Verona Pharma plc (NASDAQ:VRNA) Q3 2022 Earnings Conference Call November 9, 2022 9:00 AM ET

Company Participants

David Zaccardelli – Chief Executive Officer

Mark Hahn – Chief Financial Officer

Kathy Rickard – Chief Medical Officer

Chris Martin – Senior Vice President-Commercial

Conference Call Participants

Suji Jeong – Jefferies

Boobalan Pachaiyappan – H.C. Wainwright

Tom Shrader – BTIG

Operator

Welcome to Verona Pharma's, Third Quarter 2022 Financial Results and Operating Highlights Conference Call. At this time all participants are in a listen-only mode.

Earlier this morning Verona Pharma issued a press release announcing its financial results for the three months ended September 30, 2022. A copy can be found in the Investor Relations tab on the corporate website, www.veronapharma.com.

Before we begin, I'd like to remind you that during today's call, statements about the company's future expectations, plans and prospects are forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements are based on management's current expectations. These statements are neither promises nor guarantees and involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other important factors that may cause our actual results, performance or achievements to be materially different from our expectations, expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements. Any such forward-looking statements represent management's estimates as of the date of this conference call. While the company may elect to update such forward-looking statements at some point in the future, it disclaims any obligations to do so, even if subsequent events cause its views to change.

As a reminder, this call is being recorded and will remain available for 90 days.

I’d now like to turn the call over to Dr. David Zaccardelli, Chief Executive Officer. Dr. Zaccardelli, the floor is yours sir.

David Zaccardelli

Thank you, and welcome everyone to today's call. With me today are Mark Hahn, our Chief Financial Officer; Dr. Kathy Rickard, our Chief Medical Officer; and Chris Martin, our Senior Vice President of Commercial.

It's been another quarter of solid progress and execution for Verona Pharma. During the third quarter, we announced positive, top line results from our Phase 3 ENHANCE-2 clinical trials of nebulized ensifentrine for the maintenance treatment of COPD. And we are looking forward to the top line data readout of ENHANCE-1 trial expected around the end of this year. We have significantly strengthened our financial position with access up to approximately $400 million, including our upsized $150 million equity operating in August and $150 million debt financing facility with Oxford Finance in October. The non-dilutive $150 million debt facility replaces the existing $30 million facility with Silicon Valley Bank and is available upon achievement of certain clinical and regulatory milestones and other conditions. We expect these funds to extend our cash runway through at least the end of 2025, supporting the ongoing pre-commercialization activities and the planned future commercial launch of ensifentrine in the United States.