Conference Transcript - ZLDPF 2026-06-09

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

Good afternoon, everyone. Thanks for joining us. My name is Rajan Sharma, European Farmer and Biotech Analyst here at Goldman Sachs. Very pleased to have Zeeland Farmer with us and Adam Steensberg, CEO. Adam, thank you. Thanks for joining. I know that you've been on the road with ADA, so thanks for adding on this to the trip. Pleased to be here. Lots to get through, and obviously we're coming off the back of ADA, so maybe that's a good place to start. There are a few updates there, both with Cervagy Tide and Petrolintide. Could you maybe just start with Cervagy Tide because that was kind of the more or the newer update that we got over the weekend and just provide your thoughts on the data?

Adam Steensberg, CEO

Absolutely, and as you said, I've just spent almost a week around at ADA and it was a really, you can say, positive experience coming out of ADA and kicking off Friday with a symposium on Amelyn and really starting to change the conversations from how we get to the maximum tolerated doses more towards how do you get to the minimum effective doses when you think about treating obesity. So there's a quite significant change in the ecosystem right now, now that we start to see more modalities approaching the market. And specifically with Boehringer being the CEO of Sielan, And I was, of course, extremely pleased to see the strong presence they had at the conference, probably being one of the biggest sponsors and having this very strong presence around C, obesity, and think liver. And as you also said, they presented data Sunday, which really speaks to the strength of cervidotide being liver, fat, and visual fat-targeted therapies, which also showed signs of preserving muscles to a larger extent than what we have seen before. with other molecules. So I was actually very pleased with the profile and also with, you know, seeing how the Berger management team, their excitement around it. When we think about the top-line data that was released both on weight loss and tolerability, you know, I was also a little bit surprised to see that somewhat higher level of vomiting and discontinuation than what I had expected from the study. But at the session, we learned that Boehringer had applied a very strict titration protocol where they did not allow people in the trial to kind of personalize the titration, and they did also not allow for de-escalation once you have reached the higher doses. So, you know, we know that from any other trial that if you don't allow for flexibility in the titration, then people have side effects on the GLP-1. So that was a little bit of a surprise to me that that was a study design that was chosen. Investigators indicated that that was based on some regulatory interactions. What I would say, however, and what gives me a lot of confidence going beyond those headline numbers, is when I speak to the senior executives at Boehringer, they are very, very confident that they can, you can say, change this with a more personalized and modified situation scheme where they were allowed to go slower and also de-escalate once need be. And they, as you could also see in the release from them, have actually initiated studies now to help inform how to titrate cervidotide in a real-world setting, including also new studies in women's health and heart failure and what have you. So a very, very committed team, but also a little bit surprised to see that they have been so strict about titration.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

Just on that point on the titration, I remember at the presentation the presenter noted that the flexibility was added quite late in the trial, and that's going to be kind of informing future programs. So are you aware in Synchronize 2, for example, is the flexibility in the trial? So could that be a trial which shows better tolerability, and similarly with the leverage program, which will be important for MASH?

Adam Steensberg, CEO

Yes, so we don't have the insights. It was implemented into these studies once Berger started to discover that they had issues with dropout rates, And apparently, when you listen to the investigators, it had a meaningful impact. For some of these studies, it was perhaps too late to have an impact. What the investigators indicated, I think, at the conference, was that the leverage studies, which was started later, I think they were running with the flexible titration schedule from the start. And there they felt that the issues with tolerability had been addressed. So, I mean, and of course, I don't have all the detailed data. The Boehringer team have it, and they feel extremely comfortable around being able to address this. And that gives me a lot of confidence as the molecule moves forward. But really being a molecule that targets us, I think the biggest, you know, you can say desire for when you're engaging in weight loss, that is you should not focus about who can get the highest weight loss, but who can get the most metabolic benefits out of the reasonable weight loss.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

Okay. And just on the piece, and you mentioned around sort of liver fat and visceral fat, and even body composition, to what extent is that important to both physicians and patients? Because I know, again, at the conference, there was some debate around the whole body composition piece and the extent to which that is important in clinical practice. So what's your take there?

Adam Steensberg, CEO

I think it's, you know, easy to think about that for the physicians, it's extremely important that you lose the right amount of fat because as a physician, you know that it's the visual fat, it's the fat in the liver that cause all the negative health consequences of living with obesity. It's a driver for a physician to target that weight loss towards bad fat, if you will, and protect somewhat, especially the muscles, but actually also subcutaneous fat. One thing, if we think about people living with obesity who start on a weight loss journey, we know for a long time there's a big concern around losing muscles when you embark on a weight loss journey. And here we saw data, I would say, which showed only that 10% of the weight loss was driven by muscle, which is a very different number than the 30% we have seen with other molecules. So that could speak directly to, you can say, the patients really wanting to protect their muscles when they engage in a weight loss journey. The other thing which I think will also play into the patient experiences is that we see a lot of patients stopping taking the higher doses of the currently available DRP-1s because they don't want to lose too much facial fat and subcutaneous fat. And that's, again, with Cervilatide, where it's targeted visceral and liver fat, I think we actually have a product that will speak directly to being able to have a modest weight loss, lose the right fat, the bad fat, and protect your facial fat, for instance, so you don't get that you can say expression where people start to feel they look even older.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

And obviously as a company you know the GLP-1 space pretty well as well, given your history there. And when you look at the server-GTide data and that sort of LRA to discontinuations and the nausea, do you think that's driven by the GLP-1 component of server-GTide, or is that additional sort of AEs being driven by the glycogen component?

Adam Steensberg, CEO

I think it's driven by GLP-1, and I think there's not a single GLP-1 out there or in development which would not deliver the same amount of GI side effects and dropouts if you were as strict as Boehringer initially were in these studies. We know that these drugs are being personalized. Also in the real world, I mean, there are very few physicians who would prescribe a currently approved GD1 according to label because they know they're reasonable, both from a side effect profile, but also if you think about this, you don't want to lose for it too fast. So we are, from the real world, we are starting to learn to dose much, much more slow with these molecules, and that is what Berger is now addressing in an upcoming Phase 3 study to really inform how to use and how to titrate this product in the real world.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

Okay. Maybe thinking a little bit more positively on Servo, the MASL data I thought was pretty impressive. Could you, again, just kind of provide your perspective there and help us put that into context relative to the other GLP-1s?

Adam Steensberg, CEO

But I think I started saying that that is really what impressed me. And remember, they achieved these data even during the constraints of the study that we just discussed. So that makes it even more impressive. We saw livers that went from 30% fat content to 2% fat content in the presentation. And this is really the holy grail of trying to promote metabolic health and help people living with obesity having a better metabolic condition. And if you then think about that Boehringer is also investing in likely the largest studies ever conducted in MASL, so we have liver rates 1 and 2, which address both F2 and 3, but also cirrhotic patients, that gives Boehringer a very, very strong value proposition for their, for cervirotide being, you know, if you're an obese individual, there's a 65% chance that you also have excessive fat in your liver, and there's a chance if you live with that condition for a long time, it will develop into later stage, end-stage liver diseases. So why not treat the liver? Also knowing today that most patients are not interested in that very high weight loss. So if you're a person who looks for 12% to 15% weight loss and you can target that weight loss to liver health, liver fat, that's a strong value proposition.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

Okay. And then if you think about utilization, and obviously that's up to Boehringer in terms of the commercialization as opposed to yourselves, but you will need to think about commercializing petrolintide. So how would you sort of think about the potential population that cervidutide might be relevant for in obesity as opposed to in mash?

Adam Steensberg, CEO

Yeah, but it's relevant for patients who can tolerate a DRP1. And it's, of course, when you're a prescriber, it's relevant for patients where you want to really target that liver-specific weight loss, which could translate into very, very significant metabolic benefits, because the liver is actually where a lot of the risk markers for cardiovascular disease arise that comes from CROP, lipids, et cetera. That is from the liver, so you may actually consider a product like cervirotide could ultimately provide more metabolic benefit. can it also address ectopic fat in other organs and thus helping organs even more than the indirect effects of a weight loss. So I think it's really a product that speaks directly into the metabolic health, those who seek metabolic health more than just weight loss. And the narrative that we have been promoting for quite some years, and I've called it to stop the weight loss in limbics because the observation in the real world is that patients don't care about that highest weight loss number. We have for a long time as an industry been pushing towards that biotic surgery weight loss, not realizing that most patients are not in for it and very few actually are offered biotic surgery historically. Patients seem to be looking for that 10% to 15% weight loss. And if CERBO can deliver that but generate significant more metabolic health, that's a very sharp value proposition. And, you know, that gives me a lot of confidence in Boehringer also pushing that narrative forward as one of the highly differentiated D2-1 options out there.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

One of the other things I thought was interesting about that study was the fact that up to 15% of patients on the placebo arm were actually receiving a GLP-1 therapy and got access. So there's probably a good segue into PETRI as well. How do you think about controlling that in a clinical trial? And is that just a challenge that the industry faces from here?

Adam Steensberg, CEO

I think it's likely the highest number we have seen thus far, but I think it's things we need to get used to deal with in clinical trial readouts in the future because there's a lot of patients, number one, who have already been exposed to therapy and thus, you can say, have had initial weight losses, and therefore you may not be able to expect the same degree of weight loss in the future study environment. The other thing is when people find out that they are on placebo, which is quite easy when you're in a GILT-1 study, then you have patients who then turn to use GLP-1s. And it was a high number in this study, which also drew up the placebo effect for the study. But I think we need to be used to kind of find ways to look at the data despite the fact of these differences and how many patients decide to utilize a GLP-1. It very much depends on also which sites you go to. It's clear that it's a larger phenomenon in the U.S. because you have easier access to GLP-1s than in, for instance, Europe and other places of access to alternative channels, if you will. So it's something we as an industry will have to deal with. It's something we will have to discuss with FDA how to handle. And, of course, when we ultimately view data, we need to take those differences into account.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

And at some point, do you expect that the standard way of running an obesity trial would be to use a GLP-1 or an over-approved medication in the control arm?

Adam Steensberg, CEO

I mean, that remains to be seen, but remember, if you add DL31 as a control arm, then it will not be blinded anymore because people will know what they are because of the side effects of DL31s. So it's not easy to just... There's not a one fix here. It's going to be a multitude of different things. But, of course, ultimately, head-to-head studies will be important to inform how to use these medications as we start to have more tools. We have to remind ourselves that today we only have kind of two very similar tools, which I would normally describe as a hammer and one which is a little bit bigger, and then some are trying to develop a sledgehammer. Once we start to have a full toolbox, of course, in a more mature market, we will start to see more head-to-head studies.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

Yeah, okay. And last one on Cervagetide, and I assume the sledgehammer is potentially retitutide that you're talking about. How do you think Cervagetide compares in a world where retitutide may also be on the market, given it has the gluten component and could have a liver benefit as well?

Adam Steensberg, CEO

Yeah, but that, of course, remains to be seen, how the two molecules play out when we start to see the clinical data. I think cervirotide, as Berger is arguing, and as we have been arguing for a long time, it has specifically been designed to address liver health, liver fat, not with the maximum weight loss in mind. So with the relative balance of an appropriate weight loss, which they released, we saw these fantastic data in liver health, getting fat out of the liver. So the relative balance between the G1 and gluabone component has to be shown how that, you can say, at different dose levels, contributes to a healthy liver for the different molecules. We are very, very, you can say, happy with the profile, the balance between weight loss and metabolic improvements that we see with servolotide and that Berger reported.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

Maybe we should move on to petrolintide. I'm conscious that we've already got through quite a lot of time. What were the key updates that you would highlight for bacterial insight at ADA? Obviously, we'd already seen the top-line data. What were the incremental new learnings, in your view?

Adam Steensberg, CEO

I mean, there's no question that ADA this year was kicked off with an ADA-sponsored symposium on amylin, where the presenters presented amylin as a logical new first-line therapy, as they would argue, why would you not start with the most benign treatment and only go to more cumbersome treatments if that first modality doesn't deliver what it's looking for. And specifically at that session, they also presented the different amylin analogs. And when patrinotide was mentioned with the double-digit weight loss and placebo-like tolerability, all of them said this is a natural first-choice therapy for a patient who starts a weight loss journey. And one of the presenters even kind of presented a hypothetical future treatment paradigm where amylines would be really the primary care product and the other ones would be reserved for the more complicated of these patients, which is actually speaking very much to how we have seen the field and how we have been developing petrinotide, not trying to go for the highest possible weight loss compromising on tolerability, but really going for that weight loss that we believe most patients are looking for, 10 to 15%, and then a placebo-like tolerability profile. And that is what we saw at ADA, and that the conversation is not only in the symposium but at the Congress in general, it was about tolerability. We need to find medicines and ways whereby patients can stay on therapy so we don't have these cycles all the time, on treatment, off treatment. That doesn't promote a lot of health if people get off treatment all the time. We need to develop tools that patients can stay on. What I would also say, and I think it's going to be a quite, you can say, influential ADA when people look back at this one because it's really my sense is that the obesity field at least has matured quite a lot in just coming compared to last year where we start to think about it like what has happened in other chronic therapy areas once you you always start to treat the most difficult to treat patients but as we mature we start to think about obesity prevention why is it we should wait until you have a body mass index of 45 why not start earlier and the other thing is why don't we start with the most benign therapy that has a high likelihood of giving you the weight dose you're looking for, just like patrinitide, and then only after that go to more cumbersome treatment. So that was a lot of the themes that we heard at ADA, and patrinitide just speaks directly into that value proposition.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

I guess to be sort of a definitive first-line therapy, part of that is also going to be outcome data, right? So is that a view that you share that you would need, whether it's cardiovascular or otherwise, that you need to demonstrate that there is a benefit beyond the weight loss to be able to justify that first-line use?

Adam Steensberg, CEO

Absolutely, over time. And we just have to remind ourselves that the reason that we as an industry are in this space is, of course, to promote health. So ultimately, we also need to show that in outcome studies. And there we have more data for the G2-1 class. But what I would say is that if you think in the life of a normal prescriber, They have, you know, their three main drivers for prescriptions, data, heart, and hassle. Data is about what is the weight loss you can deliver. And here we think we can actually deliver the weight loss that the majority of patients are looking for. Heart, that is, you have to believe you do something well for the patients. And when we look into the risk markers for cardiovascular disease and other organ diseases, they all go in the right direction. So at least there's a lot of belief that you can do something good until we deliver the proof in an outcome study. And hassle, with the tolerability profile that we have of Petroian side, we can remove the hassle that people are more and more aware of with the GLT-1s. It's a super cumbersome situation to prescribe GLT-1s because you have to engage with the patients, de-escalate, personalize every patient journey. That takes a lot of time in the clinics. And the minute we can offer something where it's an easy prescription, where you don't hear back from the patients until a few months later, and they can follow the prescription, we think that's going to be a major change. In our Phase II study, we had 98% of the patients who could follow the escalation steps without having to modify it. That you could not do with the other one. So, you know, the change could come very, very fast in the minds of both patients, but also prescribe us this first line of therapy.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

You mentioned the Phase II data. Can we talk a little bit around that? So I guess it's, you know, looking at the stock reaction, it's fair to say that the market is a little bit disappointed by the level of weight loss that Petrol Insight showed in that trial. Has that data set changed your view and your conviction? And I think you talked previously to sort of 15% to 20% weight loss long term. Do you think that's still achievable given what we've seen in Phase 2?

Adam Steensberg, CEO

The product that we are aiming to deliver now in Phase 3 is a product that delivers double-digit weight loss and with a placebo-like credibility. And what really impressed us with the Phase II data was that the tolerability profile was even better than what we saw in Phase I because we are using escalation every four weeks instead of every two weeks. And that is really what is important here, that is to deliver the most tolerable approach to deliver these double-digit weight loss. And I would argue, just as a lot of the key opinion leaders at ADA argue, that for any patient, it's a logical way to start your weight loss journey, to start on an amidine, in particular with betrinside, because it looks so benign. And if you're among the high responders, most patients will likely get to the weight loss target that they have. If you're in the middle range, some will get to the weight loss target they have. Others will have to add something. And if you're in the lower range, you should change to a different modality. So, you know, I'm not going to pursue the highest number. I'm going to pursue the product, which I think will be the natural starting point for any patient, and then, as importantly, a product which patients can decide to stay on, because it's really the biggest issue is that people stop taking the dear ones today, and so we don't get to persistency. It's also the way we have less than 20% on treatment after a year, which is a huge dilemma, because then we don't achieve the health that we are looking for. If I have a product that is terrible, that doesn't impact the way people want to live their lives, I believe they will decide to stay on that therapy. And for a company also, of course, it's the opportunity to unlock the value in this market if we manage to get patients to stay on therapy rather than just using it for a few months.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

Can we talk about the phase three as well in terms of what, I mean, expectations for the trial design? and I think you haven't necessarily publicly committed to higher doses for petrol inside in Phase III and looking at the tolerability profile that you talked to may justify that. So could you just help us understand your thinking there?

Adam Steensberg, CEO

Yes, so we are together with Rose, like fully focused on getting this Phase III study studies. These studies started here in the second half, so it's full on. We are, with both companies, is really, really putting a lot of efforts in to speed up and have a keen focus on getting to market as fast as possible. It's clear as we move into phase three, you should probably expect to see a different gender balance so we have more females in this study, which should, of course, provide higher numbers and also a study of a longer duration will add to that. When it comes to doses, we have not been, you can say, specific on the doses that we're going to forward take into phase three, but we have presented the maximum effective dose, which was in the mid-range, and I would say you should not expect us to utilize doses that are beyond what we tested in Phase 2 because our data suggests that we will not get additional benefits out of that. On the other hand, what the data also suggests is even if we dose very high, we don't see a change in the side effect profile, which gives us a very high confidence as we move forward that we will not pick up some strange signals in Phase 3. So with a high degree of confidence, we move forward. The profile of the drug is one which we believe will give double-digit weight loss and a placebo-like tolerability and really speak to that first-line therapy where any patient will start the journey.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

Okay. And then you also have the combination with CT3A, and I think there is an actual name for that one now. How should we think about that fitting in with petrolintide monotherapy?

Adam Steensberg, CEO

That was actually, you're right, When we partnered up with LIDOS, we made sure that we had equal financials and also equal development and commercialization, say, on both the monotherapy with Piturinatide but also the combination. And we're going to push the combination into Phase 2 here this summer, which is a rather large study of more than 400 patients to really explore what are the right ratios between amylin and GILV1-GIP, or Piturinatide and CD388. And you can say the outcome of that study is, of course, going to inform how we're going to dose it in Phase III in a fixed-dose single-container system. What I would highlight, and another highlight for me at least at this ADA, was also that Ross presented Phase II data from CD388, which, as we have kind of also assessed in our diligence when we partnered up, suggests that it's a very, very good tier-to-one TIP. So from a combination point of view, of course, it adds a lot of hope for us to be able to deliver something very special here.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

On the point of sort of the combination, Lily were obviously quite vocal in their kind of confidence in Elora Lintide at ADA as well and talked to kind of having potentially the biggest development in their company with multiple combinations. So how do you think about competitiveness of Petrolintide? Firstly, the monotherapy relative to a lauralintide, and then obviously the combination, given that they've already started or they're ahead in development with the tizepatide combination.

Adam Steensberg, CEO

For the monotherapy, we feel extremely comfortable. Because of all the things we've discussed here, it's not about winning the numbers games. It's about delivering a product that can give patients the weight loss they're looking for in the most benign way. And that we think, that profile is what we see with petriantide. But we're actually super happy to see that Lili is also moving forward with a monotherapy because then we can be two companies who are going to build a new category. It's not a small task to build a new category. And we personally believe that amylin is going to become a larger category for weight management because of that first line and that opportunity to actually have people to stay on therapy. When it comes to combination therapies, I actually also think we have the two strongest combinations. who would not like to combine the most tolerable amylin product with the most potentially efficacious GLP-1, DIP product. So, you know, as we approach development of the combination product, we have to be very smart about what we do here. People probably are aware of that an obese individual who also have type 2 diabetes, that could be a natural place for an amylin GLP-1 because GLP-1 is very strong on HbA1c, amylin less so. Amelite is very strong on weight loss in diabetes patients. GLP-1, less so. So that's a natural opportunity that people are aware of. The other thing, when you think about combination therapies going forward, it's good practice for medical doctors to only combine things that work. And we already know for the GLP-1s there are 15% of patients who don't get any benefits, so you don't want them in your combination study. So we need to be very smart as we start to think about what is the right product profile and who are the patients who are going to develop the combination if it's focused on highest weight loss. It also has to be patients who actually want to have a 30% weight loss that you enroll in your studies and not general people living with obesity because most are going for that 10% to 15%. So this is where you will see a lot of change in the clinical trial conduct in the coming years and in the marketplace as we start to have choices. We're going to move beyond that. Let's dose to the maximum tolerated dose. That is something you normally would do in oncology, not in chronic diseases, towards minimum effective doses and then combinations that can help people individualize their weight loss journeys.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

And then on timelines, excuse me, so the combination Phase 2 starting this summer, the monotherapy Phase 3 starting second half of the year, what is the sort of timelines for readouts of those trials and then ultimately what is your base case for launch?

Adam Steensberg, CEO

So we have not committed to that, and in the honor of the partnership, I will not be more, you can say, clear on timelines except to say that we are, as companies, hyper-focused on speed-to-market and then, of course, continue to invest to expand the label.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

And how do you execute around that in terms of hyper-focus on speed-to-market? Is there anything that you can do in the Phase 3? Is it rapid recruitment, or is it sort of...

Adam Steensberg, CEO

It's, of course, making sure, number one. And it's, of course, focusing on recruitment, but still making sure to get the right patients and enroll from the right centers. And then it's focused on getting to market with enough to get to market and then expand the label from there. So, and, yeah.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

Okay, and you haven't given us a timeline for launch, but when you launch in the market, what are your expectations for pricing within obesity?

Adam Steensberg, CEO

It's too early to come because it's so dynamic, as we all have witnessed in the past period. And, you know, I'm not more, as some have described it. I've seen companies try and find where patients are ready to contribute to paying. So we have almost half of the people being on treatment today that pay themselves. So you kind of try to put your price where. And that's back to if you're out of pocket, it's back to what is the value that the patient feels that they get out. So that's value-based pricing, just as you would do in consumer goods. When it comes to the traditional channels, it's again back to value, but that's, of course, more on what value do society see and so on. So we need to see the dynamics of the market. And then I just, again, have to say, as you launch a new category, that will carry its own pricing dynamics compared to existing categories. That's what we always see in other disease areas as well. So I cannot come and be more specific on pricing, but I think the key opportunity to unlock the value and where a petranetide will really hold the potential to unlock the value is to get patients to stay in therapy because then you also capture more value from each patient.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

And then the Zupreme 2 data set should be expected second half of this year, right? What are your expectations for what we should see there or what is the profile that you're hoping to see?

Adam Steensberg, CEO

You know, the general notion from, I think, everyone who works on amylin is that amylin may provide the same degree of weight loss in patients, in obese individuals who live with type 2 diabetes as in those who don't have type 2 diabetes. But the ones in general, you see 30% less weight loss in patients living with type 2 diabetes. So, of course, I look forward to see if the profile of the weight loss is similar to what we observed in patients who did not have diabetes. Okay.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

And, of course, I guess the tolerability will, you expect, still a placebo-like.

Adam Steensberg, CEO

I would hope to see, yeah.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

Just maybe in the last few minutes, just thinking about some of the commercials on the obesity side of things, we've obviously seen a very strong launch from the first oral GLP-1. How do you think about relevance of the injectable opportunity in the context of that launch?

Adam Steensberg, CEO

Yeah, but it's clear, to me at least, that all tiered ones do not address the biggest shortcomings of having lost your appetite. That is what we hear from patients is the biggest issue. But I guess what we're seeing right now is it may be expanding the number of patients who decide to get on a weight loss medication. With a focus on a novel category, as we are doing with petrinitide, it's actually an opportunity for us because there will be more patients who have been exposed to a tiered one and have experienced those side effects that most actually decide it's not for them because we have more patients who have tried a tier-to-one and decided never again than we have patients on a tier-to-one. So if anything, it will just expand the number of patients who have been exposed to a tier-to-one and can come and claim to their health care providers, I tried it, I don't want to do another tier-to-one, I want to try this novel modality when Petrinitide hopefully launch into the marketplace.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

And do you have a kind of internal estimate or expectation as to what the split may be between injectables and orals long-term in obesity?

Adam Steensberg, CEO

No. It's too early to say, and it's this fine compromise dilemma around, yes, orals sound simple, but we also know that compliance is very bad on orals in general versus an injectable every week. Once you've taken the first shot, actually many people find it more convenient to be an injectable. So it's very difficult to predict where this market will go with all the things that are changes. I have no question there will be a place also for the orals and for the injectables. And let's remember, we are so early into the treatment. We are four years into treatment of what I consider the biggest healthcare challenge of our time, and we are treating so few patients, so there will be plenty of room for growth for a lot of different opportunities.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

And then maybe just to touch on capital allocation, you obviously have very healthy financials post the deal with Roche, and you did announce a buyback with earnings earlier this year. Could you just talk through the rationale for the buyback and the timing?

Adam Steensberg, CEO

Absolutely. And, you know, we have a clear set of priorities when it comes to our capital allocation. Number one is petrinitide and maximizing the opportunity, investing as much as we can into petrinitide monotherapy, but also the combination product with CD388 and secure the strongest launch possible. Number two is to expand our research focus. We're actually going to spend five times as much in research in the coming five years as we did in the prior five years, so 800 million U.S. dollars. That is our second priority. including expanding a research footprint into Boston, Massachusetts. And then we had excess capital and decided to pay some back to investors in our share buyback program.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

Okay. I guess the fact that you think you have excess capital, does that mean that the Petrolintide Development Program is pretty much underpinned by the cash that you have?

Adam Steensberg, CEO

We have a clear path to profitability. That was a firm point for me when we did this deal. So I didn't want to be in a situation where I could not fund my half of the party.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

And then maybe in the last second, anything in the broader pipeline that you would highlight beyond, maybe even beyond obesity that may be underappreciated?

Adam Steensberg, CEO

Yeah, but we have two rare disease assets, one which we are going to resubmit to FDA later this year, could be on the market next year, and then another one which is currently enrolling in Phase 3. So those two programs could, of course, add significant value as we mature. they're not going to be the key focus for the company. The early pipeline how we mature that one including a phase one acid in a broad autoimmune opportunity these are some of the new value opportunities that we'd love to talk more about in the future as well.

Rajan Sharma, Analyst — Goldman Sachs

Brilliant. I look forward to hearing that. I think we're just at time so thank you very much Adam.