 per share compared to a net loss of $45.6 million or $0.41 per share in the corresponding period in 2025. The increase in net loss for the three months ended March 31, 2026 was primarily due to increased research and development expenses, partially offset by decreased general and administrative expenses compared to the same period in 2025. Turning to the balance sheet, at March 31st, 2026, Viking held cash, cash equivalents and short-term investments of $603 million compared to $706 million as of December 31st, 2025. This concludes my financial review, and I'll now turn the call back over to Brian.

Thanks, Greg. I'll now provide an update on Viking's clinical and operational progress, beginning with our lead obesity program, VK2735. VK2735 is a dual agonist of the glucagon-like peptide one, or GLP-1 receptor, and the glucose dependent insulinotropic polypeptide, or GIP receptor, that has demonstrated promising increasing efficacy, safety, and tolerability across multiple clinical trials. As I mentioned in my opening comments, Viking is developing both an injectable and an oral formulation of VK2735 for the treatment of obesity, as well as evaluating a novel maintenance dosing protocol to support long-term weight management. During the first quarter, Viking made substantial progress in each of these areas. With respect to the subcutaneous VK2735 program, Viking's prior Phase I and Phase II trials successfully achieved their primary and secondary endpoints, demonstrating significant weight loss compared with placebo, as well as an impressive safety, tolerability, and pharmacokinetic profile. In the Phase I subcutaneous study, subjects receiving VK2735 achieved up to approximately 8% weight loss from baseline after four weekly doses, with no signs of plateau. In the Phase II venture study, patients demonstrated statistically significant reductions in mean body weight from baseline, ranging up to 14.7% after 13 weekly doses, again with no signs of plateau. Importantly, the Venture study also showed VK2735 to be safe and well-tolerated through 13 weeks of dosing, with the majority of treatment-emergent adverse events characterized as mild or moderate and resolving quickly. These results were highlighted in a presentation at the 2025 Obesity Week Conference last November. The final results were also published in January 2026 in Obesity, the peer reviewed journal of the Obesity Society. Following the Venture Phase II study, Viking held a Type C meeting with the FDA and subsequently an end of Phase II meeting with the agency. Based on feedback from these meetings, in June of last year, the company initiated the Vanquish Phase III registration program evaluating subcutaneous VK2735 in patients with obesity. The VANQUISH program consists of two clinical trials, one in adults with obesity and one in adults with obesity and type 2 diabetes. Each study is a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, multi-center trial designed to assess the efficacy and safety of BK2735 administered by subcutaneous injection once weekly for 78 weeks. Enrollment in each of these trials was rapid, with the VANQUISH-1 study enrolling approximately only 4,500 patients by November 2025, approximately five months after trial initiation. Enrollment in the VANQUISH II study was completed in the first quarter, enrolling approximately 1,000 patients. Participants in each trial are being randomized to weekly doses of 7.5 milligrams, 12.5 milligrams, 17.5 milligrams, or placebo. Primary endpoint of the VANQUISH trials is the percent change in body weight from baseline for participants receiving VK2735 as compared to placebo after 78 weeks of treatment. Secondary and exploratory endpoints will evaluate a range of additional safety and efficacy measures, including the percentage of patients who achieve at least 5%, 10%, 15%, and 20% weight loss. Each study will include an extension portion, allowing participants the opportunity to continue receiving treatment following completion of the primary dosing period, including patients who were randomized to placebo for the initial 78-week treatment period. Another important achievement during the first quarter for both the Vanquish 1 and Vanquish 2 studies was the successful introduction of an auto-injector device into the trials. As a reminder, both Vanquish 1 and Vanquish 2 were initiated using a vial and syringe for administration of VK2735. In the fourth quarter of 2025, Biking conducted a bioequivalent study to facilitate the introduction of an autoinjector, which we believe will add optionality to treatment and may represent a more convenient method of administration for patients. This study was successfully completed, and in the first quarter of 2026, participants in both Vanquish studies began transitioning to the autoinjector device. device. This transition has been proceeding smoothly, and we are very pleased to now have both vanquish studies advancing with our state-of-the-art auto-injector. I would now like to provide an update on Viking's oral tablet formulation of VK2735. I referenced a moment ago that we believe the auto-injector device in our subcutaneous vanquish studies will provide optionality in treatment. The concept of optionality is becoming increasingly important based on our conversations with physicians and KOLs about treatment regimens. Every patient's weight loss journey is unique, and we consistently hear from healthcare providers about the need for flexible treatment and administration options. We have long believed that an oral tablet formulation has the potential to be an attractive option for those who prefer to initiate treatment with an oral therapy or for those seeking to maintain the weight loss they have already achieved via weekly injection. Providing this optionality has been an important driver for the development of our oral program. Given the recent success of another oral peptide for obesity, we are even more optimistic about the promise of oral administration. Viking's prior Phase I and Phase II studies evaluating oral VK2735 successfully achieved their objectives. In addition to excellent safety and tolerability, our Phase I study demonstrated dose-dependent reductions in mean body weight from baseline, ranging up to 8.2% after 28 daily doses. In addition, the Phase II Venture Oral Dosing study of VK2735 achieved its primary and secondary endpoints, with participants receiving once-daily doses of the tablet formulation, demonstrating statistically significant reductions in mean body weight after 13 weeks, ranging up to 12.2% from baseline. Statistically significant differences compared to both baseline and placebo were observed for all doses above 15 milligrams, starting at week one and continuing throughout the 13-week treatment period. Up to 80% of subjects in VK2735 treatment groups achieved at least 10% weight loss after 13 weeks, compared with only 5% of placebo-treated subjects. The tablet formulation of VK2735 also demonstrated encouraging safety and tolerability through 13 weeks of once-daily dosing. The vast majority, 98%, of drug-related treatment-emergent adverse events were characterized as mild or moderate in severity. Importantly, in the dose range we plan to explore in future studies, studies, we believe the data show no meaningful difference in GI-related adverse events between subjects treated with VK2735 and placebo. The tolerability data from the Venture Oral Dosing Study also suggests that future titration regimens starting at lower doses and utilizing longer titration intervals are likely to further improve oral VK2735's tolerability profile. As with our subcutaneous program, following the completion of the Venture Oral Dosing Study, we held an end of Phase II meeting with the FDA. Based on feedback from this meeting, the company plans to advance oral VK2735 into Phase III development for the treatment of obesity. We currently expect to initiate this program in the fourth quarter of this year, and will provide more details on study design at that time. As part of our goal to create an optimal treatment experience for patients on their weight loss journey, Viking is actively engaged with KOLs, health care providers, and advocates who are focused on improving the lives of those living with obesity. Through these relationships, we have the opportunity to listen to a range of stakeholders in the community and to work toward solutions that best meet their treatment needs. Viking's efforts at developing a novel maintenance dosing strategy emerged as a result of these conversations. In approaching how to best design a maintenance study, we considered the unique characteristics of the VK2735 molecule, namely its potency and unique PK profile. We believe these features may allow the development of maintenance regimens that utilize less frequent dosing than the weekly regimens used by existing agents. This could be an attractive option for those patients who have achieved their weight loss goals and are seeking to maintain that weight loss going forward. By using the same therapeutic agent for both the induction and the longer-term maintenance phase of weight management, we believe patients may experience reduced side effects compared with options that require switching between different therapeutic agents. By reducing side effects, we believe adherence to treatment may be improved, allowing patients to ultimately realize the long-term benefits of weight loss and maintenance, including improving improved cardiovascular health, enhance physical function, and increase quality of life. With these goals in mind, in the fourth quarter of 2025, we initiated a phase one study to explore a range of maintenance dosing regimens. In this study, all subjects will receive initial weekly doses of VK2735, followed by a transition to a range of maintenance regimens or placebo. The objectives of the study are to evaluate the safety, tolerability, and pharmacokinetic profile of VK2735 under these various regimens. Exploratory endpoints will assess the change in body weight from baseline, as well as the change in body weight from the time of transition to the end of the study. The timing of this study is particularly important to our broader development program, as we We believe the results from these maintenance regimens could be utilized in the upcoming 52-week Vanquish Extension studies. As a result of this timing and the importance of selecting doses for immediate use in the subcutaneous extension studies, we have bifurcated the study to focus first on the subcutaneous maintenance cohorts, followed by the oral maintenance cohorts. To this end, we've expanded the number of subcutaneous dosing arms in this study from four to eight. This increase in cohorts will provide a broad and robust data set from which to choose for inclusion in the Vanquish Extension Study. Following the completion of the subcutaneous maintenance cohorts, we will continue the study to evaluate a similarly wide range of oral cohorts. We expect to report the results of the subcutaneous portion of the study in the third quarter of this year and expect to report the oral maintenance results in the first half of next Moving to our other pipeline programs, Viking is also evaluating a series of novel agonists of the amylin receptor. Early data demonstrate that activation of the amylin receptor is an important potential mechanism for regulating appetite and body weight, making this program an excellent addition to our obesity franchise. In 2025, we made significant progress with our lead amylin agonist, VK3019, and we recently filed an IND for this program. Pending clearance, we expect to initiate a Phase I clinical trial for VK3019 later this As VK2735 advances through Phase III development and toward potential approval and commercialization, we continue to thoughtfully grow our organization to meet the opportunities and challenges that lie in the not-too-distant future. Key recent additions to our team include staffing across a range of scientific and operational roles, including supply chain management, manufacturing, and quality. To coalesce these functions into an efficient and effective commercialization strategy, the company announced in the first quarter the appointment of Neil Abichon as its first chief commercial officer. Neil brings to Viking more than 20 years of industry experience, including nearly 17 years at Eli Lilly. He has held leadership roles across global commercial and marketing functions in the cardiometabolic space, making him uniquely qualified to lead our commercial strategy for VK2735. We are excited to have him on board to lead this critical operation. As always, Viking remains vigilant in managing the company's balance sheet to ensure we're able to successfully execute our objectives. As Greg reported a few minutes ago, the company held approximately $600 million in cash at the end of the first quarter, which allows us to reach important corporate milestones, ones, including the completion of our ongoing phase three obesity trials, as well as to pursue development of our additional programs. In conclusion, I'm happy to report that the advances and momentum of 2025 have continued through the first quarter of 2026. Looking ahead, we plan to have both our subcutaneous and oral VK2735 programs in phase three registration trials during the year. Our maintenance dosing trial continues, and we look forward to reporting data from this study in the third quarter. With respect to our earlier stage pipeline, we expect to initiate a phase one trial for our amylin agonist, VK3019, shortly. Operationally, as our programs continue to progress toward potential approval and commercialization, our organization continues to evolve as well. Our team is focused on executing a timely and strategic expansion plan that ensures that Viking has the partnerships, vendors, and in-house expertise required to succeed in all areas, including clinical, regulatory, manufacturing, and commercialization. And finally, we expect to offer industry-leading options with respect to administration, dosing, and maintenance that physicians and patients need to optimize the path to individual weight loss goals and long-term health. We look forward to reporting our advances on these fronts in the coming months. This concludes our prepared comments for today. Thanks for joining, and we'll now open the call for questions.

Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer session. To ask a question, you may press the star and one on your touchtone telephone. If you're using a speakerphone, please pick up your handset before pressing the keys. If at any time your question has been addressed and you would like to withdraw your question, please press star and two. Please note that we have a large number of participants in the queue. The company will do its best to answer as many questions as possible. We will wait for a moment as we assemble our roster. We have the first question from the line of Steve Seedhouse from Cantor. Please go ahead.

Great. Good afternoon. Thank you so much. First is just on the change from four to eight sub-Q maintenance cohorts in the ongoing study. I was hoping you could just elaborate on what, like, doses and intervals the new eight cohorts. are testing. And then also, if you wouldn't mind just quickly commenting on R&D just for our modeling, maybe connecting the dots between the like 160 million-ish or so net loss versus about 100 million in net cash change. And I think folks specifically were expecting R&D to come down a bit this quarter from some one-time phase three startup costs. So I just would hope if you could clarify if you're expecting R&D costs to come down next quarter or if this is maybe the new run rate. Thank you.

Thanks, Steve. This is Brian. I'll take the clinical question, Greg will take the cash question. So on the maintenance study, just given the importance of this study for implementation into the Vanquish extensions, we decided to extend the cohorts and then defer the oral dosing to a second part. So we'll retain those first four cohorts that we had earlier, which were 22.5, 20, 17.5 MIGs monthly, as well as 7.5 MIGs every other week. But we've added 15 monthly, 10 monthly, 10 every other week, and 5 every other week. So, we got a nice range of every other week and a broader range of monthly doses.

Yeah, and Steve, on the OPEX and cash, for one, the disconnect on that a bit is really timing, a function of timing, there just were, you know, higher expenses than cash usage and, you know, that stuff evens out over time. But over the looking ahead and this next quarter, I think our cash usage and expense will be, around where we were in quarter one, maybe a bit lower. But toward the second half of this year, I would expect things to taper down a little bit. So the overall usage is still in line with our projections from our last call. And we would anticipate having cash into 28 and through the catalysts we've talked about, including the oral phase three data points. So we remain funded as we expected, but we probably used a little bit more in the first quarter than I anticipated, but we are on track.

Thanks so much.

Thanks, Steve.

Thank you. We have the next question from the line of Thomas Smith from Leering Partners. Please go ahead.

Hi, this is for Thomas Smith. We have a couple of questions. So the first one, now that both Vanquish 1 and Vanquish 2 are fully enrolled, what baseline characteristics are you seeing and are they consistent with your expectations? Are you seeing any differences in enthusiasm, or retention between Vanquish 1 and Vanquish 2, and you have a follow-up.

Yeah, sure. So we're actually going to present the baseline demographics at two conferences this year. I think in the European Congress of Obesity, we'll have the Vanquish 1 demographics, and then at EASD, we'll have Vanquish 2 demographics. So I'll defer to those conferences for the demographic disclosures, but I don't think I don't think anything's kind of out of the ordinary with respect to the population relative to other studies. They're kind of down the middle of the fairway. Got it.

Oh. Yeah. And the second one, like, how should investors think about the expected weight loss in type 2 diabetic versus non-diabetic obesity patients?

Oh. Hard to know. No, it's up to the individual investor to make that, you know, estimation. But generally, type 2 patients are a little bit more resistant to weight loss than non-type 2 patients. So, I don't think that would be surprising to see in the weight loss data from these I think, you know, probably see a more robust effect in the straight obesity and maybe a little bit lower efficacy in type 2 diabetics, just like everybody else has shown.

And finally, on the phase 3 initiation of oral BK2035, which is now expected in 4Q26, what changed versus prior expectation for 3Q26?

Nothing really changed. You know, we're moving incredibly fast and scaling up dramatically here. And, you know, as you do that, you learn a lot about the process and efficiencies. You know, making 100 tablets is different than making a million tablets. And so you learn a little bit more about engineering processes and et cetera that get optimized along the way just to ensure you got the most efficient and cost-effective methods in place. And all that takes some time. We feel good about the supply chain and the capacity and efficiencies and where we're at in the development cycle, so I look forward to initiating as early as possible in the fourth quarter.

Thank you, David. Very helpful.

Thanks. Thank you. We have the next question. Line of Michaels from Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.

Good afternoon. Thanks for taking the question. Maybe just to follow up on the maintenance study, you know, obviously you're testing a number of different regimens, sub-q, oral, et cetera. Just curious, you know, early in the study if you're getting a sense of, you know, which one of those options that's sort of resonating most with the patients and, you know, could it be the monthly dosing or is that wrong interpretation?

Oh, yeah, you know, we're not really getting that level of feedback, Mike, and it would It would be hard to interpret because it's a placebo-controlled study, but we made the addition of the sub-Q cohorts before anybody had transitioned to the maintenance setting, so no one had actually entered into the oral maintenance portion. We made the decision and expanded the sub-Q portions. We'll do the oral then in a separate part of the study.

Got it. Very helpful.

Thanks, Mike. Thank you. We have the next question, the line of Ryan Deschner from Raymond James. Please go ahead.

Hi, thanks for the question.

What were the key factors I went into selecting the 19-week period as the sub-q induction time period for the maintenance study? Can I have a follow-up?

Yeah, thanks, Ryan. It was really driven by the time to titrate to the 22.5 mg dose. That was the highest dose, and we wanted to put people – first get people up there, and then keep them there for, I think it's a three-week treatment time there, and then transition everybody to the maintenance at the same time point. So that was sort of the rate-limiting factor, the time it took to titrate to the highest dose.

And I guess just wanted to kind of feel out what the odds might be of, would you add in additional oral cohorts potentially later on in the maintenance study? Is that something that could be on the table?

Yes, absolutely. Great question. Yeah, we will be adding more cohorts to the oral portion of the study, so we'll probably look at a few more doses as well as potentially alternative regimens.

Thanks, Brian. Thanks, Ryan.

Thank you. We have a next question from the line of Anna Milsimimi from Stifel. Please go ahead.

Hi. Thanks for taking my question. So obviously with the addition of new cohorts or maintenance studies seems to have gotten a little bit more involved. And I guess I'm trying to figure out what the various possibilities are for that extension trial. Are you going to select one of these cohorts? Are you going to give the option for multiple cohorts going into the extension study? Like, what is the purpose of having all these eight additional cohorts? I'm just trying to understand exactly what you intend to do with these cohorts going forward. Is it just for information purposes and their selection in the extension study? And then, I guess, taking it forward, are you going to develop it any further past this extension study for possible inclusion in the label, or is it just developing a wealth of data for physicians to draw on and sort of use the data as an art rather than a very prescriptive formula for maintenance for these patients?

Yeah, thanks, Anibal. Two great questions. I think with the second question, at a minimum, we would hope to be able to publish the extension information data from the Vanquish extension utilizing some of these maintenance cohorts. So that would provide valuable information in the form of publications to clinicians and patients. And what do we expect to learn from the maintenance cohorts? Really, the best maintenance strategy to employ, is every other week dosing preferable? It seems like a lot of people are doing that now just out in the real world. So, is monthly going to be the better strategy, and if so, what dose? And so, we had only three monthly doses and one every other week dose in the prior study, and so we thought to better inform the cohorts that would go into the extension of Vanquish, and there will be more than one dosing arm in the extension studies for maintenance in Vanquish. It just made sense to expand the sub-Q cohorts and then defer the oral since we weren't as time-sensitive on the oral to a separate part of the study.

Okay. So just to clarify, you will have a very defined set of cohorts in that extension study, drawing from this data, the Phase I data.

Oh, sure. Yeah, definitely. It will be multiple maintenance cohorts there that will be drawn from these data.

Thanks, Annabelle. We have the next question from the line of Brian, I'm in from Vypa-Sandler. Please go ahead.

Hi, guys. Thanks for taking my question. Brian, I guess just on the vanquished extension, when will the maintenance doses be introduced for the sub-Q? Will that be at week 78 or week 84? And how long will you be evaluating those sub-Q doses? And I guess just a follow-on question, you know, for the vanquished dose cohorts in the treatment phase of 7 1⁄2 and 12 1⁄2 weekly, how do you think about the transition of those patients to maintenance doses given the maintenance trials evaluating 15 milligrams weekly and higher in that 19-week induction period?

Yeah. Well, for the first question, we'll transition people at 78 weeks, won't be a sort of a washout or anything like that up to 84. And we plan to run the extension for 52 weeks. As far as the transition from 17.5 to whatever the maintenance dose might be, yeah, if you If you were to go from 17.5 to a higher 22.5 MIG dose, something like that, there could be some incremental adverse events. It's not really what you see after a prolonged exposure like this, but those would all be things that, you know, we'll find out during the trial.

Thanks, Miren.

We have the next question on the line of Jay Olson from Oppenheimer. Please go ahead.

Oh, hey, congrats on all the progress and thanks for taking the questions. Just to follow up on some of the factors that informed your decision to initiate the Phase III oral study in the fourth quarter, did you want to see the results of the Phase I maintenance study in the third quarter before starting the Phase III oral study in the fourth quarter, or were there other factors involved? And then we also had a question on 3019, can you just talk about your plans for the Phase I AMLIN program, or are you thinking about induction, maintenance, combination? I guess what's kind of on the table there for your AMLIN program?

Yeah, thanks, Jay. For the oral study, no, we weren't planning to wait for the data. They're just independent factors, the maintenance data and the initiation of the oral studies. They were not related. With the 3019 molecule, the first study will be, you know, before you think about combos and that sort of thing, first you want to understand the compound's basic properties. And so the first two studies will be a SAD study and then a MAD study. We are initiating combo talks with the 2735 compound. So longer term, I think that's a really promising area to look at. But the initial studies will just be single agent. And it'd be kind of the playbook we used for 2735 with a SAD followed by a 28-day MAD. And, you know, nice opportunity with this mechanism to, you know, potentially target people who are, you know, the lower BMI, you know, 32 to 34, 35, or people who can't, maybe can't tolerate the GLP-1 and want to try something different. But both are, you know, very significant opportunities for the AMLIN program.

Great, thank you. Thanks, Jay.

Thank you. We have the next question from Andy from William Blair. Please go ahead.

Yeah, thanks for taking our question. Just for the extensive portion of the Vanquish study, I'm curious about maybe the patient's ability to select, just given the open-label nature of the study, and also do you allow patients to maybe down titrate if they're at a higher, you know, monthly dose, or up titrate if they actually see be like a weight regain, just maybe from a practical protocol-related information.

Yeah, thanks, Andy. Great question. It's not really an open-label study. And so people, if you were on placebo, you will be randomized to active agent, but you You don't know which dose level you'll be at. And we're not going to, I think, discuss many design details otherwise until we actually start the study, but you can imagine some people staying on their current therapy and some people transitioning maybe to a maintenance regimen. So different groups of people might be randomized to different cohorts. I think it's a very elegant and nice study design, but we probably won't discuss too many details until we actually start it.

Got it. That's helpful. Thank you.

Thanks, Andy.

Thank you. We have the next question from the line of Roger Song from Jeffries. Please go ahead.

Great. Thanks for taking the question. Can you put a final point on the vanquish, the extension regimen from the maintenance data you will report? I understand that you want to expend every two weeks dosing. And then it does fail to say you want to pick one for monthly, one for every two weeks. And then how much delta among those dosing regimen that you will pick multiple within those two frequencies?

Thanks, Roger. Yeah, so I think more generally, we want to select the most effective arms and doses, so not wedded to a certain number of every other week or a certain number of monthlies, is just whatever seems to be the most effective. So we would look at, you know, multiple arms to come forward, and those would be based on whatever seems to look best in this initial, you know, 102 maintenance study.

Would that be all, Mr. Roger?

Yeah, that's it.

Thank you. Thanks, Roger.

We have the next question line of William Wood from B. Riley Securities. Please go ahead.

Hi, thanks for taking my questions and very nice progress you've been making. So two from us, one up front and then a follow-up, I'm just curious in terms of your maintenance trial with the additions of the new sub-Q and then also sounds like the new additions of the oral, should we expect any delay in timing throughout the third quarter, maybe from the beginning to the end? And or should we expect sort of multiple data cuts throughout the third quarter in terms of, you know, whether it's at the 19-week and then the final maintenance or we'll get the sub-Q first and then the oral, maybe just to clarify on that and then have a follow-up.

Yeah, thanks William. It'll probably be two data releases, one for the sub-Q cohorts and then subsequently for the oral cohorts, but the sub-Q will be in the third quarter, and we don't anticipate there being a substantial difference in the timing for the data to be available. Maybe a little bit, but nothing significant.

Right. That's very helpful. And then on your VK3019, you've mentioned in the past that that asset has shown better efficacy or potentially weight loss than your 27309, 27305, at least pre-clinically. I was curious if you could provide some of those comparative parameters of the two drugs, maybe C-Max, T-Max, or Half-Life, or even weight loss, understanding it all be pre-clinical and how this might have compared to, you know, to Zepatide or even P. or Amelins, if you've done any of those studies, just sort of trying to get a better understanding of what stood out on this particular asset that decided for you to bring it to the clinic. Thank you.

Thanks, William. And unfortunately, I don't carry a lot of those data around in my head. There's too much other junk up there. But it was very potent on the receptors, very good PK profile that would be amenable to weekly dosing, we think, and that marries up nicely with the 2735 PK profile. Now, when we looked at data in rodents, it seemed to be, you know, better than Cagrillantide. When we looked in obese monkeys, it seemed to provide better weight loss than VK2735. But I don't have those numbers off the top of my head, these are just general comments.

Great. Thank you.

Thanks, William. Thank you. We have the next question, the line of Haradeh Parikh from JP Morgan. Please go ahead.

Hey, thank you very much for the updates today. Just a couple questions on the oral program. So just one is I know in the past you've talked about you're working on reducing the number of tablets you'd have to take out a dose. I was wondering if you have any updates there on where you are in that progress. And then just a high-level question on, you know, you mentioned the launch of another oral peptide. Just what are your takeaways from that launch in terms of just what it says about the overall market and then the role of oral peptides in general? Thank you.

Yeah. So we would want to have no more than two tablets as the higher dose option. Lower doses would be one tablet. So in the Phase II trial, everybody took four tablets, and the feedback we received was that's just people weren't real satisfied with that. So no more than two tablets. And, you know, we generally don't comment too much about competitive dynamics, but I think the launch of the current oral peptide has been very robust, And it supports, you know, this real, I think, high interest level in the oral modality. And interestingly, it's represented more of a market expansion than any sort of a cannibalization of the injectable market. So it's been, I think, a very, very impressive launch. And Neil Avichon is our chief commercial officer. He's here as well. Neil, do you have any additional color on that?

Yeah, Brian, I think you characterized it well. Hi, Hardig. This is Neil here. Yeah, I think what we're seeing is this is growing the market, so it just goes to show that there's, you know, significant opportunities still. It's too early to comment on the latest launch. I think it's just several weeks in, so, you know, we wouldn't comment on it anyway, but it's awfully early. It's going to be quite competitive dynamic between these two companies, as you would expect. The only thing I would also just remind you is that, you know, both the worlds on the market our GLP-1s, where ours is going to be a dual agonist aural, so we expect to have the first dual agonist aural on the market, and I don't know if that's fully appreciated by folks in the ecosystem, so we're pretty excited about the opportunity for aural.

Great, thank you.

Thanks, Radek.

Thank you. We have a next question from the line of Yale-Gen from Ladler and Company. Please go ahead.

Good afternoon, and thanks for taking the question. In terms of the vanquish expansion study itself, would that also include both vanquish 1 and vanquish 2 in terms of the type 2 diabetes patients, as well as if you would incorporate some maintenance regimen into those in that study? Would that also include the type 2 diabetes patients as well?

Yes, it will.

That's very helpful.

Thanks, Jim.

Thank you. As we're nearing the conclusion of today's call, our final question will come from Jeet Mukherjee from BTIG. Please go ahead.

Hey, this is Blake on for Jeet. Thanks for taking the question. In regards to the sub-key maintenance data coming in the third quarter, what does good look like to you guys? And are you comfortable reporting a modest regain? If so, is there a bar to standard that qualifies as weight for retention? Thanks.

Yeah, thanks, Blake. It's a good question. You know, I guess the way we look at it is best case scenario is you see a continuation of weight loss when you transition to the maintenance regimen, just the slope might change a little bit. I think our base case is, which is a great outcome, is just the real maintenance, you a few percent either way, up or down. And then the worst case would be you see a sharp rebound. So, you know, those are kind of the general scenarios that we're looking at. And I think a flatlining or relatively flat after the transition would be a really great outcome for us.

Would that be all, Jeet? Yep, thank you. Thank you.

This concludes our Koshnatta session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Stephanie Dyes for any closing remarks.

Thank you again for your participation and continued support of Viking Therapeutics. We look forward to updating you again in the coming months. Have a good afternoon.

Thank you. The conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation.