TREVENA INC - Annual Report: 2016 (Form 10-K)

 

UNITED STATES

SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION

Washington, D.C. 20549

 

 

FORM 10‑K

 

 

Commission File Number 001‑36193

 

Trevena, Inc.

(Exact Name of Registrant as Specified in Its Charter)

 

 

Registrant’s telephone number, including area code: (610) 354‑8840

 

Securities registered pursuant to Section 12(b) of the Act:

 

 

Securities registered pursuant to Section 12(g) of the Act: None

 

 

Indicate by check mark if the registrant is a well‑known seasoned issuer, as defined in Rule 405 of the Securities Act. Yes ☐  No ☒

 

Indicate by check mark if the registrant is not required to file reports pursuant to Section 13 or Section 15(d) of the Act. Yes ☐  No ☒

 

Indicate by check mark whether the registrant (1) has filed all reports required to be filed by Section 13 or 15(d) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 during the preceding 12 months (or for such shorter period that the registrant was required to file such reports), and (2) has been subject to such filing requirements for the past 90 days. Yes ☒  No ☐

 

Indicate by check mark whether the registrant has submitted electronically and posted on its corporate Web site, if any, every Interactive Data File required to be submitted and posted pursuant to Rule 405 of Regulation S‑T (§ 232.405 of this chapter) during the preceding 12 months (or for such shorter period that the registrant was required to submit and post such files). Yes ☒  No ☐

 

Indicate by check mark if disclosure of delinquent filers pursuant to Item 405 of Regulation S‑K is not contained herein, and will not be contained, to the best of the registrant’s knowledge, in definitive proxy or information statements incorporated by reference in Part III of this Form 10‑K or any amendment to this Form 10‑K. ☒

 

Indicate by check mark whether the registrant is a large accelerated filer, an accelerated filer, a non‑accelerated filer, or a smaller reporting company. See the definitions of “large accelerated filer,” “accelerated filer,” and “smaller reporting company” in Rule 12b‑2 of the Exchange Act.:

 

 

Indicate by check mark whether the registrant is a shell company (as defined in Rule 12b‑2 of the Exchange Act). Yes ☐  No ☒

 

The aggregate market value of the voting stock held by non‑affiliates of the registrant, as of June 30, 2016, the last business day of the registrant’s most recently completed second fiscal quarter, was approximately $218.2 million. Such aggregate market value was computed by reference to the closing price of the Common Stock as reported on the NASDAQ Global Select Market on June 30, 2016. For purposes of making this calculation only, the registrant has defined affiliates as including only directors and executive officers and shareholders holding greater than 10% of the voting stock of the registrant as of June 30, 2016.

 

The number of shares of the registrant’s Common Stock outstanding as of March 3, 2017 was 57,129,584.

 

DOCUMENTS INCORPORATED BY REFERENCE

 

Portions of the registrant’s definitive proxy statement for its 2017 annual meeting of stockholders to be filed pursuant to Regulation 14A with the Securities and Exchange Commission not later than 120 days after the registrant’s fiscal year ended December 31, 2016 are incorporated by reference into Part III of this Form 10‑K.

 

 

 

 

 

 

TABLE OF CONTENTS

 

 

 

Cautionary Note Regarding Forward‑Looking Statements

 

This Annual Report on Form 10‑K (this “Annual Report”) contains forward‑looking statements that involve substantial risks and uncertainties. The forward‑looking statements are contained principally in the sections entitled “Business,” “Risk Factors,” and “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations,” but are also contained elsewhere in this Annual Report. In some cases, you can identify forward‑looking statements by the words “may,” “might,” “will,” “could,” “would,” “should,” “expect,” “intend,” “plan,” “objective,” “anticipate,” “believe,” “estimate,” “predict,” “project,” “potential,” “continue” and “ongoing,” or the negative of these terms, or other comparable terminology intended to identify statements about the future. These statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause our actual results, levels of activity, performance or achievements to be materially different from the information expressed or implied by these forward‑looking statements. Although we believe that we have a reasonable basis for each forward‑looking statement contained in this Annual Report, we caution you that these statements are based on a combination of facts and factors currently known by us and our expectations of the future, about which we cannot be certain. Forward‑looking statements include statements about:

 

•our plans to develop and potentially commercialize our product candidates;

 

•our ability to fund future operating expenses and capital expenditures with our current cash resources;

 

•our planned clinical trials and preclinical studies for our product candidates;

 

•the timing and likelihood of obtaining and maintaining regulatory approvals for our product candidates;

 

•the extent of clinical trials potentially required by the FDA for our product candidates;

 

•the clinical utility and market acceptance of our product candidates, particularly in light of existing and future competition;

 

•our commercialization, marketing and manufacturing capabilities and strategies;

 

•our intellectual property position; and

 

•our ability to identify additional product candidates with significant commercial potential that are consistent with our commercial objectives.

 

You should refer to the “Risk Factors” section of this Annual Report for a discussion of important factors that may cause our actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by our forward‑looking statements. As a result of these factors, we cannot assure you that the forward‑looking statements in this Annual Report will prove to be accurate. Furthermore, if our forward‑looking statements prove to be inaccurate, the inaccuracy may be material. In light of the significant uncertainties in these forward‑looking statements, you should not regard these statements as a representation or warranty by us or any other person that we will achieve our objectives and plans in any specified time frame, or at all. We undertake no obligation to publicly update any forward‑looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required by law.

 

 

 

PART I

 

ITEM 1.    BUSINESS

 

Overview

 

Trevena, Inc. is a biopharmaceutical company developing innovative therapies based on breakthrough science to benefit patients and healthcare providers confronting serious medical conditions. Unless the context otherwise requires, we use the terms “Trevena,” “company,” “we,” “us” and “our” to refer to Trevena, Inc.

 

Using our proprietary product platform, we have identified and are developing the following product candidates:

 

 

 

In addition to the above product candidates, we identified and have completed the initial Phase 1 studies for TRV734, an orally administered new chemical entity expected to be used for first-line treatment of moderate-to-severe acute and chronic pain. We intend to continue to focus our efforts for TRV734 on securing a development and commercialization partner for this asset. We had also been developing TRV027 for the treatment of acute heart failure, or AHF. In May 2016, we announced that TRV027 did not meet either the primary or secondary endpoints of our Phase 2b (BLAST-AHF) clinical trial of the compound. In August 2016, Allergan plc (formerly Actavis plc and Forest Laboratories Holdings Limited), or Allergan, notified us of its decision to not exercise its exclusive option to license TRV027. We are seeking a partner to fund any future clinical testing of TRV027.

 

Our Pipeline

 

 

OLINVO™ (oliceridine injection)

 

OLINVO is a novel µ‑receptor G protein Pathway Selective modulator that activates the G protein pathway, which is associated with analgesia and avoids the β‑arrestin pathway, which is associated with limiting opioid analgesia and with promoting opioid‑induced adverse events.We are developing OLINVO for the management of moderate-to- severe acute pain where IV administration is preferred.

 

Disease and treatment options

 

According to 2015 IMS data, approximately 51 million patients in the United States were treated with an IV opioid in the hospital setting.  The majority of use is in the inpatient setting where approximately 16 million patients were treated an average of two days.  In the outpatient setting, approximately 35 million patients were treated for an average of two hours.  The World Health Organization estimates that over 230 million major surgical procedures are performed each year worldwide. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or CDC, estimates that 100 million surgical and invasive diagnostic procedures occur annually in the United States. Based on market research, we believe that approximately 19 million hospital inpatient surgeries are performed collectively in France, Germany, the United Kingdom, Italy, and Spain each year. Accordingly, if approved, we believe that there is a large potential commercial opportunity for OLINVO in the management of both surgical and medical acute pain.

 

The typical treatment paradigm in developed markets for the management of moderate‑to‑severe acute pain is to initiate injectable or IV pain medication in the preoperative or immediate postoperative period to provide rapid and effective pain relief.  Conventional IV opioid analgesics such as morphine, fentanyl and hydromorphone are the mainstays of pain management in the immediate postoperative period and are approximately 50% of the injectable analgesic unit market. In a 2012 survey of 300 surgical patients in the United States, over 80% of patients reported postoperative pain after the first analgesic medication had been administered, and 40% of this pain was reported to be moderate or severe. In addition, the effectiveness of conventional opioid agonists is limited because of severe side effects such as respiratory depression, nausea, vomiting, and constipation. Injectable non‑opioid analgesics are often used together with IV opioids for post‑surgical pain management; however, these drugs, such as IV non‑steroidal anti‑inflammatory drugs, or NSAIDs, IV acetaminophen or local anesthetics such as bupivacaine, have potential cardiovascular, hepatic and gastrointestinal side effects. None of these non‑opioid analgesic approaches has displaced the use of opioid analgesics as the cornerstone of IV therapy for acute moderate-to-severe pain. We believe that there remains significant unmet need for an effective analgesic agent with an improved safety and tolerability profile. 

 

Clinical development

 

In December 2015, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, or FDA, granted Fast Track designation to OLINVO for the management of moderate‑to‑severe acute pain. The Fast Track program is designed to facilitate the development and review of drugs intended to treat serious conditions with unmet medical needs by providing sponsors with the opportunity for frequent interactions with the FDA. In February 2016, the FDA granted Breakthrough Therapy designation to OLINVO for the management of moderate‑to‑severe acute pain. Breakthrough Therapy designation is granted by the FDA to new therapies intended to treat serious conditions and for which preliminary clinical evidence indicates that the drug may demonstrate substantial clinical improvement over available therapies. Breakthrough Therapy designation provides all the benefits of the Fast Track program, as well as more intensive FDA guidance on preparing an efficient drug development program and eligibility for rolling review and priority review.  We currently expect to submit a new drug application, or NDA, for OLINVO in the fourth quarter of 2017.

 

We are developing OLINVO for the management of moderate‑to‑severe acute pain where IV administration is preferred. In the future, we also may explore other formulations, such as transmucosal or transdermal administration for breakthrough or chronic pain, respectively, in additional, separate clinical trials.

 

Phase 3 development program

 

In January 2016, we initiated the Phase 3 clinical program for OLINVO with the enrollment of patients in the ATHENA study, a Phase 3, open label, multicenter study evaluating the safety and tolerability of OLINVO in approximately 900 patients. The study is enrolling eligible patients with moderate-to-severe pain caused by medical conditions or surgery. Patients are treated with OLINVO on an as‑needed basis via IV bolus, patient‑controlled analgesia, or PCA, or both, as determined by the investigator. The primary objective is to assess the safety and tolerability of OLINVO. Pain intensity is being measured as a secondary endpoint.  As of February 15, 2017, over 400 patients have been treated in the ATHENA study, with no apparent off-target or unexpected adverse effects.

 

In the first quarter of 2016, we discussed our Phase 3 development program with the FDA at an End of Phase 2 meeting. At this meeting, the FDA agreed that pivotal efficacy trials in bunionectomy and abdominoplasty patients include appropriate patient populations to support an indication for the management of moderate-to-severe acute pain. 

The FDA also confirmed the need for at least 1,100 patients exposed to OLINVO across the development program for the purposes of evaluating safety and tolerability and that the trials should include a sufficient number of patients with higher exposures and longer durations of OLINVO therapy.  In addition, general agreement was reached on our planned clinical, nonclinical, clinical pharmacology, and chemistry, manufacturing and control activities to support the planned NDA.

 

APOLLO-1 and APOLLO-2 Phase 3 Studies

 

In the second quarter of 2016, we commenced two pivotal efficacy trials evaluating OLINVO in patients with moderate-to-severe acute pain: the APOLLO-1 study, which evaluated pain for 48 hours following bunionectomy, and the APOLLO-2 study, which evaluated pain for 24 hours following abdominoplasty.  On February 21, 2017, we announced positive top-line results from the APOLLO-1 and APOLLO-2 studies. In both studies, all dose regimens achieved the primary endpoint of statistically greater analgesic efficacy than placebo, as measured by responder rate. 

 

The APOLLO-1 and APOLLO-2 studies were both Phase 3, multicenter, randomized, double-blind, placebo- and active-controlled studies of OLINVO. During the study period, a loading dose of placebo, morphine (4 mg), or OLINVO (1.5 mg) was administered first, and then patients used a PCA button to dose themselves as often as every 6 minutes with the same study drug: 1 mg morphine or 0.1 mg, 0.35 mg, or 0.5 mg OLINVO. If PCA dosing was inadequate to control pain, patients could request supplemental study medication (0.75 mg OLINVO or 2 mg morphine, no more than once an hour).  If the study medication regimen did not adequately manage pain, patients could opt for an NSAID rescue analgesic. Placebo loading, demand, and supplemental doses were volume-matched.

 

All endpoints were the same in both studies.  Efficacy was measured by a responder analysis, which defined a responder as a patient who experienced at least a 30% reduction in their sum of pain intensity difference at the end of the treatment period without either early discontinuation (for lack of efficacy or safety/tolerability) or use of rescue medication. Non-inferiority to morphine and superiority to morphine were key secondary endpoints. Respiratory safety events were defined as clinically relevant worsening of respiratory status, including oxygen saturation, respiratory rate, or sedation.  The product of the frequency and conditional duration of these events was reported as respiratory safety burden, a key secondary endpoint.  Additional measures of respiratory safety included prevalence of oxygen saturation less than 90% and prevalence of supplemental oxygen use.  Measures of gastrointestinal tolerability included use of rescue antiemetics, vomiting, and spontaneously reported nausea.

 

APOLLO-1 (bunionectomy)

 

APOLLO-2 (abdominoplasty)

 

In both studies, oliceridine was generally well-tolerated. The most common drug-related adverse events were nausea, vomiting, headache, and dizziness.

 

Phase 2b trial of OLINVO in acute postoperative pain following abdominoplasty

 

The aim of our Phase 2b clinical trial was to evaluate the efficacy, safety and tolerability of OLINVO in the management of postoperative pain using morphine as a benchmark, utilizing on‑demand dosing to reflect standard clinical practice. This Phase 2b trial was a randomized, double‑blind, placebo‑ and active‑controlled trial of OLINVO in which we enrolled 200 patients with moderate-to-severe acute postoperative pain after abdominoplasty surgery. Two regimens of OLINVO were tested: the first consisted of a 1.5 mg intravenous loading dose with 0.1 mg self‑administered on‑demand doses as often as every six minutes using a PCA device; the second consisted of a 1.5 mg loading dose with 0.35 mg on‑demand doses as often as every six minutes using a PCA device. A commonly used morphine PCA regimen also was tested, consisting of a 4 mg loading dose with 1 mg on‑demand doses as often as every six minutes. Placebo was administered as a loading dose and on‑demand doses were volume‑matched to the active regimens. Rescue medication consisting of ibuprofen or oxycodone was used in all groups.

 

In August 2015, we reported top‑line results from this trial. OLINVO demonstrated statistically significant pain reduction compared to placebo and comparable efficacy to morphine. OLINVO provided rapid reduction in average pain scores, consistent with the previous Phase 2 trial where OLINVO showed more rapid onset of meaningful pain relief than morphine. Rescue analgesic use was similar for both OLINVO and morphine, and less than half the rate of rescue analgesic use for placebo. In this study, the OLINVO groups had a significantly lower prevalence (percentage of patients) of hypoventilation events (a measure of respiratory safety), nausea, and vomiting than the morphine group. The most frequently reported adverse events, or AEs, associated with OLINVO were nausea, vomiting, hypoventilation and headache. Opioid‑related AEs were generally less frequent in the OLINVO groups compared to morphine. No drug‑related serious adverse events were reported in the study.

 

Phase 2a/b trial of OLINVO in acute postoperative pain following bunionectomy

 

The aim of our Phase 2a/b clinical trial was to evaluate the efficacy and tolerability of OLINVO in the management of postoperative pain using morphine as a benchmark, using fixed dose and dose interval to characterize the performance of OLINVO. The trial was a multicenter, randomized, double‑blind, placebo‑ and active‑controlled, multiple dose, adaptive trial in 333 women and men undergoing a primary unilateral first‑metatarsal bunionectomy surgery at four sites in the United States. Patients were randomized after surgery to receive OLINVO, morphine or placebo to manage their pain. Pain intensity was measured using validated numeric rating scales ranging from ten (most severe pain) to zero (no pain) at multiple time points up to 48 hours. Based on these scales, analgesic efficacy was

assessed with a time‑weighted average change in pain score over 48 hours—a well‑established measure of changes in the intensity of pain over time and an FDA‑recommended endpoint for pain studies.

 

In November 2014, we announced top‑line data from this trial. At doses of 2 mg and 3 mg of OLINVO administered every three hours, the trial achieved its primary endpoint of statistically greater pain reduction than placebo for 48 hours, which we believe demonstrates proof of concept for OLINVO. Over the 48‑hour trial period, the 3 mg dose of OLINVO administered every three hours also showed statistically superior analgesic efficacy compared to the 4 mg dose of morphine administered every four hours. Additionally, in the first three hours of dosing, when pain was most severe, the 1 mg, 2 mg and 3 mg doses of OLINVO demonstrated superior analgesic efficacy in the trial compared to placebo, and the 2 mg and 3 mg doses of OLINVO demonstrated superior analgesic efficacy compared to the 4 mg dose of morphine.

 

There were no serious adverse events reported in the trial. Both the 2 mg and 3 mg doses of OLINVO showed overall tolerability over the 48‑hour trial period similar to that of the 4 mg dose of morphine administered every four hours. The most frequently reported adverse events associated with OLINVO were dizziness, headache, somnolence, nausea, vomiting, flushing and itching. Adverse effects were generally dose‑related.

 

Phase 1 clinical studies of OLINVO

 

We have completed a number of Phase 1 clinical studies of OLINVO. These included two single ascending dose studies of OLINVO given as a 60 minute continuous infusion or a 2 minute bolus infusion that showed dose‑related increases in plasma exposure and pupil constriction, a biomarker for CNS opioid activity across a range of doses that were generally well tolerated. Because in vitro data suggest that OLINVO is metabolized by at least two liver enzymes, CYP2D6 and CYP3A4, we assessed OLINVO pharmacokinetics, pharmacodynamics, safety and tolerability in CYP2D6 “poor metabolizer” healthy volunteers with little to no CYP2D6 activity. This study showed that OLINVO clearance was reduced by approximately 50% in the poor metabolizers suggesting that a lower frequency of dosing may be required to offer effective pain relief.

 

In 2013, we completed a Phase 1b proof of concept exploratory trial in healthy male subjects. The aims of this trial were to characterize the analgesic efficacy and safety and tolerability of a single dose of OLINVO as compared to a single 10 mg dose of morphine. We used a well‑established evoked‑pain model, the cold pain test, to evaluate the analgesic effects of OLINVO by measuring the time to hand removal, or latency, from a temperature‑controlled cold water bath. At both the 3.0 mg and 4.5 mg doses, OLINVO showed superior efficacy as compared to a 10 mg morphine dose that was statistically significant with a p‑value of less than 0.05 at the ten and 30 minute time points after dosing. The durability of the analgesic effect was similar to morphine. In addition, the time to peak effect was more rapid than that for morphine. Overall, OLINVO was well tolerated in the trial. Subjects receiving OLINVO showed less severe nausea and less frequent vomiting at the 1.5 mg and 3.0 mg doses as compared to a 10 mg dose of morphine. OLINVO also showed less respiratory depression compared to morphine over 4 hours.

 

In October 2014, we completed an adaptive, multiple ascending dose study of OLINVO in more than 50 healthy subjects. The safety, tolerability, pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics results of this study were consistent with the earlier Phase 1 studies described above. Recently, we also successfully completed an absorption, distribution, metabolism, and excretion study, a QTc interval study, a renal impairment study, and a human abuse liability study.

 

Commercialization

 

We intend to build hospital commercial capabilities in the United States and retain full U.S. rights to OLINVO. We expect to seek collaborators to commercialize OLINVO outside the United States to offset risk and preserve capital.

 

To commercialize OLINVO in the United States, we intend to utilize a hospital-focused specialty sales force targeting surgeons, anesthesiologists, hospitalists, and other healthcare providers with acute post-surgical or medical pain management responsibility.  Within the inpatient setting, we believe that there will be opportunities for OLINVO in the post-anesthesia care unit, the emergency department, the intensive/critical care unit, and the medical/surgical floor.  Based on market research conducted to date with key customers, we currently expect to focus on multiple surgical and medical procedures in which OLINVO may be a good clinical fit due to patient or procedure characteristics.  In targeted hospitals, we will work to secure Pharmacy and Therapeutics Committee approval and subsequent pull-through utilization of OLINVO. Given the changing dynamics in the hospital marketplace and the increased emphasis on clinical

and economic outcomes, we expect our commercialization plans also will include health economic information designed to demonstrate the value OLINVO could provide to the healthcare system through a potential reduction in adverse events related to the use of conventional IV opioids.  Because many of our targeted customers also provide care in other hospital settings, we anticipate that we will also target a select number of hospital outpatient departments and ambulatory surgery centers.

 

Manufacturing

 

We have completed process development of the active pharmaceutical ingredient, or API, and have manufactured multiple commercial scale batches using our proposed commercial process under commercial good manufacturing practices, or cGMP, conditions. We also have completed drug product process development and have manufactured multiple batches of drug product using the proposed commercial process under cGMP conditions.  Both API and drug product will be manufactured in the United States by third party contract manufacturing vendors with which we have established contractual relationships for supply.

 

Competition

 

If OLINVO is approved for IV management of moderate-to-severe acute pain, it will compete with generic IV opioid analgesics, such as morphine, hydromorphone and fentanyl. The analgesic effectiveness of these agents is limited by well‑known adverse side effects, such as respiratory depression, nausea, vomiting, constipation, and post‑operative ileus. OLINVO also may compete against, or be used in combination with, OFIRMEV®  (IV acetaminophen), marketed by Mallinckrodt plc, with EXPAREL®  (liposomal bupivacaine), marketed by Pacira Pharmaceuticals, Inc., CALDOLOR® (IV ibuprofen), marketed by Cumberland Pharmaceuticals, DYLOJECT™ (IV diclofenac), marketed by Pfizer Inc., and IONSYS® marketed by The Medicines Company. Together with generic versions of IV NSAIDs such as ketorolac, and generic versions of local anesthetics such as bupivacaine, these non‑opioid analgesics are currently used in combination with opioids in the multimodal management of moderate-to-severe acute pain.

 

We also are aware of a number of products in mid- and late-stage clinical development that are aimed at improving the treatment of moderate-to-severe, acute pain and will directly compete with OLINVO. AcelRx Pharmaceuticals, Inc. is developing a range of acute pain products involving sufentanil oral nanotabs in hand‑held dispensers including DSUVIA™ and ZALVISO™. Durect Corporation, Innocoll Holdings plc, and Heron Therapeutics Inc. all have proprietary long‑acting reformulations of bupivacaine in development. Recro Pharma, Inc. is developing an IV version of the NSAID meloxicam. Cara Therapeutics Inc. is developing IV and oral dose forms of a peripherally restricted κ‑opioid receptor agonist, which has been administered in combination with µ‑opioids in clinical trials.

 

Intellectual property

 

Our OLINVO patent portfolio is wholly owned by us. The portfolio includes two issued U.S. patents (U.S. Patent Nos. 8,835,488 and 9,309,234), which claim among other things, OLINVO, compositions comprising OLINVO and methods of using OLINVO. The portfolio also includes one allowed U.S. patent application (U.S. Patent Application No. 15/093,315) claiming OLINVO, other compounds and/or methods of making or using the same. The issued patents are expected to expire no earlier than 2032, subject to any disclaimers or extensions and any U.S. patent to issue in the future is also expected to expire no earlier than 2032, subject to any disclaimers or extensions. We also have issued patents in Japan and New Zealand, which claim among other things, OLINVO, compositions comprising OLINVO and methods of using OLINVO.  The foreign portfolio also includes applications that have been allowed in China, Australia and by the European Patent Office, which claim among other things, OLINVO, compositions comprising OLINVO and methods of using OLINVO.  We have patent applications pending in South Korea, the European Patent Office, the Eurasian Patent Office, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Israel, India, Japan, China, Hong Kong and New Zealand. The issued patents and patents that could issue in the future from these allowed or pending applications outside the United States are expected to expire no earlier than 2032, subject to any disclaimers or extensions.

 

TRV250

 

TRV250 is a small molecule G protein biased ligand of the δ‑opioid receptor in preclinical development.  In the second quarter of 2017, we expect to commence a Phase I study of TRV250 in the United Kingdom in healthy volunteers. Based on the profile of TRV250, we believe it has the potential to be a first‑in‑class treatment for migraine. According to Decision Resources, a healthcare consulting company, the acute episodic migraine market encompassed

approximately 12 million drug‑treated patients in 2013 in the United States, representing approximately $2.2 billion of sales. We estimate that approximately 20% to 30% of these patients either do not respond to or cannot tolerate the market‑leading triptan drug class, and an additional 30% would benefit from improved efficacy compared to these drugs.

Triptans, a generic family of 5HT_1B agonists, are the current standard treatment for acute treatment of migraine, and account for 80% of migraine therapies prescribed during physician office visits. Other less commonly prescribed acute treatments include ergot alkaloids, and analgesics such as opioids and NSAIDs. Various branded reformulations of triptan molecules have been launched and we are aware of others in development. In May 2016, Avanir Pharmaceuticals, Inc. launched a dry powder nasal delivery formulation of sumatriptan, called ONZETRA™ Xsail™. RedHill Biopharma, Ltd. and IntelGenx Corp. plan to resubmit the NDA for RIZAPORT  ®, an oral thin film rizatriptan formulation, to the FDA in the first half of 2017. In addition, Allergan is developing an orally inhaled formulation of dihydroergotamine, called SempranaTM. Lasmiditan, an selective 5HT_1F agonist, is in late stage development by Colucid Pharmaceuticals, Inc., recently acquired by Eli Lilly and Company. Allergan also has an oral anti-calcitonin gene-related peptide, or CGRP, ubrogepant (MK-1602), in Phase 3 testing for the acute treatment of migraine.

 

Patients suffering from frequent or chronic migraine headaches may also use preventative agents to decrease the frequency and severity of migraines. Botox® is currently the most widely prescribed migraine prophylactic, but certain anticonvulsants, such as topiramate, and beta-blockers, such as propranolol, are also used. We are aware of four companies with anti-CGRP antibodies in mid-to-late stage development for preventative treatment of migraine: Amgen, Inc. with AMG 334; Alder BioPharmaceuticals Inc. with ALD403; Eli Lilly and Company with LY2951742 and Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Limited with LBR-101.

 

We believe our preclinical data support targeting the δ‑opioid receptor for the treatment of CNS disorders. Prior approaches to modulate this receptor have been limited by a significant risk of seizure associated with this target. By contrast, TRV250 is a potent δ‑opioid receptor ligand that displayed strong efficacy in animal models of migraine and other CNS disorders with reduced seizure liability through selectively activating G protein coupling without engaging β‑arrestin. These in vivo data are further supported by data for δ‑agonists in β‑arrestin knockout mice suggesting that β‑arrestin plays a role in seizures. In the future, we may decide to seek a collaborator for TRV250 with CNS development and commercialization expertise outside the United States. Phase 1 clinical trials could include electroencephalogram studies to specifically assess seizure liability.

 

We have one non-provisional patent application in the United States directed to compounds that modulate the δ‑opioid receptor. This application is solely owned by us.  We have also filed a Patent Cooperation Treaty, or PCT, application and anticipate filing foreign national phase applications based upon the PCT application by the appropriate deadlines.  Any patents that may issue from these applications are expected to expire no earlier than 2036, subject to any disclaimers or extensions.

 

TRV734

 

TRV734 is a small molecule µ‑GPS that we discovered and have developed through Phase 1 as a first‑line, orally administered compound for the treatment of moderate-to-severe acute and chronic pain. Like OLINVO, TRV734 takes advantage of a well‑established mechanism of pain relief by targeting the µ‑opioid receptor, but does so with enhanced selectivity for the G protein signaling pathway, which in preclinical studies was linked to analgesia, as opposed to the β‑arrestin signaling pathway, which in preclinical studies was associated with side effects. Subject to successful preclinical and clinical development and regulatory approval, we believe TRV734 may have an improved efficacy and side effect profile as compared to current commonly prescribed oral analgesics, such as oxycodone. We intend to continue to focus our efforts for TRV734 on securing a worldwide development and commercialization partner for this asset.

 

TRV734 has shown a similar profile to OLINVO in in vitro and in vivo studies. It is highly selective for the µ‑opioid receptor where, like the most powerful opioid analgesics, it is a strong agonist of G protein coupling. TRV734 is distinct from those analgesics in its very weak recruitment of β‑arrestins to the µ‑opioid receptor. In our preclinical studies, TRV734 showed analgesic effects in preclinical pain models similar to oxycodone and morphine. In the same studies, TRV734 caused less constipation compared to equivalently analgesic doses of oxycodone and morphine. TRV734 is active after oral administration in mice and rats, has high oral bioavailability and has been well tolerated in non‑human primates.

 

We have completed three Phase 1 trials of TRV734 in healthy volunteers, including a single ascending dose study, a multiple ascending dose study, and a pharmacokinetic study. In these studies, a total of 127 healthy volunteers were exposed to TRV734 at doses between 2 mg and 250 mg. We incorporated measures to assess the potential for analgesic efficacy and tolerability advantages in these studies. Based on these data and data for OLINVO, we believe that TRV734 may offer an improved efficacy profile as compared to current opioid therapies or equivalent efficacy with an improved gastrointestinal tolerability and respiratory safety profile.

 

Our TRV734 patent portfolio is wholly owned by us and includes one issued U.S. patent (U.S. Patent No, 9,044,469) claiming TRV734, other compounds and/or methods of making or using the same. This patent is expected to expire no earlier than 2032, subject to any disclaimers or extensions. We also have issued patents in Japan and New Zealand claiming TRV734, other compounds and/or methods of making or using the same.  The foreign portfolio also includes applications that have been allowed in China, Australia, and by the European Patent Office claiming TRV734, other compounds and/or methods of making or using the same.  We also have patent applications pending in South Korea, the European Patent Office, the Eurasian Patent Office, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Israel, India, Japan, China, Hong Kong and New Zealand. The issued patents and patents that could issue in the future from these allowed or pending applications outside the United States are expected to expire no earlier than 2032, subject to any disclaimers or extensions.

 

TRV027

 

TRV027 is a peptide β‑arrestin biased ligand that targets the angiotensin II type 1 receptor (AT1R), inhibiting angiotensin II‑mediated G protein signaling and activating β‑arrestin signaling. For the past several years, we have been developing TRV027 for the treatment of AHF in combination with standard diuretic therapy.

 

The current approach to treating patients with AHF involves facilitating the excretion of accumulated fluid with loop diuretics like furosemide; improving hemodynamics by reducing preload and afterload blood pressure with vasodilators like nitroglycerin; and directly stimulating the heart to contract more forcefully with inotropes like dobutamine. None of these approaches has been shown to greatly improve patient outcomes in AHF, and each therapy has specific adverse effects that limit its clinical utility.

 

Clinical development experience

 

In May 2016, we announced that TRV027 did not meet either the primary or secondary endpoints of the Phase 2b (BLAST-AHF), randomized, double-blind, standard of care controlled clinical trial evaluating the safety and efficacy of TRV027 in 618 patients with AHF.  The study compared TRV027 (1.0 mg/hr, 5.0 mg/hr and 25 mg/hr) plus standard heart failure therapy versus placebo plus standard therapy. The primary objective of this trial was to evaluate the effects of TRV027 on a composite of clinically important outcomes: mortality, worsening heart failure, hospital readmission rate, dyspnea, and length of hospital stay. In this study, TRV027 or placebo were initiated after presentation to the hospital and then continued to be administered for a minimum of 48 hours and a maximum of 96 hours. Pre-specified analyses to identify populations that may respond best to TRV027 included segmentation by ejection fraction, systolic blood pressure, plasma renin activity, and glomerular filtration rate. The study methodology was published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology – Heart Failure in March 2015.

 

Although the BLAST-AHF trial did not meet its primary or secondary endpoints, in a post-hoc analysis of patients with systolic blood pressure in the upper two tertiles (top two thirds), there were statistically significant improvements in long-term mortality and morbidity for the lowest tested dose of 1mg/hr.  These data, in conjunction with a finding of improved serum creatinine at day 30 for TRV027 1 mg/hr compared to placebo as well as published preclinical data, suggest a new hypothesis that TRV027 may improve longer term outcomes based on its unique biased ligand mechanism.  This mechanism has been linked to cytoprotective and anti-apoptotic effects.  We are seeking a partner to fund future clinical testing of this hypothesis.

 

In addition to the BLAST-AHF trial, we have completed three clinical trials of TRV027:

 

 

 

 

Option and License Agreements with Allergan

 

On May 3, 2013, we entered into an option agreement and a license agreement with Allergan plc (formerly Actavis plc and Forest Laboratories Holdings Limited), under which we granted to Allergan an exclusive option to license TRV027. In March 2015, we signed a letter agreement with Allergan pursuant to which Allergan paid us $10.0 million to fund the expansion of the Phase 2b trial of TRV027 in AHF from 500 patients to 620 patients.  In August 2016, Allergan notified us of its decision to not exercise its exclusive option.  As such, we have retained all rights to TRV027. 

 

Intellectual Property

 

Our TRV027 patent portfolio is wholly owned by us. The portfolio includes four issued U.S. patents (U.S. Patent Nos. 8,486,885; 8,796,204; 8,809,260; and 8,993,511) that claim, among other things, TRV027, compositions comprising TRV027, and methods of using TRV027. We also have issued patents in Europe, Australia, Japan, New Zealand China, and Hong Kong. The issued U.S. patents covering the composition of matter and methods of using TRV027 are expected to expire no earlier than 2031 (U.S. Patent No. 8,486,885) and 2029 (U.S. Patent Nos. 8,796,204; 8,809,260; and 8,993,511), subject to any disclaimers or extensions available under the Hatch‑Waxman Act. The issued European Patent is expected to provide coverage for TRV027 throughout most of European Union until at least 2029, subject to any disclaimers or extensions. The TRV027 patent portfolio also includes two pending U.S. patent applications, which claim a genus of compounds that would encompass TRV027 and methods of using such compounds. If the two pending U.S. patent applications were to issue, they would be expected to expire no earlier than 2029, subject to any disclaimers or extensions. Outside of the United States, we have pending patent applications in Canada and India that are directed to TRV027. The patents from these applications, if issued, are predicted to expire in 2029, subject to any disclaimers or extensions.

 

Additionally, the TRV027 patent portfolio includes one issued patent (U.S. Patent No. 9,518,086) directed to a crystalline form of TRV027, two U.S. non‑provisional directed to, among other things, synthesis of TRV027, crystalline and amorphous forms of TRV027, and methods of preparing crystalline and amorphous forms of TRV027.  We have foreign application directed to, among other things, crystalline and amorphous forms of TRV027, that are pending in Australia, Canada, China, Europe, Japan, and New Zealand.  We also have foreign application directed to, among other things, synthesis of TRV027, that are pending in Australia, Canada, China, Europe, India, Japan, and New Zealand.  U.S. Patent No. 9,518,086 covering a crystalline form of TRV027 is expected to expire no earlier than 2035, subject to any disclaimers or extensions.  Any patents resulting from the pending patent applications, if issued are also expected to expire no earlier than 2035.

 

Our Platform

 

G protein coupled receptors, or GPCRs, are a large family of cell surface receptors that trigger two signaling pathways, G protein and β‑arrestin, and are implicated in cellular function and disease processes. More than 30% of all currently marketed therapeutics target GPCRs. Currently available therapeutics that target GPCRs, or GPCR ligands, are typically not signal specific, and therefore either inhibit both the G protein and β‑arrestin pathways (an antagonist ligand) or activate both pathways (an agonist ligand). This lack of signal specificity often results in a suboptimal therapeutic profile for these drugs because in many cases one of the pathways is associated with a beneficial therapeutic effect and the other is associated with limiting that benefit or with an undesirable side effect. We use our proprietary Advanced Biased Ligand Explorer, or ABLE, product platform to identify “biased” ligands, which are compounds that activate one of the two signaling pathways of the GPCR while inhibiting the other. This signaling specificity is the basis for our drug discovery and development approach, which is to identify selective GPCR biased ligands and develop them into differentiated clinical products. While some GPCRs trigger other signaling pathways in addition to G protein and β‑arrestin, most GPCRs trigger those two pathways.

 

Our ABLE product platform is a collection of proprietary biological information, in vitro assays, know‑how and expertise that we use to identify unique GPCR‑targeted biased ligands with attractive pharmaceutical properties. In vitro assays are laboratory tests performed outside of a living organism. Our in vitro assays use cells that have the receptor of interest on the cell surface, where G protein and β‑arrestin signaling from that receptor can be measured to determine if a particular ligand is biased, and if so whether it is a G protein or β‑arrestin biased ligand. Our assays can also measure different cellular responses resulting from signaling through β ‑arrestin and can thereby help us to associate pharmacological responses with molecular signaling. Most components of our ABLE product platform are maintained as trade secrets, but the output of the product platform is reflected in the product candidates that we have advanced into clinical testing and the research we have published in numerous peer‑reviewed journals. We believe that our ABLE product platform provides us with an important competitive advantage in identifying further opportunities for efficient and high‑impact biased ligand drug discovery, development and commercialization.

 

We were founded in late 2007 to discover and develop product candidates based on biased ligands, a concept discovered by our scientific founder, Dr. Robert Lefkowitz, who was awarded the 2012 Nobel Prize in Chemistry in part for his elucidation of the multiple pathways that a GPCR engages. We believe that we are the first company to progress a GPCR biased ligand into clinical trials. The members of our executive management team have held senior positions at leading pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies and possess substantial experience across the spectrum of drug discovery, development, and commercialization.

 

Intellectual Property

 

We strive to protect the proprietary technologies that we believe are important to our business, including seeking and maintaining patent protection intended to cover the composition of matter of our product candidates, their methods of use, related technology and other inventions that are important to our business. We also rely on trade secrets and careful monitoring of our proprietary information to protect aspects of our business that are not amenable to, or that we do not consider appropriate for, patent protection.

 

Our success will depend significantly on our ability to obtain and maintain patent and other proprietary protection for commercially important technology, inventions and know‑how related to our business, defend and enforce our patents, maintain our licenses to use intellectual property owned by third parties, preserve the confidentiality of our trade secrets and operate without infringing valid and enforceable patents and other proprietary rights of third parties. We also rely on know‑how, and continuing technological innovation to develop, strengthen and maintain our proprietary position in the field of modulating GCPRs with biased ligands.

 

One or more third parties may hold intellectual property, including patent rights, that is important or necessary to the development of our products. It may be necessary for us to use the patented or proprietary technology of third parties to commercialize our products, in which case we would be required to obtain a license from these third parties on commercially reasonable terms, or our business could be harmed, possibly materially. If we were not able to obtain a license, or were not able to obtain a license on commercially reasonable terms, our business could be harmed, possibly materially.

 

We plan to continue to expand our intellectual property estate by filing patent applications directed to dosage forms, methods of treatment and additional biased modulators of GCPRs. We anticipate seeking patent protection in the United States and internationally for compositions of matter covering the compounds, the chemistries and processes for manufacturing these compounds and the use of these compounds in a variety of therapies.

 

The patent positions of biopharmaceutical companies like us are generally uncertain and involve complex legal, scientific and factual questions. In addition, the coverage claimed in a patent application can be significantly reduced before the patent is issued, and the patent’s scope can be modified after issuance. Consequently, we do not know whether any of our product candidates will be protectable or remain protected by enforceable patents. We cannot predict whether the patent applications we are currently pursuing will issue as patents in any particular jurisdiction or whether the claims of any issued patents will provide sufficient proprietary protection from competitors. Any patents that we hold may be challenged, circumvented or invalidated by third parties.

 

Because many patent applications in the United States and certain other jurisdictions are maintained in secrecy for 18 months, and since publication of discoveries in the scientific or patent literature often lags behind actual

discoveries, we cannot be certain that we will be able to obtain patent protection for the inventions disclosed and/or claimed in our pending patent applications. Moreover, we may have to participate in interference proceedings declared by the United States Patent and Trademark Office or a foreign patent office to determine priority of invention or in post‑grant challenge proceedings, such as oppositions, inter‑partes review, post grant review or a derivation proceeding, that challenge our entitlement to an invention or the patentability of one or more claims in our patent applications or issued patents. Such proceedings could result in substantial cost, even if the eventual outcome is favorable to us.

 

The term of individual patents depends upon the legal term of the patents in the countries in which they are obtained. In most countries in which we file, the patent term is 20 years from the earliest date of filing a PCT application or a non‑provisional patent application, subject to any disclaimers or extensions. The term of a patent in the United States can be adjusted and extended due to the failure of the United States Patent and Trademark Office following certain statutory and regulation deadlines for issuing a patent.

 

In the United States, the patent term of a patent that covers an FDA‑approved drug also may be eligible for patent term extension, which permits patent term restoration as compensation for a portion of the patent term lost during clinical development and the FDA regulatory review process. The Hatch‑Waxman Act permits a patent term extension of up to five years beyond the expiration of the patent. The length of the patent term extension is related to the length of time the drug is under clinical development and regulatory review. Patent term extension cannot extend the remaining term of a patent beyond a total of 14 years from the date of product approval and only one patent applicable to an approved drug may be extended. Similar provisions are available in Europe and other non‑United States jurisdictions to extend the term of a patent that covers an approved drug. In the future, if and when our pharmaceutical products receive FDA approval, we expect to apply for patent term extensions on patents covering those products. Although, we intend to seek patent term extensions to any of our issued patents in any jurisdiction where these are available there is no guarantee that the applicable authorities, including the United States Patent and Trademark Office, will agree with our assessment of whether such extensions should be granted, and even if granted, the length of such extensions.

 

We also rely on trade secret protection for our confidential and proprietary information. Although we take steps to protect our proprietary information and trade secrets, including through contractual means with our employees and consultants, third parties may independently develop substantially equivalent proprietary information and techniques or otherwise gain access to our trade secrets or disclose our technology. Thus, we may not be able to meaningfully protect our trade secrets. It is our policy to require our employees, consultants, outside scientific collaborators, sponsored researchers and other advisors to execute confidentiality agreements upon the commencement of employment or consulting relationships with us. These agreements provide that all confidential information concerning our business or financial affairs developed or made known to the individual during the course of the individual’s relationship with us is to be kept confidential and not disclosed to third parties except in specific circumstances. In the case of employees, the agreements provide that all inventions conceived by the individual, and which are related to our current or planned business or research and development or made during normal working hours, on our premises or using our equipment or proprietary information, are our exclusive property.

 

Manufacturing

 

We do not have any manufacturing facilities. We currently rely, and expect to continue to rely, on third parties for the manufacture of our product candidates for preclinical and clinical testing, as well as for commercial manufacture if our product candidates receive marketing approval. At this time, none of our contract manufacturing agreements limit where, or with whom we can contract for commercial manufacture or distribution.

 

Commercialization

 

We have not yet fully established sales, marketing or product distribution infrastructure. Subject to successfully completing product development and receiving marketing approvals, we expect to commence commercialization activities for our wholly owned products by building a sales organization in the United States, initially in the hospital market. We believe that such an organization will be able to address the community of physicians who are the key specialists in treating the patient populations for which our product candidates are being developed. Outside the United States, we expect to enter into distribution and other commercial arrangements with third parties for any of our product candidates that obtain marketing approval. We also intend to license out commercial rights for products that require a substantial primary care presence.

 

In parallel with building our commercial organization, we plan to develop educational initiatives with respect to approved products and relationships with thought leaders in relevant fields of medicine.

 

Competition

 

The biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries are characterized by rapidly advancing technologies, intense competition and a strong emphasis on proprietary products. While we believe that our technology, knowledge, experience and scientific resources provide us with competitive advantages, we face potential competition from many different sources, including major pharmaceutical, specialty pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, academic institutions and governmental agencies and public and private research institutions. Any product candidates that we successfully develop and commercialize will compete with existing therapies and new therapies that may become available in the future. Products in development by other companies may provide efficacy, safety, convenience and other benefits that are not provided by currently marketed therapies. As a result, they may provide significant competition for any of our product candidates for which we obtain marketing approval.

 

Some of the companies against which we are competing or against which we may compete in the future have significantly greater financial resources and expertise in research and development, manufacturing, preclinical testing, conducting clinical trials, obtaining regulatory approvals and marketing approved products than we do. Mergers and acquisitions in the pharmaceutical, biotechnology and diagnostic industries may result in even more resources being concentrated among a smaller number of our competitors. Smaller or early stage companies also may prove to be significant competitors, particularly through collaborative arrangements with large and established companies. These competitors also compete with us in recruiting and retaining qualified scientific and management personnel and establishing clinical trial sites and patient registration for clinical trials, as well as in acquiring technologies complementary to, or necessary for, our programs.

 

The key competitive factors affecting the success of all of our therapeutic product candidates, if approved, are likely to be their efficacy, safety, convenience, price, the level of generic competition and the availability of reimbursement from government and other third party payors.

 

Our commercial opportunity could be reduced or eliminated if our competitors develop and commercialize products that are safer, more effective, have fewer or less severe side effects, are more convenient or are less expensive than any products that we may develop. Our competitors also may obtain FDA or other regulatory approval for their products more rapidly than we may obtain approval for ours, which could result in our competitors establishing a strong market position before we are able to enter the market. In addition, our ability to compete may be affected in many cases by insurers or other third party payors seeking to encourage the use of generic products. Generic products that broadly address these indications are currently on the market for the indications that we are pursuing, and additional products are expected to become available on a generic basis over the coming years. If our product candidates achieve marketing approval, we expect that they will be priced at a significant premium over competitive generic products.

 

Government Regulation and Product Approval

 

Government authorities in the United States, at the federal, state and local level, and in other countries extensively regulate, among other things, the research, development, testing, manufacture, packaging, storage, recordkeeping, labeling, advertising, promotion, distribution, marketing, import and export of pharmaceutical products such as those we are developing. The processes for obtaining regulatory approvals in the United States and in foreign countries, along with subsequent compliance with applicable statutes and regulations, require the expenditure of substantial time and financial resources.

 

FDA Regulation

 

In the United States, the FDA regulates drugs under the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, or FDCA, and its implementing regulations. The process of obtaining regulatory approvals and the subsequent compliance with applicable federal, state, local and foreign statutes and regulations requires the expenditure of substantial time and financial resources. Failure to comply with the applicable United States requirements at any time during the product development process, approval process or after approval, may subject an applicant to a variety of administrative or judicial sanctions, such as the FDA’s refusal to approve pending new drug applications, or NDAs, withdrawal of an approval, imposition of a clinical hold, issuance of warning or untitled letters, product recalls, product seizures, total or

partial suspension of production or distribution, injunctions, fines, refusals of government contracts, restitution, disgorgement or civil or criminal penalties.

 

The process required by the FDA before a drug may be marketed in the United States generally involves the following:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Preclinical Studies

 

Preclinical studies include laboratory evaluation of drug substance chemistry, toxicity and drug product formulation, as well as animal studies to assess potential safety and efficacy. An IND sponsor must submit the results of the preclinical tests, together with manufacturing information, analytical data and any available clinical data or literature, among other things, to the FDA as part of an IND. Manufacture of drug substance, drug product and the labeling and distribution of clinical supplies must all comply with cGMP standards. Some preclinical testing may continue even after the IND is submitted. An IND automatically becomes effective 30 days after receipt by the FDA, unless before that time the FDA raises concerns or questions related to one or more proposed clinical trials and places the trial on a clinical hold. In such a case, the IND sponsor and the FDA must resolve any outstanding concerns before the clinical trial can begin. As a result, submission of an IND may not result in the FDA allowing clinical trials to commence.

 

Clinical Trials

 

Clinical trials involve the administration of the investigational new drug to human subjects under the supervision of qualified investigators in accordance with GCP requirements, which include the requirement that all research subjects provide their informed consent in writing for their participation in any clinical trial. Clinical trials are conducted under protocols detailing, among other things, the objectives of the trial, the parameters to be used in monitoring safety and the effectiveness criteria to be evaluated. A protocol for each clinical trial and any subsequent protocol amendments must be submitted to the FDA as part of the IND. In addition, an IRB at each institution participating in the clinical trial must review and approve the plan for any clinical trial before it commences at that institution, and the IRB must continue to oversee the clinical trial while it is being conducted. Information about certain clinical trials must be submitted within specific timeframes to the National Institutes of Health, or NIH, for public dissemination on their ClinicalTrials.gov website.

 

Human clinical trials are typically conducted in three sequential phases, which may overlap or be combined. In Phase 1, the drug is initially introduced into healthy human subjects or patients with the target disease or condition and tested for safety, dosage tolerance, absorption, metabolism, distribution, excretion and, if possible, to gain an initial indication of its effectiveness. In Phase 2, the drug typically is administered to a limited patient population to identify possible adverse effects and safety risks, to preliminarily evaluate the efficacy of the product for specific targeted diseases and to determine dosage tolerance and optimal dosage. In Phase 3, the drug is administered to an expanded patient population, generally at geographically dispersed clinical trial sites, in well‑controlled clinical trials to generate enough data to statistically evaluate the efficacy and safety of the product for approval, to establish the overall risk‑benefit profile of the product and to provide adequate information for the labeling of the product.

 

Progress reports detailing the results of the clinical trials must be submitted at least annually to the FDA and more frequently if serious adverse events occur. Phase 1, Phase 2 and Phase 3 clinical trials may not be completed successfully within any specified period, or at all. Furthermore, the FDA or the sponsor may suspend or terminate a clinical trial at any time on various grounds, including a finding that the research subjects are being exposed to an unacceptable health risk. Similarly, an IRB can suspend or terminate approval of a clinical trial at its institution if the clinical trial is not being conducted in accordance with the IRB’s requirements or if the drug has been associated with unexpected serious harm to patients.

 

Marketing Approval

 

Assuming successful completion of the required clinical testing, the results of the preclinical and clinical studies, together with detailed information relating to the product’s chemistry, manufacture, controls and proposed labeling, among other things, are submitted to the FDA as part of an NDA requesting approval to market the product for one or more indications. In most cases, the submission of an NDA is subject to a substantial application user fee. Under the Prescription Drug User Fee Act, or PDUFA, guidelines that are currently in effect, the FDA has agreed to certain performance goals regarding the timing of its review of an application.

 

In addition, under the Pediatric Research Equity Act an NDA or supplement to an NDA must contain data that are adequate to assess the safety and effectiveness of the drug for the claimed indications in all relevant pediatric subpopulations, and to support dosing and administration for each pediatric subpopulation for which the product is safe and effective. The FDA may, on its own initiative or at the request of the applicant, grant deferrals for submission of some or all pediatric data until after approval of the product for use in adults, or full or partial waivers from the pediatric data requirements.

 

The FDA also may require submission of a risk evaluation and mitigation strategy, or REMS, to mitigate any identified or suspected serious risks and ensure safe use of the drug. The REMS plan could include medication guides, physician communication plans, assessment plans and elements to assure safe use, such as restricted distribution methods, patient registries or other risk minimization tools. We expect that the µ‑opioid agonist products will be subject to a REMS, since currently marketed opioid products are subject to this requirement.

 

The FDA conducts a preliminary review of all NDAs within the first 60 days after submission, before accepting them for filing, to determine whether they are sufficiently complete to permit substantive review. The FDA may request additional information rather than accept an NDA for filing. In this event, the application must be resubmitted with the additional information. The resubmitted application is also subject to review before the FDA accepts it for filing. Once the submission is accepted for filing, the FDA begins an in‑depth substantive review. The FDA reviews an NDA to determine, among other things, whether the drug is safe and effective and whether the facility in which it is manufactured, processed, packaged or held meets standards designed to assure the product’s continued safety, quality and purity.

 

The FDA typically refers a question regarding a novel drug to an external advisory committee. An advisory committee is a panel of independent experts, including clinicians and other scientific experts, that reviews, evaluates and provides a recommendation as to whether the application should be approved and under what conditions. The FDA is not bound by the recommendations of an advisory committee, but it considers such recommendations carefully when making decisions.

 

Before approving an NDA, the FDA typically will inspect the facility or facilities where the product is manufactured, referred to as a Pre‑Approval Inspection, or PAI. The FDA will not approve an application unless it

determines that the manufacturing processes and facilities are in compliance with cGMP requirements and adequate to assure consistent production of the product within required specifications. Additionally, before approving an NDA, the FDA will typically inspect one or more clinical trial sites to assure compliance with GCP.

 

The testing and approval process for an NDA requires substantial time, effort and financial resources, and each may take several years to complete. Data obtained from preclinical and clinical testing are not always conclusive and may be susceptible to varying interpretations, which could delay, limit or prevent regulatory approval. The FDA may not grant approval of an NDA on a timely basis, or at all.

 

After evaluating the NDA and all related information, including the advisory committee recommendation, if any, and inspection reports regarding the manufacturing facilities and clinical trial sites, the FDA may issue an approval letter, or, in some cases, a complete response letter. A complete response letter generally contains a statement of specific conditions that must be met in order to secure final approval of the NDA and may require additional clinical or preclinical testing in order for the FDA to reconsider the application. Even with submission of this additional information, the FDA ultimately may decide that the application does not satisfy the regulatory criteria for approval. If and when those conditions have been met to the FDA’s satisfaction, the FDA will typically issue an approval letter. An approval letter authorizes commercial marketing of the drug with specific prescribing information for specific indications. For some products, an additional step of DEA review and scheduling is required.

 

Even if the FDA approves a product, it may limit the approved indications for use of the product, require that contraindications, warnings or precautions be included in the product labeling, including a boxed warning, require that post‑approval studies, including Phase 4 clinical trials, be conducted to further assess a drug’s safety after approval, require testing and surveillance programs to monitor the product after commercialization or impose other conditions, including distribution restrictions or other risk management mechanisms under a REMS which can materially affect the potential market and profitability of the product. The FDA may prevent or limit further marketing of a product based on the results of post‑marketing studies or surveillance programs. After approval, some types of changes to the approved product, such as adding new indications, manufacturing changes and additional labeling claims, are subject to further testing requirements and FDA review and approval.

 

Expedited Review and Approval

 

The FDA has various programs, including Fast Track, Breakthrough Therapy designation, priority review, and accelerated approval, that are intended to expedite or simplify the process for reviewing drugs, and/or provide for the approval of a drug on the basis of a surrogate endpoint. Even if a drug qualifies for one or more of these programs, the FDA may later decide that the drug no longer meets the conditions for qualification or that the time period for FDA review or approval will be shortened. Generally, drugs that are eligible for these programs are those for serious or life‑threatening conditions, those with the potential to address unmet medical needs and those that offer meaningful benefits over existing treatments. For example, Fast Track is a process designed to facilitate the development and expedite the review of drugs to treat serious or life‑threatening diseases or conditions and fill unmet medical needs. In December 2015, FDA granted Fast Track designation to OLINVO for the management of moderate‑to‑severe acute pain. Priority review is designed to give drugs that offer major advances in treatment or provide a treatment where no adequate therapy exists an initial review within six months as compared to a standard review time of ten months.

 

Although Fast Track and priority review do not affect the standards for approval, the FDA will attempt to facilitate early and frequent meetings with a sponsor of a Fast Track designated drug and expedite review of the application for a drug designated for priority review. Accelerated approval, which is described in Subpart H of 21 Code of Federal Regulations, or 21 CFR Part 314, provides for an earlier approval for a new drug that is intended to treat a serious or life‑threatening disease or condition and that fills an unmet medical need based on a surrogate endpoint. A surrogate endpoint is a clinical measurement or other biomarker used as an indirect or substitute measurement to predict a clinically meaningful outcome. As a condition of approval, the FDA may require that a sponsor of a product candidate receiving accelerated approval perform post‑marketing clinical trials.

 

In the Food and Drug Administration Safety and Innovation Act, which was signed into law in July 2012, Congress encouraged the FDA to utilize innovative and flexible approaches to the assessment of products under accelerated approval. The law required the FDA to issue related draft guidance within a year after the law’s enactment and also promulgate confirming regulatory changes. In June 2013, the FDA published a draft Guidance for Industry entitled, “Expedited Programs for Serious Conditions—Drugs and Biologics” which provides guidance on FDA

programs that are intended to facilitate and expedite development and review of new drugs as well as threshold criteria generally applicable to concluding that a drug is a candidate for these expedited development and review programs. In addition to the Fast Track, accelerated approval and priority review programs discussed above, the FDA also provided guidance on a new program for Breakthrough Therapy designation. A Breakthrough Therapy designation is intended to expedite the development and FDA review of drugs for serious or life‑threatening conditions or where preliminary clinical evidence indicates that the drug may demonstrate substantial improvement on a clinically significant endpoint(s) over available therapies. A request for Breakthrough Therapy designation should be submitted concurrently with, or as an amendment to an IND. In February 2016, OLINVO received a Breakthrough Therapy designation from the FDA for the management of moderate‑to‑severe acute pain in patients 18 years of age or older for whom a parenteral opioid is warranted.

 

Post‑Approval Requirements

 

Drugs manufactured or distributed pursuant to FDA approvals are subject to pervasive and continuing regulation by the FDA, including, among other things, requirements relating to recordkeeping, periodic reporting, product sampling and distribution, advertising and promotion and reporting of adverse experiences with the product. After approval, most changes to the approved product, such as adding new indications or other labeling claims are subject to prior FDA review and approval. There also are continuing, annual user fee requirements for any marketed products and the establishments at which such products are manufactured, as well as new application fees for supplemental applications with clinical data.

 

The FDA may impose a number of post‑approval requirements as a condition of approval of an NDA. For example, the FDA may require post‑marketing testing, including Phase 4 clinical trials and surveillance to further assess and monitor the product’s safety and effectiveness after commercialization.

 

In addition, drug manufacturers and other entities involved in the manufacture and distribution of approved drugs are required to register their establishments with the FDA and state agencies, and are subject to periodic unannounced inspections by the FDA and these state agencies for compliance with cGMP requirements. Changes to the manufacturing process are strictly regulated and often require prior FDA approval before being implemented. FDA regulations also require investigation and correction of any deviations from cGMP and impose reporting and documentation requirements upon the sponsor and any third party manufacturers that the sponsor may decide to use. Accordingly, manufacturers must continue to expend time, money and effort in the area of production and quality control to maintain cGMP compliance.

 

Once an approval is granted, the FDA may withdraw the approval if compliance with regulatory requirements and standards is not maintained or if problems occur after the product reaches the market.

 

Later discovery of previously unknown problems with a product, including adverse events of unanticipated severity or frequency, or with manufacturing processes, or failure to comply with regulatory requirements, may result in mandatory revisions to the approved labeling to add new safety information; imposition of post‑market studies or clinical trials to assess new safety risks; or imposition of distribution or other restrictions under a REMS program. Other potential consequences include, among other things:

 

 

 

 

 

 

The FDA strictly regulates marketing, labeling, advertising and promotion of products that are placed on the market. Although physicians, in the practice of medicine, may prescribe approved drugs for unapproved indications,

pharmaceutical companies generally are required to promote their drug products only for the approved indications and in accordance with the provisions of the approved label. The FDA and other agencies actively enforce the laws and regulations prohibiting the promotion of off‑label uses, and a company that is found to have improperly promoted off‑label uses may be subject to significant liability.

 

In addition, the distribution of prescription pharmaceutical products is subject to the Prescription Drug Marketing Act, or PDMA, which regulates the distribution of drugs and drug samples at the federal level, and sets minimum standards for the registration and regulation of drug distributors by the states. Both the PDMA and state laws limit the distribution of prescription pharmaceutical product samples and impose requirements to ensure accountability in distribution.

 

DEA Regulation

 

Both OLINVO and TRV734, if approved, will be regulated as a “controlled substance” as defined in the Controlled Substances Act of 1970, or CSA, which establishes registration, security, recordkeeping, reporting, storage, distribution and other requirements administered by the DEA. The DEA is concerned with the control of handlers of controlled substances, and with the equipment and raw materials used in their manufacture and packaging, in order to prevent loss and diversion into illicit channels of commerce.

 

The DEA regulates controlled substances as Schedule I, II, III, IV or V substances. Schedule I substances by definition have no established medicinal use, and may not be marketed or sold in the United States. A pharmaceutical product may be listed as Schedule II, III, IV or V, with Schedule II substances considered to present the highest risk of abuse and Schedule V substances the lowest relative risk of abuse among such substances. OLINVO and TRV734, if approved, are expected to be listed by the DEA as Schedule II controlled substances under the CSA. Consequently, their manufacture, shipment, storage, sale and use will be subject to a high degree of regulation.

 

Annual registration is required for any facility that manufactures, distributes, dispenses, imports or exports any controlled substance. The registration is specific to the particular location, activity and controlled substance schedule. For example, separate registrations are needed for import and manufacturing, and each registration will specify which schedules of controlled substances are authorized.

 

The DEA typically inspects a facility to review its security measures prior to issuing a registration. Security requirements vary by controlled substance schedule, with the most stringent requirements applying to Schedule I and Schedule II substances. Required security measures include background checks on employees and physical control of inventory through measures such as cages, surveillance cameras and inventory reconciliations. Records must be maintained for the handling of all controlled substances, and periodic reports made to the DEA, for example distribution reports for Schedule I and II controlled substances, Schedule III substances that are narcotics, and other designated substances. Reports must also be made for thefts or losses of any controlled substance, and to obtain authorization to destroy any controlled substance. In addition, special authorization and notification requirements apply to imports and exports.

 

In addition, a DEA quota system controls and limits the availability and production of controlled substances in Schedule I or II. Distributions of any Schedule I or II controlled substance must also be accompanied by special order forms, with copies provided to the DEA. The DEA may adjust aggregate production quotas and individual production and procurement quotas from time to time during the year, although the DEA has substantial discretion in whether or not to make such adjustments. Our, or our contract manufacturers’, quota of an active ingredient may not be sufficient to meet commercial demand or complete clinical trials. Any delay or refusal by the DEA in establishing our, or our contract manufacturers’, quota for controlled substances could delay or stop our clinical trials or product launches.

 

To meet its responsibilities, the DEA conducts periodic inspections of registered establishments that handle controlled substances. Individual states also regulate controlled substances, and we and our contract manufacturers will be subject to state regulation with respect to the distribution of these products.

 

Federal and State Fraud and Abuse and Data Privacy and Security Laws and Regulations

 

In addition to FDA restrictions on marketing of pharmaceutical products, federal and state fraud and abuse laws restrict business practices in the biopharmaceutical industry. These laws include anti‑kickback and false claims laws and regulations as well as data privacy and security laws and regulations.

 

The federal Anti‑Kickback Statute prohibits, among other things, knowingly and willfully offering, paying, soliciting or receiving remuneration to induce or in return for purchasing, leasing, ordering or arranging for or recommending the purchase, lease or order of any item or service reimbursable under Medicare, Medicaid or other federal healthcare programs. The term “remuneration” has been broadly interpreted to include anything of value. The Anti‑Kickback Statute has been interpreted to apply to arrangements between pharmaceutical manufacturers on one hand and prescribers, purchasers and formulary managers on the other. Although there are a number of statutory exemptions and regulatory safe harbors protecting some common activities from prosecution, the exemptions and safe harbors are drawn narrowly. Practices that involve remuneration that may be alleged to be intended to induce prescribing, purchases or recommendations may be subject to scrutiny if they do not qualify for an exemption or safe harbor. Several courts have interpreted the statute’s intent requirement to mean that if any one purpose of an arrangement involving remuneration is to induce referrals of federal healthcare covered business, the statute has been violated.

 

The reach of the Anti‑Kickback Statute was also broadened by the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010, as amended by the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010, or collectively PPACA, which, among other things, amended the intent requirement of the federal Anti‑Kickback Statute such that a person or entity no longer needs to have actual knowledge of this statute or specific intent to violate it in order to have committed a violation. In addition, PPACA provides that the government may assert that a claim including items or services resulting from a violation of the federal Anti‑Kickback Statute constitutes a false or fraudulent claim for purposes of the civil False Claims Act or the civil monetary penalties statute, which imposes penalties against any person who is determined to have presented or caused to be presented a claim to a federal health program that the person knows or should know is for an item or service that was not provided as claimed or is false or fraudulent. PPACA also created new federal requirements for reporting, by applicable manufacturers of covered drugs of payments and other transfers of value to physicians and teaching hospitals.

 

The federal False Claims Act prohibits any person from knowingly presenting, or causing to be presented, a false claim for payment to the federal government or knowingly making, using or causing to be made or used a false record or statement material to a false or fraudulent claim to the federal government. A claim includes “any request or demand” for money or property presented to the U.S. government. Several pharmaceutical and other healthcare companies have been prosecuted under these laws for allegedly providing free product to customers with the expectation that the customers would bill federal programs for the product. Other companies have been prosecuted for causing false claims to be submitted because of the companies’ marketing of products for unapproved, and thus non‑reimbursable, uses.

 

The federal Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, or HIPAA, created new federal criminal statutes that prohibit knowingly and willfully executing a scheme to defraud any healthcare benefit program, including private third party payors and knowingly and willfully falsifying, concealing or covering up a material fact or making any materially false, fictitious or fraudulent statement in connection with the delivery of or payment for healthcare benefits, items or services. Also, many states have similar fraud and abuse statutes or regulations that apply to items and services reimbursed under Medicaid and other state programs, or, in several states, apply regardless of the payor.

 

In addition, we may be subject to data privacy and security regulation by both the federal government and the states in which we conduct our business. HIPAA, as amended by the Health Information Technology and Clinical Health Act, or HITECH, and their respective implementing regulations, including the final omnibus rule published on January 25, 2013, imposes specified requirements relating to the privacy, security and transmission of individually identifiable health information. Among other things, HITECH makes HIPAA’s privacy and security standards directly applicable to “business associates,” defined as independent contractors or agents of covered entities that create, receive, maintain or transmit protected health information in connection with providing a service for or on behalf of a covered entity. HITECH also increased the civil and criminal penalties that may be imposed against covered entities, business associates and possibly other persons, and gave state attorneys general new authority to file civil actions for damages or injunctions in federal courts to enforce the federal HIPAA laws and seek attorney’s fees and costs associated with

pursuing federal civil actions. In addition, state laws govern the privacy and security of health information in certain circumstances, many of which differ from each other in significant ways and may not have the same effect, thus complicating compliance efforts.

 

Because of the breadth of these laws and the narrowness of available statutory and regulatory exemptions, it is possible that some of our business activities could be subject to challenge under one or more of such laws. If our operations are found to be in violation of any of the federal or state laws described above or any other governmental regulations that apply to us, we may be subject to penalties, including criminal and significant civil monetary penalties, damages, fines, imprisonment, exclusion from participation in government healthcare programs, and the curtailment or restructuring of our operations, any of which could adversely affect our ability to operate our business and our results of operations. To the extent that any of our products are sold in a foreign country, we may be subject to similar foreign laws and regulations, which may include, for instance, applicable post‑marketing requirements, including safety surveillance, anti‑fraud and abuse laws, and implementation of corporate compliance programs and reporting of payments or transfers of value to healthcare professionals.

 

Coverage and Reimbursement

 

The commercial success of our product candidates and our ability to commercialize any approved product candidates successfully will depend in part on the extent to which governmental payor programs at the federal and state levels, including Medicare and Medicaid, private health insurers and other third party payors provide coverage for and establish adequate reimbursement levels for our product candidates. Government health administration authorities, private health insurers and other organizations generally decide which drugs they will pay for and establish reimbursement levels for healthcare. In particular, in the United States, private health insurers and other third party payors often provide reimbursement for products and services based on the level at which the government provides reimbursement through the Medicare or Medicaid programs for such treatments. In the United States, the European Union and other potentially significant markets for our product candidates, government authorities and third party payors are increasingly attempting to limit or regulate the price of medical products and services, particularly for new and innovative products and therapies, which often has resulted in average selling prices lower than they would otherwise be. Further, the increased emphasis on managed healthcare in the United States and on country and regional pricing and reimbursement controls in the European Union will put additional pressure on product pricing, reimbursement and usage, which may adversely affect our future product sales and results of operations. These pressures can arise from rules and practices of managed care groups, judicial decisions and governmental laws and regulations related to Medicare, Medicaid and healthcare reform, pharmaceutical coverage and reimbursement policies and pricing in general.

 

Third party payors are increasingly imposing additional requirements and restrictions on coverage and limiting reimbursement levels for medical products. For example, federal and state governments reimburse covered prescription drugs at varying rates generally below average wholesale price. These restrictions and limitations influence the purchase of healthcare services and products. Third‑ party payors may limit coverage to specific drug products on an approved list, or formulary, which might not include all of the FDA‑approved drug products for a particular indication. Third party payors are increasingly challenging the price and examining the medical necessity and cost‑effectiveness of medical products and services, in addition to their safety and efficacy. We may need to conduct expensive pharmacoeconomic studies in order to demonstrate the medical necessity and cost‑effectiveness of our products, in addition to the costs required to obtain the FDA approvals. Our product candidates may not be considered medically necessary or cost‑effective. A payor’s decision to provide coverage for a drug product does not imply that an adequate reimbursement rate will be approved. Adequate third party reimbursement may not be available to enable us to maintain price levels sufficient to realize an appropriate return on our investment in drug development. Legislative proposals to reform healthcare or reduce costs under government insurance programs may result in lower reimbursement for our products and product candidates or exclusion of our products and product candidates from coverage. The cost containment measures that healthcare payors and providers are instituting and any healthcare reform could significantly reduce our revenue from the sale of any approved product candidates. We cannot provide any assurances that we will be able to obtain and maintain third party coverage or adequate reimbursement for our product candidates in whole or in part.

 

Impact of Healthcare Reform on Coverage, Reimbursement and Pricing

 

The United States and some foreign jurisdictions are considering enacting or have enacted a number of additional legislative and regulatory proposals to change the healthcare system in ways that could affect our ability to sell our products profitably. Among policy makers and payors in the United States and elsewhere, there is significant

interest in promoting changes in healthcare systems with the stated goals of containing healthcare costs, improving quality and expanding access. In the United States, the pharmaceutical industry has been a particular focus of these efforts and has been significantly affected by major legislative initiatives. For example, the Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement, and Modernization Act of 2003, or the MMA, imposed new requirements for the distribution and pricing of prescription drugs for Medicare beneficiaries. Under Part D, Medicare beneficiaries may enroll in prescription drug plans offered by private entities that provide coverage of outpatient prescription drugs. Part D plans include both standalone prescription drug benefit plans and prescription drug coverage as a supplement to Medicare Advantage plans. Unlike Medicare Part A and B, Part D coverage is not standardized. Part D prescription drug plan sponsors are not required to pay for all covered Part D drugs, and each drug plan can develop its own drug formulary that identifies which drugs it will cover and at what tier or level. However, Part D prescription drug formularies must include drugs within each therapeutic category and class of covered Part D drugs, though not necessarily all the drugs in each category or class. Any formulary used by a Part D prescription drug plan must be developed and reviewed by a pharmacy and therapeutic committee. Government payment for some of the costs of prescription drugs may increase demand for any products for which we receive marketing approval. However, any negotiated prices for our future products covered by a Part D prescription drug plan will likely be lower than the prices we might otherwise obtain. Moreover, while the MMA applies only to drug benefits for Medicare beneficiaries, private payors often follow Medicare coverage policy and payment limitations in setting their own payment rates. Any reduction in payment that results from Medicare Part D may result in a similar reduction in payments from non‑governmental payors.

 

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 provides funding for the federal government to compare the effectiveness of different treatments for the same illness. A plan for the research will be developed by the Department of Health and Human Services, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality and the National Institutes of Health, and periodic reports on the status of the research and related expenditures will be made to Congress. Although the results of the comparative effectiveness studies are not intended to mandate coverage policies for public or private payors, it is not clear what effect, if any, the research will have on the sales of any product, if any such product or the condition that it is intended to treat is the subject of a study. It is also possible that comparative effectiveness research demonstrating benefits in a competitor’s product could adversely affect the sales of our product candidates. If third party payors do not consider our product candidates to be cost‑effective compared to other available therapies, they may not cover our product candidates, once approved, as a benefit under their plans or, if they do, the level of payment may not be sufficient to allow us to sell our products on a profitable basis.

 

PPACA became law in March 2010 and substantially changes the way healthcare is financed by both governmental and private insurers. Among other cost containment measures, the PPACA establishes an annual, nondeductible fee on any entity that manufactures or imports specified branded prescription drugs and biologic agents; a new Medicare Part D coverage gap discount program; and a new formula that increases the rebates a manufacturer must pay under the Medicaid Drug Rebate Program. In the future, there may continue to be additional proposals relating to the reform of the U.S. healthcare system, some of which could further limit the prices we are able to charge for our product candidates, once approved, or the amounts of reimbursement available for our product candidates once they are approved.

 

In addition, other legislative changes have been proposed and adopted since PPACA was enacted. In August 2011, the Budget Control Act of 2011, as amended, was signed into law. Among other things, this law created the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction to propose spending reductions to Congress. The Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction did not achieve its targeted deficit reduction of at least $1.2 trillion for the years 2013 through 2021, triggering the legislation’s automatic reductions to several government programs. These reductions include aggregate reductions to Medicare payments to providers of 2% per fiscal year, which went into effect on April 1, 2013, and will remain in effect through 2024 unless additional Congressional action is taken. In January 2013, the American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012 became law, which, among other things, further reduced Medicare payments to several providers and increased the statute of limitations period for the government to recover overpayments to providers from three to five years. These and other healthcare reform initiatives may result in additional reductions in Medicare and other healthcare funding. In 2017, President Trump and the Republican Congressional leadership have vowed to repeal and replace PPACA. We cannot anticipate what impact any such replacement or other future healthcare reform initiatives will have on coverage and reimbursement of our products or our business more generally.

 

Exclusivity and Approval of Competing Products

 

Hatch‑Waxman Patent Exclusivity

 

In seeking approval for a drug through an NDA, applicants are required to list with the FDA each patent with claims that cover the applicant’s product or a method of using the product. Upon approval of a drug, each of the patents listed in the application for the drug is then published in the FDA’s Approved Drug Products with Therapeutic Equivalence Evaluations, commonly known as the Orange Book. Drugs listed in the Orange Book can, in turn, be cited by potential competitors in support of approval of an abbreviated new drug application, or ANDA, or 505(b)(2) NDA. Generally, an ANDA provides for marketing of a drug product that has the same active ingredients in the same strengths, dosage form and route of administration as the listed drug and has been shown to be bioequivalent through in vitro or in vivo testing or otherwise to the listed drug. ANDA applicants are not required to conduct or submit results of preclinical or clinical tests to prove the safety or effectiveness of their drug product, other than the requirement for bioequivalence testing. Drugs approved in this way are commonly referred to as “generic equivalents” to the listed drug, and can often be substituted by pharmacists under prescriptions written for the original listed drug. 505(b)(2) NDAs generally are submitted for changes to a previously approved drug product, such as a new dosage form or indication.

 

The ANDA or 505(b)(2) NDA applicant is required to certify to the FDA concerning any patents listed for the approved product in the FDA’s Orange Book, except for patents covering methods of use for which the ANDA applicant is not seeking approval. Specifically, the applicant must certify with respect to each patent that:

 

 

 

 

 

Generally, the ANDA or 505(b)(2) NDA cannot be approved until all listed patents have expired, except when the ANDA or 505(b)(2) NDA applicant challenges a listed drug. A certification that the proposed product will not infringe the already approved product’s listed patents or that such patents are invalid or unenforceable is called a Paragraph IV certification. If the applicant does not challenge the listed patents or indicate that it is not seeking approval of a patented method of use, the ANDA or 505(b)(2) NDA application will not be approved until all the listed patents claiming the referenced product have expired.

 

If the ANDA or 505(b)(2) NDA applicant has provided a Paragraph IV certification to the FDA, the applicant must also send notice of the Paragraph IV certification to the NDA and patent holders once the application has been accepted for filing by the FDA. The NDA and patent holders may then initiate a patent infringement lawsuit in response to the notice of the Paragraph IV certification. The filing of a patent infringement lawsuit within 45 days after the receipt of notice of the Paragraph IV certification automatically prevents the FDA from approving the ANDA or 505(b)(2) NDA until the earlier of 30 months, expiration of the patent, settlement of the lawsuit or a decision in the infringement case that is favorable to the ANDA applicant.

 

Hatch‑Waxman Non‑Patent Exclusivity

 

Market and data exclusivity provisions under the FDCA also can delay the submission or the approval of certain applications for competing products. The FDCA provides a five‑year period of non‑patent data exclusivity within the United States to the first applicant to gain approval of an NDA for a new chemical entity. A drug is a new chemical entity if the FDA has not previously approved any other new drug containing the same active moiety, which is the molecule or ion responsible for the activity of the drug substance. During the exclusivity period, the FDA may not accept for review an ANDA or a 505(b)(2) NDA submitted by another company that contains the previously approved active moiety. However, an ANDA or 505(b)(2) NDA may be submitted after four years if it contains a certification of patent invalidity or noninfringement.

 

The FDCA also provides three years of marketing exclusivity for an NDA, 505(b)(2) NDA, or supplement to an existing NDA or 505(b)(2) NDA if new clinical investigations, other than bioavailability studies, that were conducted or sponsored by the applicant, are deemed by the FDA to be essential to the approval of the application or supplement. Three‑year exclusivity may be awarded for changes to a previously approved drug product, such as new indications, dosages, strengths or dosage forms of an existing drug. This three‑year exclusivity covers only the conditions of use associated with the new clinical investigations and, as a general matter, does not prohibit the FDA from approving ANDAs or 505(b)(2) NDAs for generic versions of the original, unmodified drug product. Five‑year and three‑year exclusivity will not delay the submission or approval of a full NDA; however, an applicant submitting a full NDA would be required to conduct or obtain a right of reference to all of the preclinical studies and adequate and well‑controlled clinical trials necessary to demonstrate safety and effectiveness.

 

Pediatric Exclusivity

 

Pediatric exclusivity is another type of non‑patent marketing exclusivity in the United States and, if granted, provides for the attachment of an additional six months of marketing protection to the term of any existing regulatory exclusivity, including the non‑patent exclusivity periods described above. This six‑month exclusivity may be granted if an NDA sponsor submits pediatric data that fairly respond to a written request from the FDA for such data. The data do not need to show the product to be effective in the pediatric population studied; rather, if the clinical trial is deemed to fairly respond to the FDA’s request, the additional protection is granted. If reports of requested pediatric studies are submitted to and accepted by FDA within the statutory time limits, whatever statutory or regulatory periods of exclusivity or Orange Book listed patent protection cover the drug are extended by six months. This is not a patent term extension, but it effectively extends the regulatory period during which the FDA cannot approve an ANDA or 505(b)(2) application owing to regulatory exclusivity or listed patents. When any of our products is approved, we anticipate seeking pediatric exclusivity when it is appropriate.

 

Foreign Regulation

 

To market any product outside of the United States, we would need to comply with numerous and varying regulatory requirements of other countries regarding safety and efficacy and governing, among other things, clinical trials, marketing authorization, commercial sales and distribution of our products. For example, in the European Union, we must obtain authorization of a clinical trial application, or CTA, in each member state in which we intend to conduct a clinical trial. Whether or not we obtain FDA approval for a product, we would need to obtain the necessary approvals by the comparable regulatory authorities of foreign countries before we can commence clinical trials or marketing of the product in those countries. The approval process varies from country to country and can involve additional product testing and additional administrative review periods. The time required to obtain approval in other countries might differ from and be longer than that required to obtain FDA approval. Regulatory approval in one country does not ensure regulatory approval in another, but a failure or delay in obtaining regulatory approval in one country may negatively impact the regulatory process in others.

 

Employees

 

As of December 31, 2016, we had 72 employees, all of whom are located in the United States. None of our employees are represented by a labor union or covered by a collective bargaining agreement. We consider our relationship with our employees to be good.

 

Corporate Information

 

We were incorporated under the laws of the State of Delaware in November 2007. Our principal executive offices are located at 1018 West 8th Avenue, Suite A, King of Prussia, Pennsylvania 19406. Our telephone number is (610) 354‑8840.

 

Available Information

 

Our Annual Report on Form 10‑K, Quarterly Reports on Form 10‑Q, Current Reports on Form 8‑K, and other filings with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission, or the SEC, and all amendments to these filings, are available, free of charge, on our website at www.trevenainc.com as soon as reasonably practicable following our filing of any of these reports with the SEC. You can also obtain copies free of charge by contacting our Investor Relations

department at our office address listed below. The public may read and copy any materials we file with the SEC at the SEC’s Public Reference Room at 100 F Street NE, Room 1580, Washington, DC 20549. The public may obtain information on the operation of the Public Reference Room by calling the SEC at 1‑800‑SEC‑0330. The SEC maintains an Internet site that contains reports, proxy, and information statements, and other information regarding issuers that file electronically with the SEC at www.sec.gov. The information posted on or accessible through these websites are not incorporated into this filing.

 

We are an “emerging growth company,” as defined in the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act of 2012. We will remain an emerging growth company until the earlier of (1) the last day of the fiscal year (a) following the fifth anniversary of the completion of our initial public offering in February 2014, (b) in which we have total annual gross revenue of at least $1.0 billion, or (c) in which we are deemed to be a large accelerated filer, which means the market value of our common stock that is held by non‑affiliates exceeded $700.0 million as of the prior June 30th, and (2) the date on which we have issued more than $1.0 billion in non‑convertible debt during the prior three‑year period. We refer to the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act of 2012 in this Annual Report on Form 10‑K as the “JOBS Act,” and references to “emerging growth company” have the meaning associated with it in the JOBS Act.

 

EXECUTIVE OFFICERS OF THE REGISTRANT

 

 

Maxine Gowen, Ph.D.

 

Dr. Gowen has served as our President and Chief Executive Officer and as a member of our board of directors since our founding in November 2007. Prior to joining our company, Dr. Gowen was Senior Vice President for the Center of Excellence for External Drug Discovery at GlaxoSmithKline plc, or GSK, where she held a variety of leadership positions during her tenure of 15 years. Before GSK, Dr. Gowen was Senior Lecturer and Head, Bone Cell Biology Group, Department of Bone and Joint Medicine, of the University of Bath, U.K. Dr. Gowen has served as a director of Akebia Therapeutics, Inc. since July 2014 and Idera Pharmaceuticals, Inc. since January 2016. From 2008 until 2012, Dr. Gowen served as a director of Human Genome Sciences, Inc., a public biopharmaceutical company. Dr. Gowen also serves on the boards of BIO, the biotechnology industry association, and its affiliate, Life Sciences PA. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Sheffield, U.K., an M.B.A. with academic honors from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, and a B.Sc. with Honors in Biochemistry from the University of Bristol, U.K.

 

Carrie L. Bourdow

 

Ms. Bourdow has served as our Senior Vice President and Chief Commercial Officer since May 2015. From May 2013 to May 2015, she was Vice President of Marketing at Cubist Pharmaceuticals, Inc. Prior to joining Cubist in 2013, Ms. Bourdow served for more than 20 years at Merck & Co., Inc., where she held positions of increasing responsibility across several therapeutic areas including anti‑infectives, acute heart failure, and pain. Ms. Bourdow earned her B.A. from Hendrix College and her M.B.A. from Southern Illinois University.

 

Roberto Cuca

 

Mr. Cuca joined our company as Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer in September 2013. Prior to joining us, he held various leadership positions in the finance organization of Endo Health Solutions Inc., a pharmaceutical company, from March 2010 to August 2013, including, most recently, Treasurer and Senior Vice President, Finance. Prior to that, he was Director, Corporate and Business Development, at moksha8 Pharmaceuticals, Inc., an emerging markets‑focused pharmaceutical company, from March 2008 until February 2010. From 2005 until 2008, he worked at JPMorgan Chase & Co. as an equity analyst covering U.S. pharmaceutical

companies. Mr. Cuca received an M.B.A. from the Wharton School of The University of Pennsylvania, a J.D. from Cornell Law School, an A.B. from Princeton University, and he is a CFA charterholder.

 

Yacoub Habib, Ph.D.

 

Dr. Habib has served as our Senior Vice President, Business Development and Corporate Planning since July 2015. Previously, from 2009 to June 2015, he served as Vice President of Business Development at Ikaria, Inc. and led the business development strategy for the company until its acquisition. From 2007 to 2009, he served as Executive Director of New Business Development for Pfizer Inc. Before joining Pfizer, Dr. Habib was Executive Director of Global Business Development for Organon Pharmaceuticals, a division of Akzo Nobel, where he was responsible for the identification, evaluation, and negotiation of in‑licensing, out‑licensing and divestiture opportunities in neuroscience, fertility, and women health. He started his career at Bristol‑Myers Squibb where he spent nine years in various research, corporate, and business development roles including as Director of Corporate and Business Development. Dr. Habib holds a Ph.D. in pharmaceutical sciences from the University of Maryland and an M.B.A. with a major in finance and marketing from New York University Stern School of Business.

 

Michael W. Lark, Ph.D.

 

Dr. Lark has served in a number of capacities with our company since February 2008, and since March 2011 has served as Senior Vice President, Research and Chief Scientific Officer. Prior to joining our company, he was Vice President of Biology at Centocor Inc., a division of Johnson & Johnson, or Centocor, from 2004 until 2008 and the Senior Director of Cardiovascular and Metabolic Diseases at Centocor from 2002 to 2004. Prior to that, Dr. Lark was Director of Musculoskeletal Diseases at GSK, from 1999 until 2002. Dr. Lark received his Ph.D. in Molecular Biology and Microbiology from the Case Western Reserve University Medical School and his B.S. in Microbiology from the Pennsylvania State University.

 

John M. Limongelli, Esq.

 

Mr. Limongelli joined our company as Senior Vice President, General Counsel and Corporate Secretary in May 2014 and was appointed Chief Administrative Officer in March 2016. Prior to this, he was Vice President, Associate Chief Counsel and Corporate Secretary at Cigna Corporation from September 2013 until May 2014. From October 2012 to September 2013, he was a partner at the law firm Royer Cooper Cohen Braunfeld LLC. He served as Senior Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary at Adolor Corporation from September 2008 until December 2011. Prior to Adolor, Mr. Limongelli held roles of increasing responsibility with Cephalon, Inc., most recently serving as Vice President and Associate General Counsel. Mr. Limongelli began his legal career in private practice with Morgan, Lewis & Bockius, LLP. Prior to his legal career, Mr. Limongelli was a certified public accountant with KPMG LLP. Mr. Limongelli obtained both his J.D. and M.B.A. from Temple University.

 

David Soergel, M.D.

 

Dr. Soergel has served in multiple positions since joining our company in November 2009 and currently serves as our Senior Vice President, Clinical Development and Chief Medical Officer. Prior to joining our company, he served as Senior Director, Clinical Development for Concert Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a biotechnology company, from July 2008 to November 2009. Prior to Concert, Dr. Soergel served as Director, Discovery Medicine, in the Cardiovascular Urogenital Center of Excellence in Drug Discovery at GSK, from 2005 until 2008. Dr. Soergel received an M.D. from Cornell University Medical College and a B.A. from The Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Soergel completed his clinical training in pediatric cardiology at Johns Hopkins Hospital and underwent additional training in heart failure and transplant at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.

 

ITEM 1A.  RISK FACTORS

 

Our business is subject to numerous risks. You should carefully consider the following risks and all other information contained in this Annual Report on Form 10‑K, as well as general economic and business risks, together with any other documents we file with the SEC. If any of the following events actually occur or risks actually materialize, it could have a material adverse effect on our business, operating results and financial condition and cause the trading price of our common stock to decline.

 

Risks Related to Our Financial Position and Capital Needs

 

We have incurred significant losses since our inception. We expect to incur losses over the next several years and may never achieve or maintain profitability.

 

Since inception, we have incurred significant operating losses. Our net loss was $103.0 million, $50.5 million and $49.7 million for the years ended December 31, 2016, 2015, and 2014, respectively. As of December 31, 2016, we had an accumulated deficit of $285.6 million. To date, we have financed our operations primarily through private placements and public offerings of our equity securities and debt borrowings. We have devoted substantially all of our financial resources and efforts to research and development, including preclinical studies and clinical trials. We still have not completed development of any of our product candidates. We expect to continue to incur significant expenses and operating losses over the next several years. Our net losses may fluctuate significantly from quarter to quarter and year to year. We anticipate that our expenses will increase substantially as we:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To become and remain profitable, we must succeed in developing and eventually commercializing products that generate significant revenue. This will require us to be successful in a range of challenging activities, including completing preclinical testing and clinical trials of our product candidates, discovering additional product candidates, potentially entering into collaboration and license agreements, obtaining regulatory approval for product candidates and manufacturing, marketing and selling any products for which we may obtain regulatory approval. We are only in the preliminary stages of some of these activities and have not begun others. We may never succeed in these activities and, even if we do, may never achieve profitability.

 

Because of the numerous risks and uncertainties associated with pharmaceutical product development, we are unable to accurately predict the timing or amount of increased expenses or when, or if, we will be able to achieve profitability. If we are required by the FDA or foreign regulatory authorities, to perform studies in addition to those currently expected, or if there are any delays in completing our clinical trials, making necessary regulatory filings, or the development of any of our product candidates, our expenses could increase.

 

Even if we do achieve profitability, we may not be able to sustain or increase profitability on a quarterly or annual basis. Our failure to become and remain profitable would depress the value of our company and could impair our ability to raise capital, expand our business, maintain our research and development efforts, diversify our product offerings or even continue our operations. A decline in the value of our company also could cause you to lose all or part of your investment.

We will need substantial additional funding, which may not be available to us on acceptable terms, or at all. If we are unable to raise capital when needed, we could be forced to delay, reduce or eliminate our product development programs or commercialization efforts.

We expect our expenses to increase in connection with our ongoing activities, particularly as we complete enrollment in the remaining Phase 3 clinical trial for OLINVO, continue research and development, and initiate additional clinical trials of, and seek regulatory approval for, OLINVO and our other product candidates. In addition, if we obtain regulatory approval for any of our product candidates, we expect to incur significant commercialization expenses related to product manufacturing, marketing, sales, and distribution. Accordingly, we will need to obtain substantial additional funding in connection with our continuing operations. If we are unable to raise capital when needed or on attractive terms, we could be forced to:

 

 

 

We estimate that our existing cash and cash equivalents and marketable securities as of December 31, 2016, together with interest thereon, will enable us to fund our operating expenses and capital expenditure requirements into the second quarter of 2018. Accordingly, we expect that we will need to raise substantial additional funds in the future. Our future capital requirements will depend on many factors, including:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Identifying potential product candidates and conducting preclinical testing and clinical trials is a time-consuming, expensive and uncertain process that takes years to complete. Despite these efforts, we may never generate the necessary data or results required to obtain regulatory approval and achieve product sales. For example, in May 2016, we announced that TRV027 failed to meet either the primary or secondary endpoints of the BLAST-AHF Phase 2b clinical trial. In addition, our product candidates, if approved, may not achieve commercial success or meet our expectations. Our commercial revenue, if any, will be derived from sales of products that we do not expect to be commercially available for at least two years, if at all. Accordingly, we will need to continue to rely on additional financing to achieve our business objectives. Adequate additional financing may not be available to us on acceptable terms, or at all. In addition, we may seek additional capital due to favorable market conditions or strategic considerations, even if we believe we have sufficient funds for our current or future operating plans.

Raising additional capital may cause dilution to our stockholders, restrict our operations, or require us to relinquish rights to our technologies or product candidates.

Until such time, if ever, as we can generate substantial product revenue and positive cash flows from operations, we expect to finance our cash needs through a combination of equity offerings, debt financings, and license and development agreements in connection with any collaborations. We do not have any committed external source of funds. To the extent that we raise additional capital through the sale of equity or convertible debt securities, your ownership interest will be diluted, either at the time of such capital raise or thereafter, and the terms of these securities may include liquidation or other preferences that adversely affect your rights as a common stockholder. Preferred equity financing and additional debt financing, if available, may involve agreements that include covenants limiting or restricting our ability to take specific actions, such as incurring additional debt, making capital expenditures, or declaring dividends.

If we raise additional funds through collaborations, strategic alliances, or marketing, distribution or licensing arrangements with third parties, we may have to relinquish valuable rights to our technologies, future revenue streams, research programs or product candidates or grant licenses on terms that may not be favorable to us. If we are unable to raise additional funds through equity or debt financings when needed, we may be required to delay, limit, reduce or terminate our product development or future commercialization efforts or grant rights to develop and market product candidates that we would otherwise prefer to develop and market ourselves.

Our limited operating history may make it difficult for you to evaluate the success of our business to date and to assess our future viability.

 

We commenced active operations in late 2007, and our activities to date have been limited to, among other things, organizing and staffing our company, business planning, raising capital, developing our ABLE product platform, identifying potential product candidates, undertaking preclinical studies and conducting clinical trials. With the exception of OLINOVO, our product candidates are early in development. We have not yet demonstrated our ability to successfully complete all necessary later stage clinical trials, obtain regulatory approvals, manufacture a product at commercial scale or arrange for a third party to do so on our behalf, or conduct sales, marketing, and distribution activities necessary for successful product commercialization. Consequently, any predictions you make about our future success or viability may not be as reliable as they could be if we had a longer operating history.

 

In addition, as a young business, we may encounter unforeseen expenses, difficulties, complications, delays, and other known and unknown factors. We will need to significantly expand our capabilities to support future activities related to the approval, manufacture, and commercialization of our product candidates. We may be unsuccessful in adding such capabilities.

 

We expect our financial condition and operating results to continue to fluctuate significantly from quarter to quarter and year to year due to a variety of factors, many of which are beyond our control. Accordingly, you should not rely upon the results of any past quarterly or annual periods as indications of future operating performance.

 

Risks Related to the Discovery and Development of Our Product Candidates

 

Our research and development efforts are focused on discovering and developing novel drugs based on biased ligands, and the approach we are taking to discover and develop drugs is not proven and may never lead to marketable products.

 

The discovery and development of drugs based on biased ligands is an emerging field, and the scientific discoveries that form the basis for our efforts to discover and develop product candidates are relatively new. The scientific evidence to support the feasibility of developing differentiated product candidates based on these discoveries is both preliminary and limited. We believe that we are the first company to conduct a clinical trial of a product candidate based on the concept of biased ligands. Therefore, we do not know if our approach will be successful or will ultimately lead to the approval of any current or future product candidate.

We are early in our development efforts and have only one product candidate, OLINVO, in Phase 3 development. If we are unable to successfully complete development and commercialization of our product candidates, either on our own or with a partner, or experience significant delays in doing so, our business will be materially harmed.

We are early in our development efforts and have only one product candidate, OLINVO, that is in Phase 3 development. We have invested substantially all of our efforts and financial resources in the identification and development of biased ligands. Our ability to generate product revenue, which we do not expect will occur for at least two years, if ever, will depend heavily on the successful development and eventual commercialization of our product candidates. The success of our product candidates will depend on several factors, including the following:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

If we do not achieve one or more of these factors in a timely manner or at all, we could experience significant delays or an inability to successfully commercialize our product candidates, which would materially harm our business.

Even though OLINVO has received breakthrough therapy designation and fast track designation for the management of moderate-to-severe acute pain, there can be no assurance that such designations will result in expedited review or approval.

 

Breakthrough therapy designation and fast track designation are intended to expedite the development and review of products that address unmet medical needs for serious conditions. We have received breakthrough therapy designation and fast track designation for OLINVO for the management of moderate-to-severe acute pain, but there can be no assurance that such designations ultimately will result in expedited review or approval. Furthermore, the FDA may

rescind the breakthrough therapy designation if it determines that subsequent data no longer support the designation. Fast track designation and breakthrough therapy designation do not change the standards for product approval.

 

The reported results of OLINVO are based on top-line data and may ultimately differ from actual results once additional data are received and fully evaluated.

 

The reported results of OLINVO that we have publicly disclosed, and that are discussed herein, consist of top-line data. Top-line data are based on a preliminary analysis of currently-available efficacy and safety data, and therefore the reported results, findings and conclusions related to OLINVO are subject to change following a comprehensive review of the more extensive data that we expect to receive related to OLINVO. Top-line data are based on important assumptions, estimations, calculations, and information currently available to us, and we have not received or had an opportunity to fully and carefully evaluate all of the data related to OLINVO. As a result, the top-line results of OLINVO that we have reported may differ from future results, or different conclusions or considerations may qualify such results, once additional data have been received and fully evaluated. In addition, third parties, including regulatory agencies, may not accept or agree with our assumptions, estimations, calculations or analyses or may interpret or weigh the importance of data differently, which could impact the value of OLINVO, the approvability or commercialization of OLINVO, and our business in general. If the top-line data that we have reported related to OLINVO differ from actual results, our ability to obtain approval for, and commercialize, our products may be harmed, which could harm our business, financial condition, operating results or prospects.

 

We may not be successful in our efforts to expand our pipeline of product candidates.

 

One element of our strategy is to expand our pipeline of therapeutics based on biased ligands and advance these product candidates through clinical development for the treatment of a variety of indications. Although our research and development efforts to date have resulted in a number of development programs based on biased ligands, we may not be able to develop product candidates that are safe and effective. Even if we are successful in continuing to expand our pipeline, the potential product candidates that we identify may not be suitable for clinical development, including as a result of being shown to have harmful side effects or other characteristics that indicate that they are unlikely to receive marketing approval and achieve market acceptance. If we do not successfully develop and commercialize product candidates based upon our technological approach, we will not be able to obtain product revenue in future periods, which would make it unlikely that we would ever achieve profitability.

 

Preclinical and clinical drug development involves a lengthy and expensive process, with an uncertain outcome. We may incur additional costs or experience delays in completing, or ultimately be unable to complete, the development and commercialization of our product candidates.

 

Clinical testing is expensive, can take many years to complete, and has a high risk of failure. It is impossible to predict when or if any of our product candidates will prove effective or safe in humans or will receive regulatory approval. Before obtaining marketing approval from regulatory authorities for the sale of any product candidate, we must complete preclinical studies and then conduct extensive clinical trials to demonstrate the safety and efficacy of our product candidates in humans. A failure of one or more clinical trials can occur at any stage of testing. The outcome of preclinical testing and early clinical trials may not be predictive of the success of later clinical trials, and interim results of a clinical trial do not necessarily predict final results. Moreover, preclinical and clinical data often are susceptible to varying interpretations and analyses, and many companies that have believed their product candidates performed satisfactorily in preclinical studies and clinical trials have nonetheless failed to obtain marketing approval of their products. We may experience numerous unforeseen events during, or as a result of, clinical trials, which could delay or prevent our ability to receive marketing approval or subsequently to commercialize our product candidates, including:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

If we are required to conduct additional clinical trials or other testing of our product candidates beyond those that we currently contemplate, if we are unable to successfully complete clinical trials of our product candidates or other testing, if the results of these trials or tests are not positive or are only modestly positive or if there are safety concerns, we may:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our product development costs also will increase if we experience delays in testing or in receiving marketing approvals. We do not know whether any of our preclinical studies or clinical trials will begin as planned, will need to be restructured or will be completed on schedule, or at all. Significant preclinical study or clinical trial delays also could shorten any periods during which we may have the exclusive right to commercialize our product candidates or allow our competitors to bring products to market before we do and impair our ability to successfully commercialize our product candidates, thereby harming our business and results of operations.

If we experience delays or difficulties in the enrollment of patients in clinical trials, our receipt of necessary regulatory approvals could be delayed or prevented.

We may not be able to initiate or continue clinical trials for our product candidates if we are unable to locate and enroll a sufficient number of eligible patients to participate in these trials as required by the FDA or similar regulatory authorities outside the United States. Some of our competitors have ongoing clinical trials for product candidates that treat the same indications as our product candidates, and patients who would otherwise be eligible for our

clinical trials may instead enroll in clinical trials of our competitors' product candidates. Patient enrollment is affected by other factors including:

Our inability to enroll a sufficient number of patients for our clinical trials would result in significant delays and could require us to abandon one or more clinical trials altogether. Enrollment delays in our clinical trials may result in increased development costs for our product candidates, which would cause the value of our company to decline and limit our ability to obtain additional financing.

If serious adverse or unacceptable side effects are identified during the development of our product candidates, we may need to abandon or limit our development of some of our product candidates.

If our product candidates are associated with adverse side effects in clinical trials or have characteristics that are unexpected, we may need to abandon their development or limit development to more narrow uses or subpopulations in which the side effects or other characteristics are less prevalent, less severe, or more acceptable from a risk-benefit perspective. In our industry, many compounds that initially showed promise in early stage testing have later been found to cause side effects that prevented further development of the compound or significantly limited its commercial opportunity. In the event that our clinical trials reveal a high and unacceptable severity and prevalence of side effects, our trials could be suspended or terminated, and the FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authorities could order us to cease further development or deny approval of our product candidates for any or all targeted indications. Drug-related side effects could affect patient recruitment or the ability of enrolled patients to complete the trial and could result in potential product liability claims.

Additionally if one or more of our product candidates receives marketing approval, and we or others later identify undesirable side effects caused by such products, a number of potentially significant negative consequences could result, including:

 

 

 

 

Any of these events could prevent us from achieving or maintaining market acceptance of the particular product candidate, if approved.

 

OLINVO is predominantly metabolized by two liver enzymes, CYP2D6 and CYP3A4, that are common metabolic pathways for drugs. Because of competitive use of these pathways, we may need to conduct additional drug

interaction studies and OLINVO may be limited in its co-administration with other drugs using these pathways as their safety and effectiveness, as well as OLINVO's, may be adversely affected. This could limit our commercial opportunity due to the common co-administration of drugs in patients with moderate-to-severe acute pain requiring IV therapy. In addition, since CYP2D6 enzyme activity varies in the population, different dosing may be required in the product label for individuals that have low levels of CYP2D6 activity, which could limit the commercial opportunity of the drug, if approved. We continue to discuss this question with the FDA and cannot assure you that the FDA will not require us to utilize different dosing for this population and/or prospectively characterize individuals' CYP2D6 activity prior to administering OLINVO.

 

OLINVO and TRV734 are both biased ligands targeted at the µ-opioid receptor. Common adverse reactions for agonists of the µ-opioid receptor include respiratory depression, constipation, nausea, vomiting, and addiction. In rare cases, µ-opioid receptor agonists can cause respiratory arrest requiring immediate medical intervention. Since OLINVO and TRV734 also modulate the µ-opioid receptor, these adverse reactions and risks likely will apply to the use of OLINVO and TRV734. One healthy subject in the 0.25 mg dosing cohort of our Phase 1 clinical trial of OLINVO experienced a severe episode of vasovagal syncope during which he fainted and his pulse stopped. These were considered severe adverse events. It is possible that serious adverse vasovagal events could occur in other patients dosed with OLINVO. Agonists at the -opioid receptor have been associated with a risk of seizures. TRV250, our -opioid receptor product candidate, targets the same receptor as other programs that have been associated with seizures and, accordingly, it is possible that it will be associated with similar side effects.  In such case, we likely would discontinue further development of TRV250 for the treatment of migraines.

 

We may expend our limited resources to pursue a particular product candidate or indication and thereby fail to capitalize on other product candidates or indications that may be more profitable or for which there is a greater likelihood of success.

 

Because we have limited financial and managerial resources, we focus on research programs and product candidates that we identify for specific indications. As a result, we may forego or delay pursuit of opportunities with other product candidates or for other indications that later prove to have fewer clinical or regulatory risks and/or greater commercial potential. Our resource allocation decisions may cause us to fail to capitalize on viable commercial products or profitable market opportunities. Our spending on current and future research and development programs and product candidates for specific indications may not yield any commercially viable products. If we do not accurately evaluate the commercial potential or target market for a particular product candidate, we may relinquish valuable rights to that product candidate through collaboration, licensing or other royalty arrangements in cases in which it would have been more advantageous for us to retain sole development and commercialization rights to such product candidate.

 

Risks Related to the Commercialization of Our Product Candidates

 

Even if any of our product candidates receives marketing approval, it may fail to achieve the degree of market acceptance by physicians, patients, third‑ party payors, and others in the medical community necessary for commercial success.

 

If any of our product candidates receives marketing approval, it may nonetheless fail to gain sufficient market acceptance by physicians, patients, third party payors, and others in the medical community. If our product candidates do not achieve an adequate level of acceptance, we may not generate significant product revenue and we may not become profitable. The degree of market acceptance of our product candidates, if approved for commercial sale, will depend on a number of factors, including:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

If we are unable to establish manufacturing, sales, marketing, and distribution capabilities or to enter into agreements with third parties to produce, market, and sell our product candidates, we may not be successful in commercializing our product candidates if and when they are approved.

We currently have limited resources focused on the manufacturing, marketing, sales and distribution of pharmaceutical products and have limited experience and capabilities in this area. To commercialize any product candidates that receive marketing approval, we would need to build manufacturing, marketing, sales, distribution, managerial and other non-technical capabilities or make arrangements with third parties to perform these services, and we may not be successful in doing so. If we successfully develop and obtain regulatory approval for any of our product candidates, we expect to build a targeted specialist sales force to market or co-promote the product in the United States; we currently do not expect to build sales, manufacturing and distribution capabilities outside of the United States, although this expectation could change in the future. There are substantial risks involved with establishing our own sales, marketing and distribution capabilities. For example, recruiting and training a sales force is expensive and time consuming and could delay any product launch. If the commercial launch of a product candidate for which we recruit a sales force and establish marketing capabilities is delayed or does not occur for any reason, we would have prematurely or unnecessarily incurred these commercialization expenses. This may be costly, and our investment would be lost if we cannot retain or reposition our sales and marketing personnel.

There are a number of factors that may inhibit our efforts to commercialize our products on our own, including:

 

 

 

As an alternative to establishing our own sales force, we may choose to partner with third parties that have well-established direct sales forces to sell, market and distribute our products, particularly in markets outside of the United States. If we are unable to enter into collaborations with third parties for the commercialization of approved products, if any, on acceptable terms or at all, or if any such partner does not devote sufficient resources to the commercialization of our product or otherwise fails in commercialization efforts, we may not be able to successfully commercialize any of our product candidates that receive regulatory approval.

For OLINVO, we will need to partner with one or more third parties to sell, market and distribute this product, if approved, outside the United States. We may be unsuccessful in our efforts to secure such partnerships.

We face substantial competition, which may result in others discovering, developing, or commercializing products before or more successfully than we do.

The development and commercialization of new drug products is highly competitive. We face competition with respect to our current product candidates, and will face competition with respect to any product candidates that we may seek to develop or commercialize in the future, from major pharmaceutical companies, specialty pharmaceutical companies and biotechnology companies worldwide. In addition to existing therapeutic treatments for the indications we are targeting with our product candidates, which our goal would be to displace or to be used in conjunction with, if any of our product candidates achieves regulatory approval, we also face potential competition from other drug candidates in development by other companies. OLINVO also may compete against, or be used in combination with, OFIRMEV®, marketed by Mallinckrodt plc, EXPAREL®, marketed by Pacira Pharmaceuticals, Inc., CALDOLOR®, marketed by Cumberland Pharmaceuticals, DYLOJECT™, marketed by Pfizer Inc., and IONSYS® marketed by The Medicines Company. In addition to currently marketed IV analgesics, we are aware of a number of products in development that are aimed at improving the treatment of moderate-to-severe acute pain. AcelRx Pharmaceuticals, Inc. is developing a range of acute pain products involving sufentanil oral nanotabs in hand-held dispensers (DSUVIA™ and ZALVISO™). Durect Corporation, Innocoll Holdings plc, and Heron Therapeutics all have proprietary long-acting reformulations of bupivacaine in development. Recro Pharmaceuticals is developing an IV version of the NSAID meloxicam. Cara Therapeutics Inc. is developing an IV and oral peripherally restricted -opioid receptor agonist, which has been administered in combination with µ-opioids in clinical trials. Some of these potential competitive compounds are being developed by large, well-financed, and experienced pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, or have been partnered with such companies, which may give them development, regulatory and marketing advantages over us.

Our commercial opportunity could be reduced or eliminated if our competitors develop and commercialize products that are safer, more effective, have fewer or less severe side effects, are more convenient or are less expensive than any products that we may develop. Our competitors also may obtain FDA or other regulatory approval for their products more rapidly than we may obtain approval for ours, which could result in our competitors establishing a strong market position before we are able to enter the market. In addition, our ability to compete may be affected in many cases by insurers or other third party payors seeking to encourage the use of generic products. Generic products are currently on the market for the indications that we are pursuing. If our product candidates achieve marketing approval, we expect that they will be priced at a significant premium over competing generic products.

Some of the companies against which we are competing or against which we may compete in the future have significantly greater financial resources and expertise than we do in research and development, manufacturing, preclinical testing, conducting clinical trials, obtaining regulatory approvals, and selling and marketing approved products. Mergers and acquisitions in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries may result in even more resources being concentrated among a smaller number of our competitors. Smaller and other early stage companies also may prove to be significant competitors, particularly through collaborative arrangements with large and established companies. These third parties compete with us in recruiting and retaining qualified scientific and management personnel, establishing clinical trial sites and patient registration for clinical trials, as well as in acquiring technologies complementary to, or necessary for, our programs.

 

Even if we or any future collaborators are able to commercialize any of our product candidates, the product candidates may become subject to unfavorable pricing regulations, third party coverage and reimbursement policies, healthcare reform initiatives, or regulatory or political concerns.

 

Both our and our collaborators’ ability to commercialize any of our product candidates successfully will depend, in part, on the extent to which coverage and adequate reimbursement for these products and related treatments will be available from government payor programs at the federal and state level, including Medicare and Medicaid, private health insurers, managed care plans and other organizations. Government authorities and third party payors, such as private health insurers and health maintenance organizations, decide which medications they will pay for and establish reimbursement levels. In addition, for hospital products, a private health insurer or Medicare will typically reimburse a fixed fee for certain procedures, including in‑patient surgeries. Pharmaceutical products such as OLINVO, if approved, that may be used in connection with the surgery generally will not be separately reimbursed and, therefore, a hospital would have to assess the cost of OLINVO, if approved, relative to its benefits. Current or future efforts to limit the level of reimbursement for in‑patient hospital procedures could cause a hospital to decide not to use OLINVO, if approved by the FDA. A primary trend in the U.S. healthcare industry and elsewhere is cost containment. Government authorities and third party payors have attempted to control costs by limiting coverage and the amount of reimbursement for particular

medications or procedures. Increasingly, third party payors are requiring that drug companies provide them with predetermined discounts from list prices and are challenging the prices charged for medical products. Coverage and reimbursement may not be available for any drug that we or our collaborators commercialize and, even if these are available, the level of reimbursement for a product or procedure may not be satisfactory. Inadequate reimbursement levels may adversely affect the demand for, or the price of, any product candidate for which we or our collaborators obtain marketing approval. Obtaining and maintaining adequate reimbursement for our products may be difficult. We may be required to conduct expensive pharmacoeconomic studies to seek to justify coverage and reimbursement or the level of reimbursement relative to other therapies. If coverage and adequate reimbursement are not available or reimbursement is available only to limited levels, we or our collaborators may not be able to successfully commercialize any product candidates for which marketing approval is obtained.

 

There may be significant delays in obtaining coverage and reimbursement for newly approved drugs, and coverage may be more limited than the indications for which the drug is approved by the FDA or analogous regulatory authorities outside the United States. Moreover, eligibility for coverage and reimbursement does not imply that a drug will be paid for in all cases or at a rate that covers our costs, including research, development, manufacture, sale, and distribution expenses. Interim reimbursement levels for new drugs, if applicable, also may not be sufficient to cover our costs and may not be made permanent. Reimbursement rates may vary according to the use of the drug and the clinical setting in which it is used, may be based on reimbursement levels already set for lower cost drugs and may be incorporated into existing payments for other services. Net prices for drugs may be reduced by mandatory discounts or rebates required by government healthcare programs or private payors and by any future relaxation of laws that presently restrict imports of drugs from countries where they may be sold at lower prices than in the United States. Third party payors often rely upon Medicare coverage policy and payment limitations in setting their own reimbursement policies. Our or our collaborators’ inability to promptly obtain coverage and adequate reimbursement rates from both government‑ funded and private payors for any approved drugs that we develop could adversely affect our operating results, our ability to raise capital needed to commercialize drugs and our overall financial condition.

 

The regulations that govern marketing approvals, pricing, coverage and reimbursement for new drugs vary widely from country to country. Current and future legislation may significantly change the approval requirements in ways that could involve additional costs and cause delays in obtaining approvals. Some countries require approval of the sale price of a drug before it can be marketed. In many countries, the pricing review period begins after marketing or licensing approval is granted. In some foreign markets, prescription pharmaceutical pricing remains subject to continuing governmental control even after initial approval is granted. As a result, we or our collaborators might obtain marketing approval for a drug in a particular country, but then be subject to price regulations that delay commercial launch of the drug, possibly for lengthy time periods, and negatively impact our ability to generate revenue from the sale of the drug in that country. Adverse pricing limitations may hinder our ability to recoup our investment in one or more product candidates, even if our product candidates obtain marketing approval.

 

In addition to the above factors, the approval and commercialization of OLINVO may be negatively impacted by changing perceptions in the United States and elsewhere among regulators, legislators, and the general public concerning the approval, use, and abuse of prescription opioid products. In the future, the FDA and other regulatory and legislative bodies may enact regulations that seek to limit opioid prescribing and use. In response to these efforts and changing perceptions, physicians may determine to reduce the volume of opioid prescriptions they prescribe to patients. Any of these changes could negatively impact both the timing and likelihood of FDA approval of OLINVO, as well as the commercial opportunity, if approved.

 

There can be no assurance that our product candidates, if they are approved for sale in the United States or in other countries, will be considered medically reasonable and necessary for a specific indication, that they will be considered cost‑effective by third party payors, that coverage or an adequate level of reimbursement will be available, or that third party payors’ reimbursement policies will not adversely affect our ability to profitably sell our product candidates if they are approved for sale.

 

Product liability lawsuits against us could cause us to incur substantial liabilities and limit commercialization of any products that we may develop.

 

We face an inherent risk of product liability exposure related to the testing of our product candidates in human clinical trials and will face an even greater risk if we commercially sell any products that we may develop. For example, we may be sued if any product we develop allegedly causes injury or is found to be otherwise unsuitable during clinical

testing, manufacturing, marketing or sale. Any such product liability claims may include allegations of defects in manufacturing, defects in design, a failure to warn of dangers inherent in the product, negligence, strict liability or a breach of warranties. If we cannot successfully defend ourselves against claims that our product candidates or products caused injuries, we will incur substantial liabilities. Regardless of merit or eventual outcome, liability claims may result in:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We currently maintain $15 million in product liability insurance coverage, which may be inadequate to cover all liabilities that we may incur. We will likely need to increase our insurance coverage as we expand our clinical trials or if we commence commercialization of our product candidates. Insurance coverage is increasingly expensive. We may not be able to maintain insurance coverage at a reasonable cost or in an amount adequate to satisfy any liability that may arise.

 

Risks Related to Our Dependence on Third Parties

 

Any future relationships or collaborations we may enter into may be important to us. If we are unable to maintain our relationship with any of these collaborations, or if our relationship with these collaborators is not successful, our business could be adversely affected.

 

We have limited capabilities for product development, sales, marketing and distribution. For our product candidates, we may in the future determine to collaborate with pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies for the development and potential commercialization of these candidates. We face significant competition in seeking appropriate collaborators. Our ability to reach a definitive agreement for collaboration will depend, among other things, upon our assessment of the collaborator’s resources and expertise, the terms and conditions of the proposed collaboration and the proposed collaborator’s evaluation of a number of factors. If we are unable to reach agreements with suitable collaborators on a timely basis, on acceptable terms, or at all, we may have to curtail the development of a product candidate, reduce or delay its development program or one or more of our other development programs, delay its potential commercialization or reduce the scope of any sales or marketing activities or increase our expenditures and undertake development or commercialization activities at our own expense. If we elect to fund and undertake development or commercialization activities on our own, we may need to obtain additional expertise and additional capital, which may not be available to us on acceptable terms or at all. If we fail to enter into collaborations and do not have sufficient funds or expertise to undertake the necessary development and commercialization activities, we may not be able to further develop our product candidates or bring them to market or continue to develop our product platform and our business may be materially and adversely affected.

 

Any future collaborations we might enter into with another third party, may pose a number of risks, including the following:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

If any collaborations we might enter into in the future do not result in the successful development and commercialization of products or if one of our collaborators terminates its agreement with us, we may not receive any future research funding or milestone or royalty payments under the collaboration. If we do not receive the funding we expect under these agreements, our development of our product platform and product candidates could be delayed and we may need additional resources to develop our product candidates and our product platform. The risks relating to our

product development, regulatory approval and commercialization described in this Annual Report also apply to the activities of our therapeutic program collaborators.

 

If a future collaborator of ours is involved in a business combination, the collaborator might deemphasize or terminate development or commercialization of any product candidate licensed to it by us. If one of our collaborators terminates its agreement with us, we may find it more difficult to attract new collaborators and our reputation in the business and financial communities could be adversely affected.

 

We rely, and expect to continue to rely, on third parties to conduct our preclinical studies and clinical trials, and those third parties may not perform satisfactorily, including failing to meet deadlines for the completion of such trials or complying with applicable regulatory requirements.

 

We rely on third party contract research organizations and clinical research organizations to conduct some of our preclinical studies and all of our clinical trials for our product candidates. We expect to continue to rely on third parties, such as contract research organizations, clinical research organizations, clinical data management organizations, medical institutions, and clinical investigators, to conduct some of our preclinical studies and all of our clinical trials. The agreements with these third parties might terminate for a variety of reasons, including a failure to perform by the third parties. If we need to enter into alternative arrangements, that could delay our product development activities.

 

Our reliance on these third parties for research and development activities will reduce our control over these activities but will not relieve us of our responsibilities. For example, we will remain responsible for ensuring that each of our preclinical studies and clinical trials are conducted in accordance with the general investigational plan and protocols for the trial and for ensuring that our preclinical studies are conducted in accordance with good laboratory practice, or GLP, as appropriate. Moreover, the FDA requires us to comply with standards, commonly referred to as good clinical practices, or GCPs, for conducting, recording and reporting the results of clinical trials to assure that data and reported results are credible and accurate and that the rights, integrity and confidentiality of trial participants are protected. Regulatory authorities enforce these requirements through periodic inspections of trial sponsors, clinical investigators, and trial sites. If we or any of our clinical research organizations fail to comply with applicable GCPs, the clinical data generated in our clinical trials may be deemed unreliable and the FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authorities may require us to perform additional clinical trials before approving our marketing applications. We cannot assure you that upon inspection by a given regulatory authority, such regulatory authority will determine that any of our clinical trials complies with GCP regulations. In addition, our clinical trials must be conducted with product produced under current good manufacturing practice, or cGMP, regulations. Our failure to comply with these regulations may require us to repeat clinical trials, which would delay the regulatory approval process. We also are required to register ongoing clinical trials and post the results of completed clinical trials on a government‑sponsored database, ClinicalTrials.gov, within specified timeframes. Failure to do so can result in fines, adverse publicity and civil and criminal sanctions.

 

The third parties with whom we have contracted to help perform our preclinical studies or clinical trials also may have relationships with other entities, some of which may be our competitors. If these third parties do not successfully carry out their contractual duties, meet expected deadlines, or conduct our preclinical studies or clinical trials in accordance with regulatory requirements or our stated protocols, we will not be able to obtain, or may be delayed in obtaining, marketing approvals for our product candidates and will not be able to, or may be delayed in our efforts to, successfully commercialize our product candidates.

 

If any of our relationships with these third party contract research organizations or clinical research organizations terminate, we may not be able to enter into arrangements with alternative contract research organizations or clinical research organizations or to do so on commercially reasonable terms. Switching or adding additional contract research organizations or clinical research organizations involves additional cost and requires management time and focus. In addition, there is a natural transition period when a new contract research organization or clinical research organization commences work. As a result, delays could occur that could compromise our ability to meet our desired development timelines. Although we seek to carefully manage our relationships with our contract research organizations and clinical research organizations, there can be no assurance that we will not encounter similar challenges or delays in the future.

We contract with third parties for the manufacture of our product candidates for preclinical and clinical testing and expect to continue to do so for commercialization. This reliance on third parties increases the risk that we will not have sufficient quantities of our product candidates or products or such quantities at an acceptable cost, which could delay, prevent or impair our development or commercialization efforts.

We have limited internal manufacturing capabilities and do not have any manufacturing facilities. In addition, our product candidates have never been manufactured at commercial scale. We rely, and expect to continue to rely, on third parties for the manufacture of our product candidates for preclinical and clinical testing, as well as for commercial manufacture, if any, of our product candidates receive marketing approval. This reliance on third parties increases the risk that we will not have sufficient quantities of our product candidates or products or such quantities at an acceptable cost or quality, which could delay, prevent or impair our development or commercialization efforts.

We also expect to rely on third party manufacturers or third party collaborators for the manufacture of commercial supply of any product candidates for which our collaborators or we obtain marketing approval. We may be unable to establish any agreements with third party manufacturers or to do so on acceptable terms. Even if we are able to establish agreements with third party manufacturers, reliance on third party manufacturers entails additional risks, including:

The facilities used by our contract manufacturers to manufacture our product candidates and, potentially in the future, our products must be approved by the FDA pursuant to inspections that will be conducted after we submit an NDA to the FDA. We do not control the manufacturing process of, and are completely dependent on, our contract manufacturers for compliance with current cGMP regulations for manufacture of our product candidates. Third party manufacturers may not be able to comply with the cGMP regulations or similar regulatory requirements outside the United States. Our failure, or the failure of our third party manufacturers, to comply with applicable regulations could result in sanctions being imposed on us, including clinical holds, fines, injunctions, civil penalties, delays, suspension or withdrawal of approvals, license revocation, seizures or recalls of product candidates or products, operating restrictions and criminal prosecutions, any of which could significantly and adversely affect supplies of our products.

Our product candidates and any products that we may commercialize likely will compete with other product candidates and products for access to manufacturing facilities. There are a limited number of manufacturers that operate under cGMP regulations and that might be capable of manufacturing for us. Any performance failure on the part of our existing or future manufacturers could delay clinical development or marketing approval. We do not currently have arrangements in place for redundant supply or a second source for bulk drug substance. If our current contract manufacturers cannot perform as agreed, we may be required to replace such manufacturers. We may incur added costs and delays in identifying and qualifying any replacement manufacturers.

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, or DEA, restricts the importation of a controlled substance finished drug product when the same substance is commercially available in the United States, which could reduce the number of potential alternative manufacturers for our µ-opioid receptor targeted product candidates, including OLINVO. In addition, a DEA quota system controls and limits the availability and production of controlled substances and the DEA also has authority to grant or deny requests for quota of controlled substances, which will likely include the active ingredients in OLINVO. Supply disruptions could result from delays in obtaining DEA approvals for controlled

substances or from the receipt of quota of controlled substances that are insufficient to meet future product demand. The quota system also may limit our ability to build inventory as a method for mitigating possible supply disruptions if OLINVO is approved for sale in the United States.

Our current and anticipated future dependence upon others for the manufacture of our product candidates or products may adversely affect our future profit margins and our ability to commercialize any products that receive marketing approval on a timely and competitive basis.

We also expect to rely on other third parties to store and distribute drug supplies for our clinical trials. Any performance failure on the part of our distributors could delay clinical development or marketing approval of our product candidates or commercialization of our products, producing additional losses and depriving us of potential product revenue.

We rely on clinical data and results obtained by third parties that could ultimately prove to be inaccurate or unreliable.

 

As part of our strategy to mitigate development risk, we seek to develop product candidates with validated mechanisms of action and we utilize biomarkers to assess potential clinical efficacy early in the development process. This strategy necessarily relies upon clinical data and other results obtained by third parties that may ultimately prove to be inaccurate or unreliable. Further, such clinical data and results may be based on products or product candidates that are significantly different from our product candidates. If the third party data and results we rely upon prove to be inaccurate, unreliable or not applicable to our product candidates, we could make inaccurate assumptions and conclusions about our product candidates and our research and development efforts could be compromised.

 

Risks Related to Our Intellectual Property

If we are unable to obtain and maintain patent protection for our technology and products or if the scope of the patent protection obtained is not sufficiently broad, our competitors could develop and commercialize technology and products similar or identical to ours, and our ability to successfully commercialize our technology and products may be impaired.

Our success depends in large part on our ability to obtain and maintain patent protection in the United States and other countries with respect to our product candidates. We seek to protect our proprietary position by filing patent applications in the United States and abroad related to our product candidates.

The patent prosecution process is expensive and time-consuming, and we may not be able to file and prosecute all necessary or desirable patent applications at a reasonable cost or in a timely manner. It is also possible that we will fail to identify patentable aspects of our research and development output before it is too late to obtain patent protection. Should we enter into collaborations with third parties, we may be required to consult with or cede control to collaborators regarding the prosecution, maintenance and enforcement of our patents. Therefore, these patents and applications may not be prosecuted and enforced in a manner consistent with the best interests of our business.

The patent position of biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies generally is highly uncertain, involves complex legal and factual questions and has in recent years been the subject of much litigation. In addition, the laws of foreign countries may not protect our rights to the same extent as the laws of the United States. For example, European patent law restricts the patentability of methods of treatment of the human body more than United States law does. Publications of discoveries in the scientific literature often lag behind the actual discoveries, and patent applications in the United States and other jurisdictions are typically not published until 18 months after a first filing, or in some cases at all. Therefore, we cannot know with certainty whether we were the first to make the inventions claimed in our owned or licensed patents or pending patent applications, or that we were the first to file for patent protection of such inventions. As a result, the issuance, scope, validity, enforceability and commercial value of our patent rights are highly uncertain. Our pending and future patent applications may not result in patents being issued which protect our technology or products, in whole or in part, or which effectively prevent others from commercializing competitive technologies and products. Changes in either the patent laws or interpretation of the patent laws in the United States and other countries may diminish the value of our patents or narrow the scope of our patent protection.

The Leahy-Smith America Invents Act, or the Leahy-Smith Act, could increase the uncertainties and costs surrounding the prosecution of our patent applications and the enforcement or defense of our issued patents. On September 16, 2011, the Leahy-Smith Act was signed into law. The Leahy-Smith Act includes a number of significant changes to United States patent law. These include provisions that affect the way patent applications are prosecuted and may also affect patent litigation. The United States Patent and Trademark Office continues to develop and implement new regulations and procedures to govern administration of the Leahy-Smith Act, and many of the substantive changes to patent law associated with the Leahy-Smith Act, and in particular, the first to file provisions, only became effective on March 16, 2013. Accordingly, it is not clear what, if any, impact the Leahy-Smith Act will have on the operation of our business. However, the Leahy-Smith Act and its implementation could increase the uncertainties and costs surrounding the prosecution of our patent applications and the enforcement or defense of our issued patents, all of which could have a material adverse effect on our business and financial condition.

Moreover, we may be subject to a third party preissuance submission of prior art to the United States Patent and Trademark Office, or become involved in opposition, derivation, reexamination, inter partes review, post-grant review or interference proceedings challenging our patent rights or the patent rights of others. An adverse determination in any such submission, proceeding or litigation could reduce the scope of, render unenforceable, or invalidate, our patent rights, allow third parties to commercialize our technology or products and compete directly with us, without payment to us, or result in our inability to manufacture or commercialize products without infringing third party patent rights. In addition, if the breadth or strength of protection provided by our patents and patent applications is threatened, it could dissuade companies from collaborating with us to license, develop or commercialize current or future product candidates.

Even if our patent applications issue as patents, they may not issue in a form that will provide us with any meaningful protection, prevent competitors from competing with us, or otherwise provide us with any competitive advantage. Our competitors may be able to circumvent our owned or licensed patents by developing similar or alternative technologies or products in a non-infringing manner.

The issuance of a patent does not foreclose challenges to its inventorship, scope, validity or enforceability. Therefore, our owned and licensed patents may be challenged in the courts or patent offices in the United States and abroad. Such challenges may result in loss of exclusivity or freedom to operate or in patent claims being narrowed, invalidated or held unenforceable, in whole or in part, which could limit our ability to stop others from using or commercializing similar or identical technology and products, or limit the duration of the patent protection of our technology and products. Given the amount of time required for the development, testing and regulatory review of new product candidates, patents protecting such product candidates might expire before or shortly after such product candidates are commercialized. As a result, our owned and licensed patent portfolio may not provide us with sufficient rights to exclude others from commercializing products similar or identical to ours.

We may become involved in lawsuits to protect or enforce our patents or other intellectual property, which could be expensive, time consuming and unsuccessful.

 

Competitors may infringe our issued patents or other intellectual property. To counter infringement or unauthorized use, we may be required to file infringement claims, which can be expensive and time consuming. Any claims we assert against perceived infringers could provoke these parties to assert counterclaims against us alleging that we infringe their patents. In addition, in a patent infringement proceeding, a court may decide that a patent of ours is invalid or unenforceable, in whole or in part, construe the patent’s claims narrowly or refuse to stop the other party from using the technology at issue on the grounds that our patents do not cover the technology in question. An adverse result in any litigation proceeding could put one or more of our patents at risk of being invalidated, rendered unenforceable, or interpreted narrowly.

 

We may need to license certain intellectual property from third parties, and such licenses may not be available or may not be available on commercially reasonable terms.

 

A third party may hold intellectual property, including patent rights that are important or necessary to the development of our products. It may be necessary for us to use the patented or proprietary technology of third parties to commercialize our products, in which case we would be required to obtain a license from these third parties on commercially reasonable terms, or our business could be harmed, possibly materially.

 

Third parties may initiate legal proceedings alleging that we are infringing their intellectual property rights, the outcome of which would be uncertain and could have a material adverse effect on the success of our business.

 

Our commercial success depends upon our ability, and the ability of our collaborators, to develop, manufacture, market and sell our product candidates and use our proprietary technologies without infringing the proprietary rights of third parties. There is considerable intellectual property litigation in the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries. We may become party to, or threatened with, future adversarial proceedings or litigation regarding intellectual property rights with respect to our products and technology, including interference or derivation proceedings before the United States Patent and Trademark Office. Third parties may assert infringement claims against us based on existing patents or patents that may be granted in the future.

 

If we are found to infringe a third party’s intellectual property rights, we could be required to obtain a license from such third party to continue developing and marketing our products and technology. However, we may not be able to obtain any required license on commercially reasonable terms or at all. Even if we were able to obtain a license, it could be non‑exclusive, thereby giving our competitors access to the same technologies licensed to us. We could be forced, including by court order, to cease commercializing the infringing technology or product. In addition, we could be found liable for monetary damages, including treble damages and attorneys’ fees if we are found to have willfully infringed a patent. A finding of infringement could prevent us from commercializing our product candidates or force us to cease some of our business operations, which could materially harm our business. Claims that we have misappropriated the confidential information or trade secrets of third parties could have a similar negative impact on our business.

 

If we fail to comply with our obligations in our intellectual property licenses and funding arrangements with third parties, we could lose rights that are important to our business.

 

We are currently party to license agreements for technologies that we use in conducting our drug discovery activities. In the future, we may become party to licenses that are important for product development and commercialization. If we fail to comply with our obligations under current or future license and funding agreements, our counterparties may have the right to terminate these agreements, in which event we might not be able to develop, manufacture or market any product or utilize any technology that is covered by these agreements or may face other penalties under the agreements. Such an occurrence could materially and adversely affect the value of a product candidate being developed under any such agreement or could restrict our drug discovery activities. Termination of these agreements or reduction or elimination of our rights under these agreements may result in our having to negotiate new or reinstated agreements with less favorable terms, or cause us to lose our rights under these agreements, including our rights to important intellectual property or technology.

 

We may be subject to claims by third parties asserting that our employees or we have misappropriated their intellectual property, or claiming ownership of what we regard as our own intellectual property.

 

Many of our employees were previously employed at universities or other biotechnology or pharmaceutical companies, including our competitors or potential competitors. Although we try to ensure that our employees do not use the proprietary information or know‑how of others in their work for us, we may be subject to claims that these employees or we have used or disclosed intellectual property, including trade secrets or other proprietary information, of any such employee’s former employer. Litigation may be necessary to defend against these claims.

 

In addition, while it is our policy to require our employees and contractors who may be involved in the development of intellectual property to execute agreements assigning such intellectual property to us, we may be unsuccessful in executing such an agreement with each party who in fact develops intellectual property that we regard as our own. Our and their assignment agreements may not be self‑executing or may be breached, and we may be forced to bring claims against third parties, or defend claims they may bring against us, to determine the ownership of what we regard as our intellectual property.

 

If we fail in prosecuting or defending any such claims, in addition to paying monetary damages, we may lose valuable intellectual property rights or personnel. Even if we are successful in prosecuting or defending against such claims, litigation could result in substantial costs and be a distraction to management.

 

Intellectual property litigation could cause us to spend substantial resources and distract our personnel from their normal responsibilities.

 

Even if resolved in our favor, litigation or other legal proceedings relating to intellectual property claims may cause us to incur significant expenses, and could distract our technical and management personnel from their normal responsibilities. In addition, there could be public announcements of the results of hearings, motions or other interim proceedings or developments and if securities analysts or investors perceive these results to be negative, it could have a substantial adverse effect on the price of our common stock. Such litigation or proceedings could substantially increase our operating losses and reduce the resources available for development activities or any future sales, marketing or distribution activities. We may not have sufficient financial or other resources to conduct such litigation or proceedings adequately. Some of our competitors may be able to sustain the costs of such litigation or proceedings more effectively than we can because of their greater financial resources. Uncertainties resulting from the initiation and continuation of patent litigation or other proceedings could compromise our ability to compete in the marketplace.

 

If we are unable to protect the confidentiality of our trade secrets, our business and competitive position would be harmed.

 

In addition to seeking patent protection for our product candidates, we rely on trade secrets, including unpatented know‑how, technology and other proprietary information, to maintain our competitive position. We limit disclosure of such trade secrets where possible, but we also seek to protect these trade secrets, in part, by entering into non‑disclosure and confidentiality agreements with parties who do have access to them, such as our employees, corporate collaborators, outside scientific collaborators, contract manufacturers, consultants, advisors, and other third parties. We also enter into confidentiality and invention or patent assignment agreements with our employees and consultants. Despite these efforts, any of these parties may breach the agreements and disclose our proprietary information, including our trade secrets, and we may not be able to obtain adequate remedies for such breaches. Enforcing a claim that a party illegally disclosed or misappropriated a trade secret is difficult, expensive and time‑consuming, and the outcome is unpredictable. In addition, some courts inside and outside the United States are less willing or unwilling to protect trade secrets. If any of our trade secrets were to be lawfully obtained or independently developed by a competitor, we would have no right to prevent them, or those to whom they communicate it, from using that technology or information to compete with us. If any of our trade secrets were to be disclosed to or independently developed by a competitor, our competitive position would be harmed.

 

Risks Related to Regulatory Approval of Our Product Candidates and Other Legal Compliance Matters

 

If we are not able to obtain, or if there are delays in obtaining, required regulatory approvals, we will not be able to timely commercialize, or to commercialize at all, our product candidates, and our ability to generate revenue will be materially impaired.

 

Our product candidates and the activities associated with their development and commercialization, including their design, testing, manufacture, safety, efficacy, recordkeeping, labeling, storage, approval, advertising, promotion, sale and distribution, are subject to comprehensive regulation by the FDA and other regulatory agencies in the United States and by the EMA and similar regulatory authorities outside the United States. Failure to obtain marketing approval for our product candidates will prevent us from commercializing these product candidates and will significantly limit our ability to generate revenue in the future. To date, we have not received approvals to market any of our product candidates from regulatory authorities in any jurisdiction and we may never be successful in obtaining any such approvals.

 

We have only limited experience in filing and supporting the applications necessary to gain marketing approvals, and we expect to rely on third parties to assist us in this process. Securing marketing approval requires the submission of extensive preclinical and clinical data and supporting information to regulatory authorities for each therapeutic indication to establish the product candidate’s safety and efficacy. Securing marketing approval also requires the submission of information about the product manufacturing process to, and inspection of manufacturing facilities by, the regulatory authorities. Our product candidates may not be effective, may be only moderately effective, or may prove to have undesirable or unintended side effects, toxicities or other characteristics that may preclude our obtaining marketing approval or prevent or limit commercial use. If any of our product candidates receives marketing approval, the accompanying label may limit the approved use of our drug in this way, which could limit sales of the product.

 

The process of obtaining marketing approvals, both in the United States and abroad, is expensive, may take many years if approval is obtained at all, and can vary substantially based upon a variety of factors, including the type, complexity, and novelty of the product candidates involved. Changes in marketing approval policies during the development period, changes in or the enactment of additional statutes or regulations, or changes in regulatory review for each submitted product application, may cause delays in the approval or rejection of an application. For OLINVO, if we submit an NDA, we expect the FDA to convene an Advisory Committee as part of the review process. The feedback received from an Advisory Committee can have a substantial impact on the FDA’s decision to approve or reject a product candidate. Regulatory authorities have substantial discretion in the approval process and may refuse to accept any application or may decide that our data are insufficient for approval and require additional preclinical studies or clinical trials. In addition, varying interpretations of the data obtained from preclinical and clinical testing could delay, limit or prevent marketing approval of a product candidate. Any marketing approval we ultimately obtain may be limited or subject to restrictions or post‑approval commitments that render the approved product not commercially viable.

 

If we experience delays in obtaining approval, the commercial prospects for our product candidates may be harmed and our ability to generate revenue may be materially impaired. Furthermore, even if we were to obtain approval, regulatory authorities may approve any of our product candidates for fewer or more limited indications than we request, may not approve the price we intend to charge for our products, may grant approval contingent on the performance of costly post‑marketing clinical trials, or may approve a product candidate with a label that does not include the labeling claims necessary or desirable for the successful commercialization of that product candidate or that includes language, such as a black box warning, that may impair our ability to successfully commercial that product candidate. Any of these scenarios could compromise the commercial prospects for our product candidates.

 

We anticipate that our µ‑opioid receptor targeted product candidates, including OLINVO, will require Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategies, which could delay the approval of these product candidates and increase the cost, burden and liability associated with the commercialization of these product candidates.

 

The FDA Amendments Act of 2007 implemented safety‑related changes to product labeling and provided the FDA with expanded authority to require the adoption of a Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategy, or REMS, to assure safe use of the product candidates, either as a condition of product candidate approval or on the basis of new safety information. We anticipate that our µ‑opioid receptor product candidates, if approved, will require a REMS, and it is possible that our other product candidates may require a REMS. The REMS may include medication guides for patients, special communication plans to health care professionals or elements to assure safe uses such as restricted distribution methods, patient registries and/or other risk minimization tools. We cannot predict the specific REMS that will be required as part of the FDA’s approval of our product candidates. Any of these limitations on approval or marketing could restrict the commercial promotion, distribution, prescription, or dispensing of our product candidates, if approved. Depending on the extent of the REMS requirements, these requirements may significantly increase our costs to commercialize these product candidates and could negatively affect sales. Furthermore, risks of our product candidates that are not adequately addressed through proposed REMS for such product candidates also may prevent or delay their approval for commercialization.

 

Our µ‑opioid receptor targeted product candidates, including OLINVO, may be classified as controlled substances, the making, use, sale, importation, exportation and distribution of which are subject to regulation by state, federal and foreign law enforcement and other regulatory agencies.

 

Our µ‑opioid receptor targeted product candidates, including OLINVO, may be classified as controlled substances, which are subject to state, federal and foreign laws and regulations regarding their manufacture, use, sale, importation, exportation and distribution. Controlled substances are regulated under the Federal Controlled Substances Act of 1970, or CSA, and regulations of the DEA.

 

The DEA regulates controlled substances as Schedule I, II, III, IV or V substances. Schedule I substances by definition have no established medicinal use and may not be marketed or sold in the United States. A pharmaceutical product may be listed as Schedule II, III, IV or V, with Schedule II substances considered to present the highest risk of abuse and Schedule V substances the lowest relative risk of abuse among such substances. We expect OLINVO to be regulated by the DEA as a Schedule II controlled substance.

 

Various states also independently regulate controlled substances. Though state controlled substances laws often mirror federal law, because the states are separate jurisdictions, they may separately schedule drugs as well. While some

states automatically schedule a drug when the DEA does so, in other states there must be rulemaking or a legislative action. State scheduling may delay commercial sale of any controlled substance drug product for which we obtain federal regulatory approval and adverse scheduling could impair the commercial attractiveness of such product. We or our collaborators must also obtain separate state registrations in order to be able to obtain, handle and distribute controlled substances for clinical trials or commercial sale, and failure to meet applicable regulatory requirements could lead to enforcement and sanctions from the states in addition to those from the DEA or otherwise arising under federal law.

 

For any of our product candidates classified as controlled substances, we and our suppliers, manufacturers, contractors, customers and distributors are required to obtain and maintain applicable registrations from state, federal and foreign law enforcement and regulatory agencies and comply with state, federal and foreign laws and regulations regarding the manufacture, use, sale, importation, exportation and distribution of controlled substances. There is a risk that DEA regulations may limit the supply of the compounds used in clinical trials for our product candidates, and, in the future, the ability to produce and distribute our products in the volume needed to both meet commercial demand and build inventory to mitigate possible supply disruptions.

 

Regulations associated with controlled substances govern manufacturing, labeling, packaging, testing, dispensing, production and procurement quotas, recordkeeping, reporting, handling, shipment and disposal. These regulations increase the personnel needs and the expense associated with development and commercialization of product candidates including controlled substances. The DEA, and some states, conduct periodic inspections of registered establishments that handle controlled substances. Failure to obtain and maintain required registrations or comply with any applicable regulations could delay or preclude us from developing and commercializing our product candidates containing controlled substances and subject us to enforcement action. The DEA may seek civil penalties, refuse to renew necessary registrations or initiate proceedings to revoke those registrations. In some circumstances, violations could lead to criminal proceedings. Because of their restrictive nature, these regulations could limit commercialization of any of our product candidates that are classified as controlled substances.

 

Failure to obtain marketing approval in international jurisdictions would prevent our product candidates from being marketed abroad.

 

To market and sell our products in the European Union and many other jurisdictions, we or any future third party collaborators must obtain separate marketing approvals and comply with numerous and varying regulatory requirements. The approval procedure varies among countries and can involve additional testing. The time required to obtain approval may differ substantially from that required to obtain FDA approval. The regulatory approval process outside the United States generally includes all of the risks associated with obtaining FDA approval. In addition, in many countries outside the United States, it is required that the product be approved for reimbursement before the product can be approved for sale in that country. We or our collaborators may not obtain approvals from regulatory authorities outside the United States on a timely basis, if at all. Approval by the FDA does not ensure approval by regulatory authorities in other countries or jurisdictions, and approval by one regulatory authority outside the United States does not ensure approval by regulatory authorities in other countries or jurisdictions or by the FDA. However, the failure to obtain approval in one jurisdiction may compromise our ability to obtain approval elsewhere. We may not be able to file for marketing approvals and may not receive necessary approvals to commercialize our products in any market.

 

Any product candidate for which we obtain marketing approval could be subject to post‑marketing restrictions or withdrawal from the market and we may be subject to penalties if we fail to comply with regulatory requirements or if we experience unanticipated problems with our products, when and if any of them are approved.

 

Any product candidate for which we obtain marketing approval, along with the manufacturing processes, post‑approval clinical data, labeling, advertising, and promotional activities for such product, will be subject to ongoing requirements of and review by the FDA and other regulatory authorities. These requirements include submissions of safety and other post‑marketing information and reports, registration, and listing requirements, cGMP requirements relating to manufacturing, quality control, quality assurance and corresponding maintenance of records and documents, requirements regarding the distribution of samples to physicians and recordkeeping. Even if marketing approval of a product candidate is granted, the approval may be subject to limitations on the indicated uses for which the product may be marketed or to the conditions of approval, including the requirement to implement a REMS. If any of our product candidates receives marketing approval, the accompanying label may limit the approved use of our drug, which could limit sales of the product.

 

The FDA also may impose requirements for costly post‑marketing studies or clinical trials and surveillance to monitor the safety or efficacy of the product. The FDA closely regulates the post‑approval marketing and promotion of drugs to ensure drugs are marketed only for the approved indications and in accordance with the provisions of the approved labeling. The FDA imposes stringent restrictions on manufacturers’ communications regarding off‑label use and if we do not market our products for only their approved indications, we may be subject to enforcement action for off‑label marketing. Violations of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act relating to the promotion of prescription drugs may lead to investigations alleging violations of federal and state health care fraud and abuse laws, as well as state consumer protection laws.

 

In addition, later discovery of previously unknown adverse events or other problems with our products, manufacturers or manufacturing processes, or failure to comply with regulatory requirements, may yield various results, including:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The FDA’s policies may change and additional government regulations may be enacted that could prevent, limit or delay regulatory approval of our product candidates. If we are slow or unable to adapt to changes in existing requirements or the adoption of new requirements or policies, or if we are not able to maintain regulatory compliance, we may lose any marketing approval that we may have obtained.

 

Our current and future relationships with customers and third party payors in the United States and elsewhere may be subject, directly or indirectly, to applicable anti‑kickback, fraud and abuse, false claims, transparency, health information privacy and security and other healthcare laws and regulations, which could expose us to criminal sanctions, civil penalties, contractual damages, reputational harm, administrative burdens and diminished profits and future earnings.

 

Healthcare providers, physicians and third party payors in the United States and elsewhere will play a primary role in the recommendation and prescription of any product candidates for which we obtain marketing approval. Our future arrangements with third party payors and customers may expose us to broadly applicable fraud and abuse and other healthcare laws and regulations, including, without limitation, the federal Anti‑Kickback Statute and the federal False Claims Act, which may constrain the business or financial arrangements and relationships through which we sell, market and distribute any drugs for which we obtain marketing approval. In addition, we may be subject to transparency

laws and patient privacy regulation by U.S. federal and state governments and by governments in foreign jurisdictions in which we conduct our business. The applicable federal, state and foreign healthcare laws and regulations that may affect our ability to operate include:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Efforts to ensure that our business arrangements with third parties will comply with applicable healthcare laws and regulations may involve substantial costs. It is possible that governmental authorities will conclude that our business practices may not comply with current or future statutes, regulations or case law involving applicable fraud and abuse or other healthcare laws and regulations. If our operations are found to be in violation of any of these laws or any other governmental regulations that may apply to us, we may be subject to significant civil, criminal and administrative penalties, including, without limitation, damages, fines, imprisonment, exclusion from participation in government healthcare programs, such as Medicare and Medicaid, and the curtailment or restructuring of our operations, which could have a material adverse effect on our business. If any of the physicians or other healthcare providers or entities with whom we expect to do business, including our collaborators, is found not to be in compliance with applicable laws, it may be subject to criminal, civil or administrative sanctions, including exclusions from participation in government healthcare programs, which also could materially affect our business.

 

Recently enacted and future legislation may increase the difficulty and cost for us to obtain marketing approval of and commercialize our product candidates and affect the prices we may obtain.

 

In the United States and some foreign jurisdictions, there have been a number of legislative and regulatory changes and proposed changes regarding the healthcare system that could prevent or delay marketing approval of our product candidates, restrict or regulate post‑approval activities, and affect our ability to profitably sell any product candidates for which we obtain marketing approval.

 

Among policy makers and payors in the United States and elsewhere, there is significant interest in promoting changes in healthcare systems with the stated goals of containing healthcare costs, improving quality, and expanding access. In the United States, the pharmaceutical industry has been a particular focus of these efforts and has been significantly affected by major legislative initiatives. In March 2010, President Obama signed into law the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, as amended by the Health Care and Education Affordability Reconciliation Act, or collectively, the PPACA, a sweeping law intended to broaden access to health insurance, reduce or constrain the growth of healthcare spending, enhance remedies against fraud and abuse, add new transparency requirements for the healthcare and health insurance industries, impose new taxes and fees on the health industry and impose additional health policy reforms.

 

Among the provisions of the PPACA of importance to our potential product candidates are:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In addition, other legislative changes have been proposed and adopted since the PPACA was enacted. These changes include aggregate reductions to Medicare payments to providers of 2% per fiscal year, which went into effect on April 1, 2013, and will remain in effect through 2024 unless additional Congressional action is taken. The American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012, among other things, further reduced Medicare payments to several providers and increased the statute of limitations period for the government to recover overpayments to providers from three to five years. More recently, President Trump and the Republican Congressional leaders have vowed to repeal and replace PPACA. These new laws may result in additional reductions in Medicare and other healthcare funding, which could have a material adverse effect on customers for our drugs, if approved, and, accordingly, our financial operations.

 

It is possible that healthcare reform measures that may be adopted in the future, may result in more rigorous coverage criteria and in additional downward pressure on the reimbursement that we receive for any approved drug. Any reduction in reimbursement from Medicare or other government healthcare programs may result in a similar reduction in payments from private payors. The implementation of cost containment measures or other healthcare reforms may prevent us from being able to generate revenue, attain profitability or commercialize our drugs.

 

Legislative and regulatory proposals have been made to expand post‑approval requirements and restrict sales and promotional activities for drugs. We cannot be sure whether additional legislative changes will be enacted, or whether the FDA regulations, guidance or interpretations will be changed, or what the impact of such changes on the marketing approvals of our product candidates, if any, may be. In addition, increased scrutiny by the U.S. Congress of the FDA’s approval process may significantly delay or prevent marketing approval, as well as subject us to more stringent product labeling and post‑marketing testing and other requirements.

 

Governments outside the United States tend to impose strict price controls, which may adversely affect our revenue, if any.

 

In some countries, particularly the countries of the European Union, the pricing of prescription pharmaceuticals is subject to governmental control. In these countries, pricing negotiations with governmental authorities can take considerable time after the receipt of marketing approval for a product. To obtain coverage and reimbursement or pricing approval in some countries, we may be required to conduct a clinical trial that compares the cost‑effectiveness of our product candidate to other available therapies. If reimbursement of our products is unavailable or limited in scope or amount, or if pricing is set at unsatisfactory levels, our business could be harmed, possibly materially

 

If we fail to comply with environmental, health, and safety laws and regulations, we could become subject to fines or penalties or incur costs that could harm our business.

 

We are subject to numerous environmental, health, and safety laws and regulations, including those governing laboratory procedures and the handling, use, storage, treatment and disposal of hazardous materials and wastes. Our operations involve the use of hazardous and flammable materials, including chemicals and biological materials. Our operations also produce hazardous waste products. We generally contract with third parties for the disposal of these materials and wastes. We cannot eliminate the risk of contamination or injury from these materials. In the event of contamination or injury resulting from our use of hazardous materials, we could be held liable for any resulting damages, and any liability could exceed our resources. We also could incur significant costs associated with civil or criminal fines and penalties for failure to comply with such laws and regulations.

 

Although we maintain workers’ compensation insurance to cover us for costs and expenses we may incur due to injuries to our employees resulting from the use of hazardous materials, this insurance may not provide adequate coverage against potential liabilities. We do not maintain insurance for environmental liability or toxic tort claims that may be asserted against us in connection with our storage or disposal of biological, hazardous or radioactive materials.

 

In addition, we may incur substantial costs in order to comply with current or future environmental, health, and safety laws and regulations. These current or future laws and regulations may impair our research, development or production efforts. Our failure to comply with these laws and regulations also may result in substantial fines, penalties, or other sanctions.

 

Risks Related to Employee Matters and Managing Our Growth

 

Our future success depends on our ability to retain key executives and to attract, retain and motivate qualified personnel.

 

We are highly dependent on the research, development, clinical, business development, legal, financial, and commercial expertise of our executive officers. Although we have entered into employment agreements with these individuals, each of them may terminate their employment with us at any time. We do not maintain “key person” insurance for any of our executives or other employees.

 

Recruiting and retaining qualified management, scientific, clinical, manufacturing, sales and marketing, and other personnel also will be critical to our success. The loss of the services of our executive officers or other key employees could impede the achievement of our research, development and commercialization objectives and seriously harm our ability to successfully implement our business strategy. Furthermore, replacing executive officers and key employees may be difficult and may take an extended period of time because of the limited number of individuals in our industry with the breadth of skills and experience required to successfully develop, gain regulatory approval of and commercialize products. Competition to hire from this limited pool is intense, and we may be unable to hire, train, retain or motivate these key personnel on acceptable terms given the competition among numerous pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies for similar personnel. We also experience competition for the hiring of scientific and clinical personnel from universities and research institutions. In addition, we rely on consultants and advisors, including scientific, clinical and commercial advisors, to assist us in formulating our research and development and commercialization strategy. Our consultants and advisors may be employed by employers other than us and may have commitments under consulting or advisory contracts with other entities that may limit their availability to us. If we are unable to continue to attract and retain high quality personnel, our ability to pursue our growth strategy will be limited.

 

We expect to expand our development, regulatory, manufacturing, sales, marketing, and distribution capabilities, and as a result, we may encounter difficulties in managing our growth, which could disrupt our operations.

 

We expect to continue to experience significant growth in the number of our employees and the scope of our operations, particularly in the areas of drug development, regulatory affairs, manufacturing, sales, marketing and distribution. To manage our anticipated future growth, we must continue to implement and improve our managerial, operational and financial systems, expand our facilities and continue to recruit and train additional qualified personnel. Due to our limited financial resources and the limited experience of our management team in managing a company with such anticipated growth, we may not be able to effectively manage the expansion of our operations or recruit and train additional qualified personnel. The expansion of our operations may lead to significant costs and may divert our management and business development resources. Any inability to manage growth could delay the execution of our business plans or disrupt our operations.

 

Our employees may engage in misconduct or other improper activities, including noncompliance with regulatory standards and requirements, which could expose us to liability and hurt our reputation.

 

We are exposed to the risk of employee fraud or other misconduct. Misconduct by employees could include intentional failures to comply with FDA regulations, provide accurate information to the FDA, report financial information or data accurately or disclose unauthorized activities to us. Employee misconduct also could involve the improper use or misrepresentation of information obtained in the course of clinical trials, which could result in regulatory sanctions and serious harm to our reputation. It is not always possible to identify and deter employee misconduct, and the precautions we take to detect and prevent this activity may not be effective in controlling unknown or unmanaged risks or losses or in protecting us from governmental investigations or other actions or lawsuits stemming from a failure to be in compliance with such laws or regulations. If any such actions are instituted against us, and we are not successful in defending ourselves or asserting our rights, those actions could have a significant impact on our business and financial results, including the imposition of significant fines or other sanctions.

 

Other Risks Related to our Business

 

We intend to conduct a substantial portion of the clinical trials for our product candidates outside of the United States and, if approved, we intend to market our product candidates abroad through third party collaborators. Accordingly, we will be subject to the risks of doing business outside of the United States.

 

We intend to conduct a substantial portion of our clinical trials outside of the United States and, if approved, we intend to market our product candidates outside of the United States. We are thus subject to risks associated with doing business outside of the United States. With respect to our product candidates, we may choose to partner with third parties that have direct sales forces and established distribution systems, either to augment our own sales force and distribution systems outside of the United States or in lieu of our own sales force and distribution systems, which would indirectly expose us to these risks. Our business and financial results in the future could be adversely affected due to a variety of factors associated with conducting development and marketing of our product candidates, if approved, outside of the United States, including:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our business and operations would suffer in the event of system failures.

 

Despite our implementation of security measures, our internal computer systems and those of our contractors and consultants are vulnerable to damage from computer viruses, unauthorized access, natural disasters, terrorism, war, and telecommunication and electrical failures. If such an event were to occur and cause interruptions in our operations, it could result in a material disruption to our product candidate development programs. For example, the loss of clinical trial data from completed, ongoing or planned clinical trials could result in delays in our regulatory approval efforts and significantly increase our costs to recover or reproduce the data. To the extent that any disruption or security breach were to result in a loss of or damage to our data or applications, or inappropriate disclosure of personal, confidential or proprietary information, we could incur liability and the further development of any of our product candidates could be delayed or abandoned.

 

Risks Related to Ownership of Our Common Stock

 

An active trading market for our common stock may not continue to develop or be sustained.

 

Although our common stock is listed on the NASDAQ Global Select Market, or NASDAQ, we cannot assure you that an active, liquid trading market for our shares will continue to develop or be sustained. If an active market for

our common stock does not continue to develop or is not sustained, it may be difficult for you to sell shares quickly or without depressing the market price for the shares or to sell your shares at all.

 

The trading price of the shares of our common stock has been and may continue to be volatile, and you may not be able to resell some or all of your shares at a desired price.

 

Since our common stock commenced trading in January 2014, our stock price has been highly volatile, with closing stock prices ranging from a high of $13.30 per share to a low of $3.81 per share. The stock market in general and the market for biopharmaceutical companies in particular have experienced extreme volatility that has often been unrelated to the operating performance of particular companies. As a result of this volatility, investors in our stock may not be able to sell their common stock at or above the price paid for the shares. The market price for our common stock may be influenced by many factors, including:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In addition, in the past, stockholders have initiated class action lawsuits against pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies following periods of volatility in the market prices of these companies’ stock. Such litigation, if instituted against us, could cause us to incur substantial costs and divert management’s attention and resources from the operation of our business.

 

If equity research analysts do not continue to publish research or reports or publish unfavorable research or reports about us, our business or our industry, our stock price and trading volume could decline.

 

The trading market for our common stock is influenced by the research and reports that equity research analysts publish about us and our business. As a relatively new public company, we have only limited research coverage by equity research analysts. Equity research analysts may elect not to initiate or continue to provide research coverage of our common stock, and such lack of research coverage may adversely affect the market price of our common stock. We have no control over the analysts or the content and opinions included in their reports. The price of our stock could decline if one or more equity research analysts downgrade our stock or issue other unfavorable commentary or research.

If one or more equity research analysts ceases coverage of our company or fails to publish reports on us regularly, demand for our stock could decrease, which in turn could cause our stock price or trading volume to decline.

 

A significant portion of our total outstanding shares are restricted from immediate resale but may be sold into the market in the near future. This could cause the market price of our common stock to drop significantly, even if our business is doing well.

 

Sales of a substantial number of shares of our common stock in the public market could occur at any time. If our stockholders sell, or the market perceives that our stockholders intend to sell, substantial amounts of our common stock in the public market, the market price of our common stock could decline significantly.

 

In addition, we have filed registration statements on Form S‑8 registering the issuance of shares of common stock subject to options or other equity awards issued or reserved for future issuance under our equity incentive plans. Shares registered under these registration statements on Form S‑8 are available for sale in the public market subject to vesting arrangements and exercise of existing options, the grant of new options in the future, the lock‑up agreements described above and the restrictions of Rule 144 in the case of our affiliates.

 

The issuance of additional stock in connection with financings, acquisitions, investments, our stock incentive plans or otherwise will dilute all other stockholders.

 

Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation authorizes us to issue up to 100,000,000 shares of common stock and up to 5,000,000 shares of preferred stock with such rights and preferences as may be determined by our board of directors. Subject to compliance with applicable rules and regulations, we may issue our shares of common stock or securities convertible into our common stock from time to time in connection with a financing, acquisition, investment, our stock incentive plans or otherwise. Any such issuance could result in substantial dilution to our existing stockholders and cause the trading price of our common stock to decline.

 

Our ability to utilize our net operating loss carryforwards and certain other tax attributes may be limited.

 

We have incurred substantial losses during our history. We do not anticipate generating revenue from sales of products for the foreseeable future, if ever, and we may never achieve profitability. To the extent that we continue to generate tax losses, unused losses will carry forward to offset future taxable income, if any, until such unused losses expire. Under Section 382 of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended, if a corporation undergoes an “ownership change,” which is generally defined as a greater than 50% change, by value, in its equity ownership over a three‑year period, the corporation’s ability to use its pre‑change net operating loss carryforwards and other pre‑change tax attributes to offset its post‑change income may be limited. We have not completed our analysis to determine what, if any, impact any prior ownership change has had on our ability to utilize our net operating loss carryforwards. In addition, we may experience ownership changes in the future as a result of subsequent shifts in our stock ownership. As of December 31, 2016, we had federal net operating loss carryforwards of approximately $38.8 million that could be limited if we have experienced, or if in the future we experience, an ownership change.

 

Provisions in our corporate charter documents and under Delaware law may prevent or frustrate attempts by our stockholders to change our management and hinder efforts to acquire a controlling interest in us, and the market price of our common stock may be lower as a result.

 

There are provisions in our amended and restated certificate of incorporation and amended and restated bylaws that may make it difficult for a third party to acquire, or attempt to acquire, control of our company, even if a change in control was considered favorable by you and other stockholders. For example, our board of directors has the authority to issue up to 5,000,000 shares of preferred stock. The board of directors can fix the price, rights, preferences, privileges, and restrictions of the preferred stock without any further vote or action by our stockholders. The issuance of shares of preferred stock may delay or prevent a change in control transaction. As a result, the market price of our common stock and the voting and other rights of our stockholders may be adversely affected. An issuance of shares of preferred stock may result in the loss of voting control to other stockholders.

 

Our charter documents also contain other provisions that could have an anti‑takeover effect, including:

 

 

 

 

 

 

In addition, we are subject to the anti‑takeover provisions of Section 203 of the Delaware General Corporation Law, which regulates corporate acquisitions by prohibiting Delaware corporations from engaging in specified business combinations with particular stockholders of those companies. These provisions could discourage potential acquisition proposals and could delay or prevent a change in control transaction. They could also have the effect of discouraging others from making tender offers for our common stock, including transactions that may be in your best interests. These provisions may also prevent changes in our management or limit the price that investors are willing to pay for our stock.

 

Concentration of ownership of our common stock among our existing executive officers, directors and principal stockholders may prevent new investors from influencing significant corporate decisions.

 

Our executive officers, directors and current beneficial owners of 5% or more of our common stock and their respective affiliates, in the aggregate, beneficially own a majority of our outstanding common stock. As a result, these persons, acting together, would be able to control all matters requiring stockholder approval, including the election and removal of directors, the approval of any merger, consolidation, sale of all or substantially all of our assets, or other significant corporate transactions.

 

We are an “emerging growth company” and as a result of the reduced disclosure and governance requirements applicable to emerging growth companies, our common stock may be less attractive to investors.

 

We are an “emerging growth company” as defined in the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act of 2012, or JOBS Act, and we intend to take advantage of some of the exemptions from reporting requirements that are applicable to other public companies that are not emerging growth companies, including not being required to comply with the auditor attestation requirements of Section 404 of the Sarbanes‑Oxley Act of 2002, or Sarbanes‑Oxley Act, reduced disclosure obligations regarding executive compensation in our periodic reports and proxy statements, and exemptions from the requirements of holding a nonbinding advisory vote on executive compensation and stockholder approval of any golden parachute payments not previously approved. We cannot predict if investors will find our common stock less attractive because we will rely on these exemptions. If some investors find our common stock less attractive as a result, there may be a less active trading market for our common stock and our stock price may be more volatile. We may take advantage of these reporting exemptions until we are no longer an emerging growth company. We will remain an emerging growth company until the earliest of (a) December 31, 2019, (b) the last day of the fiscal year in which we have total annual gross revenue of at least $1.0 billion, (c) the last day of the fiscal year in which we are deemed to be a large accelerated filer, which means the market value of our common stock that is held by non‑affiliates exceeds $700 million as of the prior June 30th, and (d) any date on which we have issued more than $1.0 billion in non‑convertible debt during the prior three‑year period.

 

Under Section 107(b) of the JOBS Act, emerging growth companies can delay adopting new or revised accounting standards until such time as those standards apply to private companies. We have irrevocably elected not to avail ourselves of this exemption from new or revised accounting standards and, therefore, we will be subject to the same new or revised accounting standards as other public companies that are not emerging growth companies.

 

If we fail to maintain proper and effective internal controls, our ability to produce accurate financial statements on a timely basis could be impaired.

 

We are subject to the reporting requirements of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, the Sarbanes‑Oxley Act and the rules and regulations of NASDAQ. The Sarbanes‑Oxley Act requires, among other things, that we maintain effective disclosure controls and procedures and internal controls over financial reporting. Effective internal controls over financial reporting are necessary for us to provide reliable financial reports and, together with adequate disclosure

controls and procedures, are designed to prevent fraud. For our fiscal year ended December 31, 2016, we are obligated to perform system and process evaluation and testing of our internal controls over financial reporting to allow management to report on the effectiveness of our internal controls over financial reporting in our Form 10‑K filing for that year, as required by Section 404(a) of the Sarbanes‑Oxley Act. We will continue to incur substantial additional professional fees and internal costs to expand our accounting and finance functions and expend significant management efforts. We may discover weaknesses in our system of internal financial and accounting controls and procedures that could result in a material misstatement of our financial statements. Our internal control over financial reporting will not prevent or detect all error and all fraud. A control system, no matter how well designed and operated, can provide only reasonable, not absolute, assurance that the control system’s objectives will be met. Because of the inherent limitations in all control systems, no evaluation of controls can provide absolute assurance that misstatements due to error or fraud will not occur or that all control issues and instances of fraud will be detected.

 

If we are not able to comply with the requirements of Section 404(a) of the Sarbanes‑Oxley Act in a timely manner, or if we are unable to implement or maintain proper and effective internal controls, we may not be able to produce timely and accurate financial statements. If that were to happen, the market price of our stock could decline and we could be subject to sanctions or investigations by the stock exchange on which our common stock is listed, the Securities and Exchange Commission, or SEC, or other regulatory authorities. In addition, any testing by us conducted in connection with Section 404(a) of the Sarbanes‑Oxley Act, or the subsequent testing by our independent registered public accounting firm conducted in connection with Section 404(b) of the Sarbanes‑Oxley Act once we no longer qualify as an “emerging growth company,” may reveal deficiencies in our internal controls over financial reporting that are deemed to be material weaknesses; or may require prospective or retroactive changes to our financial statements or identify other areas for further attention or improvement.

 

We are required to disclose changes made in our internal control procedures on a quarterly basis and our management is required to assess the effectiveness of these controls annually. However, for as long as we are an “emerging growth company” under the JOBS Act, our independent registered public accounting firm will not be required to attest to the effectiveness of our internal control over financial reporting pursuant to Section 404(b). We will cease to be an “emerging growth company” in 2017 if any of the following occur on or before December 31, 2017: (1) we generate $1.0 billion of annual revenue at an earlier date, (2) we issue more than $1.0 billion in non‑convertible debt, or (3) we qualify as a large accelerated filer under SEC rules. If and when we cease to be an “emerging growth company,” an assessment of the effectiveness of our internal controls by our independent registered public accounting firm will be very expensive and could detect problems that our management’s assessment might not.

 

Because we do not anticipate paying any cash dividends on our common stock in the foreseeable future, capital appreciation, if any, will be your sole source of gains and you may never receive a return on your investment.

 

You should not rely on an investment in our common stock to provide dividend income. We have not declared or paid cash dividends on our common stock to date and have no plans to pay cash dividends in the foreseeable future. We currently intend to retain our future earnings, if any, to fund the development and growth of our business. In addition, the terms of our term loan credit facility with Oxford Finance LLC and Pacific Western Bank prohibits us from paying cash dividends. As a result, capital appreciation, if any, of our common stock will be your sole source of gain for the foreseeable future. Investors seeking cash dividends should not purchase our common stock.

 

We incur costs and demands upon management as a result of being a public company.

 

As a public company listed in the United States, we are incurring, and will continue to incur, significant legal, accounting and other costs, particularly after we cease to be an “emerging growth company.” These costs could negatively affect our financial results. In addition, changing laws, regulations and standards relating to corporate governance and public disclosure, including regulations implemented by the SEC and stock exchanges, may increase legal and financial compliance costs and make some activities more time consuming. These laws, regulations and standards are subject to varying interpretations and, as a result, their application in practice may evolve over time as new guidance is provided by regulatory and governing bodies. We intend to invest resources to comply with evolving laws, regulations and standards, and this investment may result in increased general and administrative expenses and a diversion of management’s time and attention from revenue‑generating activities to compliance activities. If, notwithstanding our efforts to comply with new laws, regulations and standards, we fail to comply, regulatory authorities may initiate legal proceedings against us and our business may be harmed.

 

Failure to comply with these rules also might make it more difficult for us to obtain some types of insurance, including directors’ and officers’ liability insurance, and we might be forced to accept reduced policy limits and coverage or incur substantially higher costs to obtain the same or similar coverage. The impact of these events could also make it more difficult for us to attract and retain qualified persons to serve on our board of directors, on committees of our board of directors or as members of senior management.

 

ITEM 1B.  UNRESOLVED STAFF COMMENTS

 

None.

 

ITEM 2.  PROPERTIES

 

Our principal offices occupy approximately 16,714 square feet of leased office and laboratory space in King of Prussia, Pennsylvania pursuant to a lease agreement that expires in September 2020 and contains an early termination option effective at any time following May 31, 2018.  In addition, we have leased approximately 2,600 square feet of office space in King of Prussia under a lease expiring on July 31, 2017 and vivarium space in Exton, Pennsylvania under an agreement expiring on December 31, 2018.  In December 2016, we entered into a 130-month office lease for approximately 40,565 square feet of space in Wayne, Pennsylvania for our new principal executive office; the term for this lease is expected to commence in the third quarter of 2017.  This lease also contains an exclusive option, exercisable until April 1, 2017, to lease up to an additional approximately 13,055 square feet of space at this location.  We believe that our facilities are suitable and adequate to meet our current needs.

 

ITEM 3.  LEGAL PROCEEDINGS

 

From time to time, we are subject to litigation and claims arising in the ordinary course of business. We are not currently a party to any material legal proceedings and we are not aware of any pending or threatened legal proceeding against us that we believe could have a material adverse effect on our business, operating results or financial condition.

 

ITEM 4.  MINE SAFETY DISCLOSURES

 

Not applicable.

 

PART II

 

ITEM 5.  MARKET FOR REGISTRANT’S COMMON EQUITY, RELATED STOCKHOLDER MATTERS AND ISSUER PURCHASES OF EQUITY SECURITIES

 

Market Information and Holders

 

Our common stock is traded on the NASDAQ Global Select Market under the symbol “TRVN.” The following table sets forth, for the periods indicated, the high and low prices per share for our common stock as reported on the NASDAQ Global Select Market:

 

 

On March 3, 2017, there were 7 holders of record of our common stock and the closing price of our common stock was $4.17 per share.

 

Dividends

 

We have never declared or paid any dividends on our common stock. We anticipate that we will retain all of our future earnings, if any, for use in the operation and expansion of our business and do not anticipate paying cash dividends in the foreseeable future. In addition, our ability to pay dividends, other than dividends payable solely in capital stock, is currently prohibited by the terms of our term loan credit facility with Oxford Finance, LLC and Pacific Western Bank.

 

Performance Graph

 

The following graph compares the performance of our common stock since January 30, 2014, the date preceding our initial public offering, or IPO, with the performance of the NASDAQ Composite and NASDAQ Biotechnology indexes. The comparison assumes a $100 investment on January 30, 2014 in our common stock at our IPO price, the stocks comprising the NASDAQ Composite index, and the stocks comprising the NASDAQ Biotechnology index, and assumes reinvestment of the full amount of all dividends, if any. Historical stockholder return is not necessarily indicative of the performance to be expected for any future periods.

The performance graph shall not be deemed to be incorporated by reference by means of any general statement incorporating by reference this Form 10-K into any filing under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, or the Exchange Act, except to the extent that we specifically incorporate such information by reference, and shall not otherwise be deemed filed under such acts.

 

Securities Authorized for Issuance under Equity Compensation Plans

 

The following table provides certain information with respect to all of our equity compensation plans in effect as of December 31, 2016:

 

 

 

 

ITEM 6.  SELECTED FINANCIAL DATA

 

The following tables set forth our selected financial data for the periods indicated. The following statement of operations data for the years ended December 31, 2016, 2015 and 2014 and the selected balance sheet data as of December 31, 2016 and 2015 are derived from our audited financial statements appearing elsewhere in this report. The statement of operations data for the years ended December 31, 2013 and 2012, and the balance sheet data as of December 31, 2014, 2013, and 2012, have been derived from our audited financial statements that are not included herein.

 

This selected financial data should be read together with the historical financial statements and related notes to those statements, as well as “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations,” which are included elsewhere in this report.

 

Our historical results are not necessarily indicative of the results that may be expected in the future, and our interim period results are not necessarily indicative of results to be expected for a full year or any other interim period.