BioXcel Therapeutics, Inc._December 31, 2024

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UNITED STATES

SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION

Washington, D.C. 20549

FORM 10-K

(Mark one)

For the fiscal year ended December 31, 2024

For the transition period from to .

Commission file number 001-38410

BioXcel Therapeutics, Inc.

(Exact name of Registrant as specified in its charter)

Registrant’s telephone number, including area code: (475) 238-6837

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

Title of each class Trading Symbol(s) Name of exchange on which registered

Common Stock, par value $0.001 per share BTAI Nasdaq Capital Market

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 every Interactive Data File required to be submitted 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 such files). Yes☒ No ☐

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

Emerging growth company ☐

If an emerging growth company, indicate by check mark if the registrant has elected not to use the extended transition period for complying with any new or revised financial accounting standards provided pursuant to Section 13(a) of the Exchange Act. ☐

Indicate by check mark whether the registrant has filed a report on and attestation to its management’s assessment of the effectiveness of its internal control over financial reporting under Section 404(b) of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (15 U.S.C. 7262(b)) by the registered public accounting firm that prepared or issued its audit report. ☐

If securities are registered pursuant to Section 12(b) of the Act, indicate by check mark whether the financial statements of the registrant included in the filing reflect the correction of an error to previously issued financial statements. 

Indicate by check mark whether any of those error corrections are restatements that required a recovery analysis of incentive-based compensation received by any of the registrant’s executive officers during the relevant recovery period pursuant to §240.10D-1(b). 

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

As of June 30, 2024, the last business day of the registrant's most recently completed second fiscal quarter, the aggregate market value of the registrant’s common stock held by non-affiliates of the registrant was approximately $41,276,960 (based upon the closing sale price of the registrant’s common stock reported on the Nasdaq Capital Market on that date). This calculation excludes shares held by the registrant’s current directors and executive officers and stockholders that the registrant has concluded are affiliates of the registrant.

There were 5,486,038 shares of our common stock outstanding at March 26, 2025.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page

Forward Looking Statements 3

Summary Risk Factors 5

Part I.

Item 1. Business 8

Item 1A. Risk Factors 53

Item 1B. Unresolved Staff Comments 116

Item 1C. Cybersecurity 116

Item 2. Properties 118

Item 3. Legal Proceedings 118

Item 4. Mine Safety Disclosures 118

Part II.

Item 7A. Quantitative and Qualitative Disclosures About Market Risk 139

Item 8. Financial Statements and Supplementary Data 139

Item 9A. Controls and Procedures 140

Item 9B. Other Information 140

Item 9C. Disclosure Regarding Foreign Jurisdictions that Prevent Inspections 141

Part III.

Item 10. Directors, Executive Officers and Corporate Governance 142

Item 11. Executive Compensation 149

Item 14. Principal Accounting Fees and Services 161

Part IV.

Item 15. Exhibits and Financial Statement Schedules 162

Signatures 169

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FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS

This Annual Report on Form 10-K contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. We intend such forward-looking statements to be covered by the safe harbor provisions for forward-looking statements contained in Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the “Securities Act”) and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended (the “Exchange Act”). The words “anticipate,” “believe,” “can,” “continue,” “could,” “designed,” “estimate,” “expect,” “forecast,” “goal,” “intend,” “may,” “might,” “plan,” “possible,” “potential,” “predict,” “project,” “should,” “target,” “will,” “would” and similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements, though not all forward-looking statements use these words or expressions. All statements contained in this Annual Report on Form 10-K, other than statements of historical fact, are forward-looking statements, including, without limitation, statements regarding:

● our sales strategy for IGALMI®;

● our ability to raise additional capital and continue as a going concern;

● our ability to stay listed on the Nasdaq Capital market;

● compliance with covenants under our financing arrangements;

● developments relating to our SERENITY and TRANQUILITY programs;

● the size of our total addressable markets and related underlying estimates;

● the potential benefits of any future collaboration;

● the timing of and results of discussions we have with regulators;

● our intellectual property position and strategy;

● developments relating to our competitors and our industry;

● the impact of government laws and regulations;

● developments related to legal proceedings and investigations; and

● our relationship with BioXcel LLC.

These forward-looking statements are based on management’s current expectations. These statements are neither promises nor guarantees, but involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other important factors that may cause our actual results, performance or achievements to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements, including, but not limited to, those listed under Part I, Item 1A. “Risk Factors,” Part II, Item 7. “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations” and elsewhere in this Annual Report on Form 10-K. These and other important factors discussed under the caption “Risk Factors” in our other filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) could cause actual results to differ materially from those indicated by the forward-looking statements made in this filing. Given these uncertainties, you should not rely on these forward-looking statements as predictions of future events. While we may elect to update such forward-looking statements at some point in the future, we disclaim any obligation to do so, even if subsequent events cause our views to change.

This Annual Report on Form 10-K also contains estimates, projections and other information concerning our industry, our business, and the markets for certain diseases, including data regarding the estimated size of those markets, and the incidence and prevalence of certain medical conditions. Information that is based on estimates, forecasts, projections, market research or similar methodologies is inherently subject to uncertainties and actual events or circumstances may differ materially from events and circumstances reflected in this information. Unless otherwise

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expressly stated, we obtained this industry, business, market and other data from reports, research surveys, studies and similar data prepared by market research firms and other third parties, industry, medical and general publications, government data and similar sources.

As used in this Annual Report on Form 10-K, unless otherwise specified or the context otherwise requires, the terms “we,” “our,” “us,” the “Company” or “BTI” refer to BioXcel Therapeutics, Inc., and “BioXcel, LLC” refers to the Company’s former parent company and stockholder, BioXcel LLC, and its predecessor, BioXcel Corporation. All brand names or trademarks appearing in this Annual Report on Form 10-K are the property of their respective owners, including IGALMI®, which is a trademark of BioXcel Therapeutics, Inc.

We may use our website as a distribution channel of material information about the Company. Financial and other important information regarding the Company is routinely posted on and accessible through the Investors & Media section of its website at www.bioxceltherapeutics.com. In addition, you may automatically receive email alerts and other information about the Company when you enroll your email address by visiting the “Email Alerts” option under the News / Events menu of the Investors & Media section of our website at www.bioxceltherapeutics.com.

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SUMMARY RISK FACTORS

Our business is subject to numerous risks and uncertainties, including those described in Part I, Item 1A. “Risk Factors” in this Annual Report on Form 10-K. You should carefully consider these risks and uncertainties when investing in our common stock. The principal risks and uncertainties affecting our business include the following:

● We have limited experience in drug discovery and drug development.

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TRADEMARKS, TRADE NAMES AND SERVICE MARKS

This Annual Report includes our trademarks, trade names and service marks, including, without limitation, “IGALMI®” and our logo, which are our property and are protected under applicable intellectual property laws. Solely for convenience, trademarks, trade names and service marks may appear in this Annual Report without the ®, TM and SM symbols, but such references are not intended to indicate, in any way, that we or the applicable owner forgo or will not assert, to the fullest extent permitted under applicable law, our rights or the rights of any applicable licensors to these trademarks, trade names and service marks. We do not intend our use or display of other parties’ trademarks, trade names or service marks to imply, and such use or display should not be construed to imply, a relationship with, or endorsement or sponsorship of us by, these other parties.

INDUSTRY AND OTHER DATA

Unless otherwise indicated, information contained in this Annual Report concerning our industry and the markets in which we operate, including our general expectations, market position and market opportunity, is based on our management’s estimates and research, as well as industry and general publications and research, surveys and studies conducted by third parties. While we believe the information from these third-party publications, research, surveys and studies included in this Annual Report is reliable, we do not guarantee the accuracy or completeness of such information, and we have not independently verified this information. Management’s estimates are derived from publicly available information, their knowledge of our industry and their assumptions based on such information and knowledge, which we believe to be reasonable. This data involves a number of assumptions and limitations which are necessarily subject to a high degree of uncertainty and risk due to a variety of factors, including those described in this Annual Report under “Forward Looking Statements,” “Risk Factor Summary” and Part I, Item 1A “Risk Factors.” These and other factors could cause our future performance and market expectations to differ materially from our assumptions and estimates.

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PART I

Item 1. Business

Overview

BioXcel Therapeutics, Inc. (“BTI,” the “Company,” “we,” “us” or “our”) is a biopharmaceutical company utilizing artificial intelligence (“AI”) to develop transformative medicines in neuroscience and, through the Company’s wholly owned subsidiary, OnkosXcel Therapeutics LLC (“OnkosXcel”), immuno-oncology. We are focused on utilizing cutting-edge technology and innovative research to develop high-value therapeutics aimed at transforming patients’ lives. We employ various AI platforms to reduce therapeutic development costs and potentially accelerate development timelines. Our approach leverages existing approved drugs and/or clinically evaluated product candidates together with big data and proprietary machine learning algorithms to identify new therapeutic indications. We believe this differentiated approach has the potential to reduce the expense and time associated with drug development in diseases with substantial unmet medical needs.

Our most advanced neuroscience candidate is BXCL501. In indications other than those approved by the United States (“U.S.”) Food and Drug Administration (“FDA”) as IGALMI®, BXCL501 is an investigational, proprietary, orally dissolving film formulation of dexmedetomidine (or “Dex”) in development for the treatment of agitation associated with psychiatric and neurological disorders.

On April 6, 2022, we announced that the FDA approved IGALMI® sublingual film for the acute treatment of agitation associated with schizophrenia or bipolar I or II disorder in adults. IGALMI® is approved to be self-administrated by patients under the supervision of a health care provider. On July 6, 2022, we announced that IGALMI® was commercially available in doses of 120 and 180 micrograms.

On September 5, 2024, we announced the initiation of our SERENITY At-Home trial, a double-blind, placebo-controlled study to evaluate the safety of a 120 mcg dose of BXCL501 in 200 patients for acute treatment of agitation associated with bipolar disorders or schizophrenia in the at-home setting. On November 12, 2024, we announced that the first patient had been randomized in the trial, and on March 27, 2025, that 24 clinical trial sites had been opened and 127 patients had been enrolled. Topline data results, which are expected in the second half of 2025, are intended to support a supplemental new drug application (“sNDA”) submission to potentially expand the label of IGALMI® (dexmedetomidine) sublingual film in the at-home setting.

We are continuing to develop BXCL501 for the potential acute treatment of agitation associated with bipolar disorders or schizophrenia in the at-home setting and for the potential acute treatment of agitation (non-daily) associated with dementia due to probable Alzheimer’s disease in the at-home setting and in care facilities.

As described further below, we havedeprioritized the development of BXCL501 for certain other proposed indications, as a potential adjunctive treatment for major depressive disorder (“MDD”), as well as our BXCL701 program, except as noted under “Immuno-Oncology” below.

On September 5, 2024, we submitted to the FDA the proposed protocol for our TRANQUILITY In-Care Phase 3 trial designed to evaluate the efficacy and safety of a 60 mcg dose of BXCL501 for agitation associated with Alzheimer’s dementia. See further discussion in “Our Neuroscience Clinical Programs” below.

On October 15, 2024, we announced a U.S. Department of Defense grant to the University of North Carolina to fund a study of BXCL501 (sublingual dexmedetomidine) for treating Acute Stress Disorder (ASD). See further discussion in “Additional Neuroscience Opportunities” below.

Our most advanced immuno-oncology candidate, BXCL701, is an investigational oral innate immune activator being developed by OnkosXcel as a potential therapy for the treatment of aggressive forms of prostate cancer, pancreatic cancer, and other solid and liquid tumors.

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Nasdaq Notice

On September 16, 2024, the Company received a letter from the Listing Qualifications Department (the “Staff”) of The Nasdaq Stock Market LLC (“Nasdaq”) that it was not in compliance with Nasdaq Listing Rule 5550(a)(2) because its common stock failed to maintain a minimum closing bid price of $1.00 per share for 30 consecutive business days.

On February 6, 2025, the Company announced that it would effect a 1-for-16 reverse stock split of its common stock. The reverse stock split became effective at 5:00 p.m. on February 7, 2025, and the company’s common stock began trading on a split-adjusted basis (above $1 per share) at the opening of the market on Monday, February 10, 2025.

To regain compliance, the Company was required to maintain a minimum closing bid price of $1.00 per share for at least 12 consecutive trading days. This requirement was met on February 26, 2025.

As previously reported, on September 20, 2024, we received a letter from the Nasdaq Staff notifying us that for the 30 consecutive business days prior to the date of the letter, the Company’s market value of listed securities (“MVLS”) closed below the minimum $35 million requirement for continued listing on The Nasdaq Capital Market under Nasdaq Listing Rule 5550(b)(2) (the “MVLS Requirement”). In accordance with Nasdaq Listing Rule 5810(c)(3)(C), the Company was granted a period of 180 calendar days, or until March 19, 2025, to regain compliance.

As anticipated, on March 20, 2025, the Company received another letter from the Staff stating that, as a result of the Company’s continued non-compliance with the MVLS Requirement, its securities would be delisted from Nasdaq unless the Company appealed the Staff’s delisting determination by requesting a hearing before the Nasdaq Hearings Panel (the “Panel”). The Company made timely request for a hearing before the Panel to appeal the Staff’s determination. The Company’s common stock will remain listed and eligible for trading on Nasdaq at least pending the ultimate conclusion of the hearing process; however, there can be no assurance that the Company will ultimately regain compliance and remain listed on Nasdaq.

2024 Clinical Prioritization

As discussed in Note 4, Restructuring in the notes to the consolidated financial statements included elsewhere in this Annual Report on Form 10-K, on May 8, 2024 the Company took additional actions as part of its continued efforts to preserve cash and prioritize investment in its core clinical programs. As part of these actions, the Company initiated a reduction of approximately 15% of the Company’s workforce.

On September 17, 2024, the Company approved a plan for an additional reduction in its workforce by 15 employees (including all but one sales and marketing employee), or approximately 28% of the Company’s headcount (the “Clinical Prioritization”), in order to extend its cash runway and prioritize investment on the clinical development of its lead neuroscience asset, BXCL501.

Neuroscience

Our Neuroscience Strategy

Our goal is to become the leading AI-enabled neuroscience therapeutics company. We continue to evaluate all strategic options for our neuroscience assets, which could include licensing, partnering, and co-commercialization.

Our Novel Drug Re-Innovation Approach

We aim to deploy and implement, throughout the drug development process, an AI ecosystem designed to rapidly identify medications related to our key focus areas of neuroscience and immuno-oncology. Our in-house, uniquely integrated AI-to-drug-development capability is complemented by the services and technology of BioXcel LLC, our former parent company. It includes a labeled properties graph (also referred to as a “knowledge graph”) that visually relates collected big data in the form of entities and their properties that include neuropsychiatric symptoms, brain circuits, drug targets, and existing drugs. We believe that understanding the relation between entities relevant to drug development may lead to novel potential uses for existing drugs. Predictive algorithms or queries of the knowledge

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graph may uncover not only single drugs but potentially identify new combinations of drugs that we believe may be more effective in treating disorders than single agents. New combinations of drugs may lower tolerable doses of drugs and provide the basis for stronger intellectual property positions. Our AI team prioritizes the most valuable external opportunities in a data-driven manner. These opportunities may be found in new potential uses for launched drugs, in drugs that are part of pharmaceutical company pipelines no longer being pursued, or within academic efforts to develop new drug candidates.

Traditional drug development is marred by low success rates, long drug development cycles, and exorbitant development costs that are increasing year over year. In addition, many serious diseases remain unaddressed due to limitations of the current drug discovery paradigm. The pharmacological universe spans more than 27,000 active pharmaceutical agents, of which only approximately 4,000 are approved and marketed. Marketed drugs may not be exclusively effective in the indication for which they are approved but relevant to other indications, including rare diseases, and thus represent an untapped potential for addressing unmet medical needs and recouping research and development costs. Many of the remaining agents are active clinical candidates that are shelved or have failed for reasons other than toxicity, which offers the opportunity to re-innovate for other indications or patient segments. Such agents potentially represent an unrealized investment of billions of research and development dollars by the private and public sectors, while failing to remediate immeasurable patient suffering and sacrifice during clinical development. Also, these compounds may have known pharmaco-dynamic and pharmaco-kinetic properties, potentially allowing for a more data-driven selection of appropriate doses for development programs. Finally, with respect to neuropsychiatric indications, we prioritize those compounds with structural design features that we believe may contribute to high blood-brain barrier permeability, and therefore could increase the likelihood of compound penetration into the brain. Lack of brain penetration is a common cause for failure of many drugs developed for neuropsychiatric indications. In addition, we are prioritizing compounds with available human safety data, acceptable pharmacokinetic results, and data that support a high probability of achieving reasonable brain concentrations after dosing. The compounds in our pipeline have been identified using this proprietary platform.

This drug re-innovation model has been exemplified by the successful development and commercialization of drugs such as Tecfidera® (Biogen, Inc.), Thalomid® (Celgene Corporation), and Viagra® (Pfizer, Inc.). All of these drugs were identified by insights in biology and disease pathophysiology. The successful business models of biotech companies like Axsome Therapeutics, Inc. and Karuna Therapeutics, Inc. (acquired by Bristol Myers Squibb) are based on the re-innovation and combination of existing clinical candidates or marketed drugs to provide novel solutions for patients. Unfortunately, such discoveries have been severely limited in scope due to the lack of a genuinely integrated approach to mining big data and advanced analytics.

Our AI-based discovery and development process is the foundation of our drug re-innovation model for identifying the next wave of potential medicines. Our therapeutic area experts have substantial experience across the drug discovery and development value chain. We believe that our method of finding potential product candidates gives us a higher probability of success because it combines AI expertise and intuition of human experience in drug development. We believe the combination of AI and drug discovery and development expertise facilitates the generation of therapeutic candidates and gives us a significant competitive advantage.

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Our approach is illustrated below:

We continue to integrate and evolve our neuroscience and immuno-oncology AI machine learning and drug discovery and development platform. Our platform led to the identification of Dex, the rapid development of BXCL501, and its approval by the FDA as IGALMI®, as well as the advancement of BXCL501 for other potential indications. We are continuing to leverage our platform to identify and develop new neuroscience and immuno-oncology programs.

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Our Neuroscience Clinical Programs

The following is a summary of the status of our neuroscience clinical development programs as of the date of this Annual Report on Form 10-K:

As a selective adrenergic agent with a sublingual or buccal route of administration, BXCL501 is designed to be easy to administer and has shown a rapid onset of action in multiple clinical trials, including clinical trials studying patients with schizophrenia, bipolar disorders, and dementia. We believe the results from these studies suggest that BXCL501 has the potential to generate a calming effect without producing excessive sedation. We believe that BXCL501 is highly differentiated from antipsychotics currently used as a standard of care for the treatment of agitation that often produce unwanted side effects such as excessive sedation and extra-pyramidal motor effects. Managing patient agitation in neuropsychiatric and neurodegenerative disorders represents a significant challenge for physicians and caregivers. We believe that BXCL501 has the potential to address these challenges while providing an efficient treatment regimen for patients.

Agitation Overview and Market Opportunity

Agitation in patients with neuropsychiatric diseases is a serious medical condition. Agitation is characterized by feelings of unease, excessive talking, and/or unintentional and purposeless motions, such as wringing of the hands or pacing. People experiencing agitation may also express excitement, hostility, poor impulse control, tension, uncooperativeness, and occasional disruptive behavior, which may lead to aggression and violence. In many cases, people develop agitation when treatment for their underlying disorder is not working well. Stressful situations or traumatic events can also trigger agitation. Agitation can occur suddenly or slowly and vary in length, lasting for a few minutes or for an extended period.

With the agitation issues associated with schizophrenia and bipolar disease coupled with a fast-growing elderly population that is potentially likely to experience agitation associated with Alzheimer’s disease, the difficulties and expenses of acute treatment of agitation are expected to grow significantly. We estimate that in the United States, there are approximately 1.9 million patients diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease-related dementia (“AAD”) and that those patients experience agitation at a rate of about six episodes per month, on average. In addition, we estimate that there are approximately 1.6 million Americans diagnosed with schizophrenia or bipolar disorders and that those patients experience agitation at a rate of about three episodes per month, on average. We, therefore, believe there is significant

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potential market opportunity for BXCL501 if approved for use in these patient populations in the at-home setting. The foregoing estimates of the incidence of each patient population and the number of agitation episodes experienced and potential market opportunity are based on management’s estimates and third-party data, which may be materially different from actual agitation episodes and actual treatable patients. For additional information regarding risks associated with these estimates, see Part I, Item 1A, Risk Factors “— Our estimated number of episodes of agitation and our corresponding estimated total addressable market are subject to inherent challenges and uncertainties. If we have overestimated the number of episodes or the size of our total addressable market for our current and potential future products or product candidates, or if any approval that we obtain is based on a narrower definition of the patient population, our revenue and ability to achieve profitability may be harmed.”

Treatments for Agitation

Antipsychotics, the current standard of care for acute treatment of agitation associated with schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, are also used off-label to treat agitation in dementia and other conditions. Side effects of these medications include movement disorders, including akathisia and extrapyramidal symptoms. One of the serious limitations of these drugs is that they can sedate the patient and do not permit verbal interaction with the hospital staff to continue. Intramuscular (“IM”)-delivered antipsychotics, such as haloperidol and olanzapine, are used extensively in this setting but are invasive and often require patient restraint. This type of treatment can dehumanize patients and cause trauma that could have long-term impact on them. Furthermore, these treatments include a black box warning for use in elderly patients.

While sublingual tablet formulations utilizing antipsychotics have been developed, these formulations have long half-lives (21-24 hours) and significant side effects when given acutely or chronically. Oral agents such as benzodiazepines are also used but have a slow onset of action and are consequently ineffective in the acute treatment of agitation. Side effects of these agents include sedation, amnesia, confusion, and paradoxical responses. They can intensify cognitive slowing and worsen memory and motor impairment, contributing to an increased risk of falls and fractures. In addition, long-term use of benzodiazepines has been found to be habit-forming and can cause addiction or relapse to abuse substances. Nonadherence with oral agents can also be problematic as patients may attempt to spit out these medications. We believe that, based on the current method of administration of oral medicine for agitation, an orally dissolving, mucoadhesive film could offer compliance advantages by making it less likely that patients will avoid treatment.

The sublingual or buccal route of administration is an accepted alternative to oral administration of drug delivery to the central nervous system when rapid onset or more controlled delivery is required. Currently, there are six products approved for film administration, including our product, IGALMI®. For example, BioDelivery Sciences International, Inc., a commercial-stage specialty pharmaceutical company, has developed a buccal film formulation of buprenorphine for chronic pain management and buprenorphine and naloxone for opioid dependence. We developed BXCL501 as a differentiated sublingual film dosage form of Dex, which we believe may offer benefits such as ease of use and quick absorption for rapid therapeutic effects.

Mechanism of Action: α2a Adrenergic Receptor and NE Role in Acute Agitation

BXCL501 is a sublingual formulation of Dex that is designed to be easily administered and have a rapid onset of action. Dex is approved in the U.S. for the sedation of initially intubated and mechanically ventilated patients during treatment in the intensive care unit (“ICU”). It is also used in the intensive care setting for sedation of non-intubated patients prior to and/or during surgical and other invasive procedures. Dex, launched in the U.S. as PrecedexTM in 1999, is a selective α2a adrenergic receptor agonist that has a strong safety record and has been studied in over 130 clinical trials to date. It has also been sold in the European Union (“EU”) and other countries under the trade name Dexdor® as a sedative for intensive care patients. Dex was approved by the European Commission for sedation of adult ICU patients requiring a sedation level no deeper than arousal in response to verbal stimulation (corresponding to Richmond Agitation-Sedation Scale 0 to -3). It has been used to prevent or treat hyperactive delirium resulting from anesthesia in

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the ICU. Given these uses of the IV formulation of Dex, we believe Dex formulated in a sublingual film and at much lower doses allows for ease of administration in settings where rapid acute treatment of agitation is needed.

IGALMI® Commercial Strategy

We continue to support IGALMI® in the hospital setting through limited and focused commercial activity. In the third quarter of 2023, we revised our commercial strategy for IGALMI® in the institutional setting, reducing in-hospital commercialization expenses, suspending programs no longer deemed core to our business, and shifting focus to the development of BXCL501 for use in the at-home and care facilities in the treatment of acute agitation in schizophrenia and bipolar disorders, and in the treatment of acute agitation (non-daily) associated with dementia due to probable Alzheimer’s disease (collectively, the “Reprioritization”).

Following the Reprioritization, a small Corporate Account Director team supported existing customers and targeted Integrated Delivery Networks (“IDNs”) with educational assistance and contracting opportunities, while our trade operation supported customers with drug supply. The goal of this approach was to help maintain current business and potentially broaden IGALMI® utilization through volume contracting.

As part of the Clinical Prioritization announced on September 19, 2024, we made further workforce reductions including sales and marketing employees, as the Company announced it would maintain IGALMITM in the market with minimal commercial support. The Clinical Prioritization staff reductions may have future impacts on net revenue. Net revenues from IGALMI® product sales for the years ended December 31, 2024 and 2023 were $2.3 million and $1.4 million, respectively.

We are currently seeking potential commercial partners. Our continued commercialization efforts for IGALMI® are designed to build the foundation to launch additional potential follow-on indications. If IGALMI® would be approved outside the U.S., we would consider launching the product through collaborations with third parties.

BXCL501 Development

In indications other than those approved by the FDA as IGALMI®, BXCL501 remains an investigational, proprietary, orally dissolving film formulation of Dex, a selective alpha-2 receptor agonist, targeting symptoms from stress-related behaviors such as agitation. BXCL501 is our most advanced neuroscience clinical program, being evaluated for the acute treatment of agitation associated with bipolar disorders or schizophrenia in the at-home setting and for the acute treatment of agitation (non-daily) in patients with dementia due to probable Alzheimer’s disease in care facilities and at-home settings.

As a selective adrenergic agent with a sublingual or buccal route of administration, BXCL501 is designed to be easily administered and, compared to medications that may take days or weeks, has shown a relatively rapid onset of action in multiple clinical trials, including those studying patients with bipolar disorders, schizophrenia, and Alzheimer’s disease. We believe results from these studies suggest that BXCL501 has the potential to reduce agitation without producing excessive sedation. We also believe BXCL501 is highly differentiated from antipsychotics, which are currently used as first-line standard-of-care treatments despite often producing unwanted side effects such as excessive sedation or extra pyramidal motor effects. Managing patient agitation in neuropsychiatric and neurodegenerative disorders represents a significant challenge for physicians and caregivers. We believe BXCL501 has the potential to address these challenges while providing an efficient treatment regimen for patients.

We also believe that BXCL501, if approved for the respective indications, has the potential to become the standard of care for the acute treatment of agitation arising from diseases such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and Alzheimer’s disease.

In addition, given the differentiated design of BXCL501 and its mechanism of action, we believe BXCL501 has the potential to address several diseases or conditions for which agitation is a symptom of the condition or underlying disease, including opioid withdrawal and post-traumatic stress disorder (“PTSD”), which are being evaluated in investigator-sponsored trials run by several leading academic research institutions.

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BXCL501 Clinical Trials

SERENITY Program: Agitation Associated with Bipolar Disorders I and II or Schizophrenia (at-home setting)

We initiated the clinical study of BXCL501 in patients with agitation associated with bipolar disorders or schizophrenia in SERENITY III, which consisted of two parts. The first part was comparable to our pivotal SERENITY I and II studies. Using similar inclusion and exclusion criterion under a well-controlled in-patient setting, acutely agitated patients with bipolar disorders or schizophrenia were randomized to self-administer either 60 mcg of BXCL501 or placebo in a double-blind placebo-controlled trial. The primary endpoint of Part I was efficacy, as measured by the change in PEC score change from baseline at two hours post-dose. The secondary objectives of Part I were safety and tolerability.

On May 25, 2023, we reported topline results from Part I of the study. Although the trial did not meet its primary efficacy endpoint, we believe the efficacy results, observed with the 60 mcg dose, representing half of the lowest approved dose of IGALMI® for in-patient use (120 mcg), were promising. Specifically, greater than 50% of individuals were responders, defined as those patients who achieved a 40% or greater reduction in PEC score. Furthermore, this population responder rate was consistent and dose-proportionate to the same response rates observed in the larger SERENITY I and II trials. Although the primary efficacy endpoint as a group mean change in PEC score from baseline at 2 hours was not statistically significant at the primary endpoint at 2 hours (p=0.077), BXCL501 statistically separated from placebo at 4 hours (p=0.049).

Part II of the SERENITY III study was designed to evaluate the same dose tested in Part I, 60 mcg (with an optional additional 60 mcg dose), but in the at-home setting and focusing on safety only. However, because the trial did not meet its primary efficacy endpoint using this 60 mcg dose in Part I, we paused continuation of Part II of the study pending feedback from the FDA. We held a Type C meeting with the FDA on November 8, 2023 to discuss changes to Part II of our SERENITY III study. We proposed the evaluation of an 80 mcg dose based on previous clinical experience with this dose during our Phase 1b trial in schizophrenia patients with agitation, and pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic modeling suggesting that use of an 80 mcg dose of BXCL501 could provide an optimal balance between safety and efficacy for at-home use. Based on feedback from the FDA during the meeting, we made the decision to evaluate a 120 mcg dose in the at-home setting. The 120 mcg dose has already demonstrated efficacy based on the approval of IGALMI® (when administered under the supervision of a healthcare provider, for a single agitation episode), so we sought further feedback from the FDA regarding the proposed design of this study amendment in a request for a follow-up meeting with the FDA, which was held on March 6, 2024.

Based on the FDA’s feedback in advance of and during the March 6, 2024 meeting, we moved forward evaluating the use of the 120 mcg dose of BXCL501 in the at-home setting, and amended Part 2 of the SERENITY III study. We now refer to this study as the SERENITY At-Home trial, with safety as the primary objective and efficacy measures as exploratory endpoints to support use in the at-home setting. This was the FDA’s recommendation in the November 8, 2023 FDA meeting, for the acute treatment of agitation in bipolar disorders or schizophrenia. We also plan to initiate a clinical study designed to enroll approximately 30 patient-informant dyads to evaluate the correlation between patient-and informant-reported efficacy measurement and the PEC scale, conducted by trained clinician raters as previously recommended by the FDA.

IGALMI® is already approved at the 120 mcg dose based on efficacy data that we previously generated in treating a single episode of agitation. Consistent with the data generated to date, the label for IGALMI® currently includes a limitation on use (“LOU”), noting the lack of efficacy or safety data beyond 24 hours following the first dose. During our March 6, 2024 Type C meeting with the FDA, we discussed, among other things, whether evaluating the at-home use of BXCL501 120 mcg, with safety as the primary objective and efficacy measures as exploratory endpoints, if successful, could support the submission of an sNDA seeking expansion of the current label for IGALMI® 120 mcg to allow at-home use and labeling without the current LOU. Based on FDA feedback, we believe that our ability to seek labeling without the current LOU will depend, in part, on the number of agitation episodes we observe during our planned study period. On April 22, 2024, we announced our plans, subject to funding, to advance the SERENITY At-Home trial. On September 5, 2024, we announced the initiation of our SERENITY At-Home trial. The pivotal Phase 3 trial is designed to evaluate the safety of BXCL501 in the at home setting. On November 12, 2024, we announced that

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the first patient had been randomized in the trial. On March 27, 2025, 24 clinical trial sites had been opened and 127 patients have been enrolled, representing 63% of the total required enrollment in the trial. Topline data results, which are expected in the second half of 2025, are intended to support a supplemental new drug application (“sNDA”) submission to potentially expand the label of IGALMI® (dexmedetomidine) sublingual film.

TRANQUILITY Program: Acute Agitation Associated with Dementia due to Probable Alzheimer’s Disease (AAD)

On June 29, 2023, we announced positive topline results from TRANQUILITY II, a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, parallel group trial that evaluated the safety and efficacy of BXCL501 for the acute treatment of Alzheimer’s-related agitation in adults 65 years and older with mild to moderate dementia in assisted living facilities (“ALFs”) and residential care settings who required minimal assistance with activities of daily living. The trial dosed 149 patients. Randomized patients self-administered 40 mcg or 60 mcg of BXCL501 or placebo for agitation episodes that occurred over a 12-week period. The primary endpoint was the change from pre-dose in Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale-Excitatory Component (“PEC”) total score at 2 hours post-dose for the first treated episode of agitation. The key secondary efficacy endpoints were PEC change from pre-dose at 1 hour post-dose of study treatment for the first treated episode of agitation, and PEC change from pre-dose at 30 minutes post-dose of study treatment for the first treated episode of agitation.

The Phase 3 trial met its primary efficacy endpoint with the 60 mcg dose; a statistically significant and clinically meaningful 7.5 point reduction from baseline in PEC total score was observed at 2 hours versus 5.4 with placebo (p=0.0112). The 60 mcg dose also met the first key secondary endpoint of reducing agitation symptoms at 1 hour during the first episode of agitation (p=0.0185) but did not meet the other key secondary endpoint of change from baseline in PEC score at 30 minutes.

Efficacy for this dose was supported by several secondary measures, including the Clinical Global Impressions – Improvement Scale (“CGI-I”) and Agitation-Calmness Evaluation Scale (“ACES”). Most patients (76%) responded to the first 60 mcg dose and were determined to be “Very Much” or “Much Improved” (CGI-I of 1 or 2, respectively) compared to 50% with placebo. The primary endpoint was not met for the 40 mcg dose, with a 5.7 point reduction from baseline in PEC score.

On June 29, 2023, we also announced that we had learned that an investigator in this study, who enrolled approximately 40% of the patients, engaged in misconduct. Since that time, we have taken steps to further investigate and evaluate the conduct of the TRANQUILITY II trial at this clinical site. Based on these steps to date, we believe that there have been no further instances of misconduct or fraud or other findings that adversely impact the data integrity or reliability of the eligibility, safety, and efficacy data obtained at the clinical trial site in question.

On March 3, 2025 we announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) concluded that the inspection of a single site in its TRANQUILITY II Phase 3 trial was closed under 21 C.F.R.20.64(d)(3) and released the Establishment Inspection Report. The FDA designated “Voluntary Action Indicated” for the site. We believe this further supports the reliability of data from the TRANQUILITY II trial of BXCL501.

In a Type B/Breakthrough Therapy designation meeting with the FDA on October 11, 2023, we reviewed our TRANQUILITY clinical trial program and discussed the data package required to support submission of an sNDA for the potential approval of BXCL501 for the acute treatment of agitation in patients with mild to moderate dementia due to probable Alzheimer’s disease in the ALF and at-home settings. Specifically, we sought feedback from the FDA as to whether our data package consisting of TRANQUILITY I and II, along with the clinical pharmacology and toxicology programs previously discussed with the FDA, would be sufficient to support an sNDA submission for the potential use of BXCL501 to treat agitation in patients with mild to moderate dementia due to probable Alzheimer’s disease in either the at-home or ALF setting, or, if not, what additional data would be required. Based on the FDA’s feedback in this meeting, we understand that the FDA will require additional efficacy data, including repeat efficacy data, and long-term safety data. We therefore requested another meeting with the FDA to further discuss the additional data that would be required to support an sNDA submission.

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On February 20, 2024, we held a Type B/Breakthrough Therapy designation meeting with the FDA. The original purpose of this meeting was to obtain feedback on the design of a proposed at-home study that did not include caregiver-collected efficacy endpoints, based on our belief that obtaining caregiver assessments of efficacy would be challenging. We believe there are no validated caregiver endpoints for assessing efficacy in Alzheimer’s disease patients in the at-home setting. As a result, we focused on requesting feedback from the FDA regarding our proposal for an at-home clinical study with safety as the primary objective, and to better understand what additional data would be required to submit an sNDA to support labeling for BXCL501 to include the acute treatment of agitation associated with dementia in probable Alzheimer’s disease or, in the alternative, in this population in the care setting only. In its preliminary responses, the FDA reiterated its prior comments that we need to generate additional efficacy data, including repeat-dose efficacy data, to support an sNDA submission, as the FDA indicated that our proposed efficacy database, which currently includes the 70 patients who have been treated with 60 mcg of BXCL501 in TRANQUILITY I and TRANQUILITY II, would not contain substantial evidence of effectiveness absent additional data. The FDA advised that we generate the necessary efficacy data in care facilities prior to conducting any trials in the at-home setting. In addition, the FDA indicated the need to generate long-term safety data to support an sNDA submission, including from probable Alzheimer’s disease patients exposed to BXCL501, for up to one year. Based on the FDA’s feedback, we are currently planning to generate additional Phase 3 efficacy and safety data, in a variety of relevant care-facility settings and across severity of dementia, in our planned TRANQUILITY In-Care Phase 3 trial. In addition, we plan to discuss the details of the requirement for long-term safety data at a future meeting with the FDA. Also, although we announced in November 2023 that we were planning to conduct a Phase 3 trial in the at-home setting, with safety as the primary objective (TRANQUILITY At Home), given the priority to expand the database to generate additional efficacy and safety data in care facilities, and subject to funding, we are re-evaluating the timing for initiating TRANQUILITY At Home.

On September 5, 2024, we submitted to the FDA the proposed protocol for our TRANQUILITY In-Care Phase 3 trial designed to evaluate the efficacy and safety of a 60 mcg dose of BXCL501 for agitation associated with Alzheimer’s dementia. On November 12, 2024, we announced that we had received FDA feedback on the proposed protocol.

Adjunctive treatment in Major Depressive Disorder (“MDD”)

We were previously evaluating BXCL501 as an adjunctive treatment for MDD. The initial clinical study in this program was a double-blind, placebo-controlled, multiple ascending dose (“MAD”) trial to evaluate the safety and tolerability of daily doses of BXCL501 in healthy volunteers.

As part of the Reprioritization announced on August 14, 2023, we paused our plan to develop a Phase 2 human proof-of-concept trial design to investigate BXCL501 as a potential adjunctive treatment and its potential accelerant effect in combination with first-line selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors or serotonin-norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors.

Pediatric Study

In June 2021, we initiated a global clinical trial designed to evaluate the safety and efficacy of BXCL501 in the acute treatment of agitation associated with pediatric schizophrenia and bipolar disorders, in part to fulfill pediatric study requirements agreed to with the FDA in connection with the approval of IGALMI®. The trial protocol has been reviewed by the FDA, as well as by the European Medicines Agency, to fulfill potential commitments to study the effects of BXCL501 in pediatric patients ages 13 to 17 with schizophrenia and ages 10 to 17 with bipolar disorders. Enrollment of patients with schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorder, bipolar I, and bipolar II disorder is ongoing in this multisite, double-blind, placebo-controlled parallel group trial. Approximately 63% of the 150 total subjects have been enrolled in the U.S. and 95 of such subjects have completed the clinical trial. In July 2023, we stopped activities in the European region as enrollment and site recruitment was unproductive. Similar to our registration trials in schizophrenia and bipolar disorder (SERENITY I and II), the primary endpoint is the change from baseline PEC total score at two hours. The U.S. portion of this program remains active following the Reprioritization.

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In October 2024, we submitted a request to the FDA for an extension and plan to submit an updated trial protocol to complete enrollment requirements for pediatric patients with schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder. The FDA granted a 3-year extension to complete the pediatric study.

IGALMI® Post-Marketing Requirement Study

On June 25, 2024, we announced positive topline results from our post-marketing requirement study evaluating whether tolerance, tachyphylaxis, or withdrawal occur following repeat dosing of the 180 mcg (highest approved dose) of IGALMI®. This study was a single-arm, open-label study of 28 inpatient adults with frequent episodes of agitation associated with bipolar disorders or schizophrenia who self-administered 180 mcg dose of IGALMI® as needed over seven days. A total of 83 episodes were treated. The study achieved its objective and demonstrated no evidence of tachyphylaxis, tolerance, or withdrawal, and IGALMI® was generally well tolerated during the study.

Additional Neuroscience Opportunities

BXCL501 Pipeline Opportunities for Franchise Expansion

Given the differentiated design of BXCL501 and its selective mechanism of action, we believe BXCL501 has the potential for broad applicability across several indications where agitation is a symptom of a condition or underlying disease.

Government-Supported Investigator-Sponsored Trial Programs

The Company has been awarded key opportunities for the development of BXCL501 in post-traumatic stress disorder (“PTSD”), alcohol use disorder (“AUD”), and opioid use disorder (“OUD”). These are being funded through Cooperative Agreements with the U.S. Department of Defense Congressionally Directed Medical Research Program and National Institute on Drug Abuse (“NIDA”). Clinical and regulatory responsibilities are led by clinical researchers and regulatory staff at the Veterans Affairs Connecticut Healthcare System, Yale University Medical School, RTI International, Columbia University New York State Psychiatric Institute, and NIDA.

Opioid Use Disorder Program

As previously announced, NIDA awarded a grant to Columbia University to fund clinical testing of BXCL501 as a potential treatment for opioid withdrawal in patients diagnosed with OUD. The original 160-patient, three-site, four-armstudy is a randomized, double-blind, double-dummy inpatient study comparing BXCL501 (180 mcg and 240 mcg BID), lofexidine (as a positive control), and placebo. The study’s goal is to evaluate the safety and efficacy of BXCL501 relative to lofexidine and placebo in subjects with OUD. A majority of OUD patients participating in the study are anticipated to be exposed to fentanyl adulterated or associated with xylazine. To date, all three initial sites have recruited, enrolled, and dosed patients diagnosed with OUD who are physically dependent on opioids, including prescription opioids. The Company is supplying BXCL501 for the conduct of this study, which is sponsored by Columbia University. We expect that the results from current study will be used to select a recommended dose of BXCL501 to compare to placebo in a later outpatient Phase 3 study sponsored by NIDA.

On November 6, 2023, we announced that NIDA requested Columbia University, the trial coordinator, to add a fourth site to expedite trial completion.The patient screening and enrollment process for the fourth site commenced in March 2024, a potential mid-study readout anticipated in the first half of 2025. Subject to favorable results and available funding, we plan to seek FDA feedback on potential registrational paths.

Alcohol Use Disorder with Comorbid Post-traumatic Stress Disorder Program

In December 2020, the Veterans Affairs Connecticut Healthcare System and Yale University Medical School were awarded a grant by the U.S. Department of Defense’s Congressionally Directed Medical Research Program with the overall objective to evaluate BXCL501 in patients who suffer from AUD with comorbid PTSD. The Company provided BXCL501 for the inpatient Alcohol Interaction Study, which has been completed. We understand Yale is currently seeking approval from its Institutional Review Board (“IRB”) and allowance from the FDA to proceed with a trial

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evaluating the effects of up to 80 mcg BID of BXCL501 per day for 28 days on alcohol consumption, PTSD symptoms, cognitive function, memory, sleep, and mood in patients diagnosed with mild, moderate, or severe AUD and who meet Criterion A for comorbid PTSD. The new outpatient study has received funding approval from the Pharmacotherapies for Alcohol and Substance Use Disorders Alliance (funded through a Cooperative Agreement between the U.S. Department of Defense Congressionally Directed Medical Research Program and RTI International). Patient screening and enrollment began in the fourth quarter of 2024. We believe the results from this study may be used to inform a Phase 3 study intended to commence with support by the alliance.

Acute Stress Disorder (ASD) Program

On October 15, 2024, we announced a U.S. Department of Defense grant to the University of North Carolina (“UNC”) to fund a study of BXCL501 for treating ASD. The award provides $2,800 to the UNC Institute for Trauma Recovery from September 15, 2024 through September 14, 2026 to evaluate the potential efficacy of BXCL501 to reduce ASD symptom severity and/or posttraumatic neuropsychiatric symptoms. The double-blind, placebo-controlled trial is expected to enroll 100 patients experiencing ASD resulting from motor vehicle collisions, beginning in the first half of 2025. We intend to supply BXCL501 for the trial.

BXCL502 Development

We identified a second neuropsychiatric drug candidate, BXCL502 − Latrepirdine (Dimebon) − through our AI-based platform. We plan to evaluate BXCL502 initially as a monotherapy and possibly in combination with BXCL501 for the chronic treatment of agitation in patients with dementia and acute stress disorder. The active pharmaceutical ingredient (“API”) underlying BXCL502 affects serotonergic signaling in the brain. Our preclinical data suggests BXCL502 has the potential to treat stress-related neuropsychiatric symptoms in dementia and other stress-related disorders. In previously published third-party clinical trial data, daily administration of the API of BXCL502 demonstrated improvement in behaviors using a well-established, clinically validated symptom scale. Formulation and further clinical development planning for BXCL502 was paused as part of the Reprioritization.

Other Product Candidates Leveraging the AI Platform

Our AI platform is comprised of a series of customized and specific AI applications aimed at identifying, predicting efficacy and testing of late-stage assets with known mechanisms of action and associated pharmacology and safety data. We target neuropsychiatric and neurological rare disorders, where the compounds are either disease-modifying or symptom-mitigating. Compounds are tested in relevant models of disease and rank-ordered based on the potential to enter the clinic and ease of development. Disease areas of interest are stress related such as agitation, or neuropsychiatric symptoms associated with dementia and responsible for increased levels of healthcare burden. For example, our pipeline concepts BXCL503 and BXCL504 putatively have the potential to address apathy and aggression in dementia, respectively. These programs were also paused as part of the Reprioritization.

Neuroscience Competition

The pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries are characterized by rapidly advancing technologies, intense competition, and a strong emphasis on proprietary products. The neuroscience and rare disease segments of the industry are highly competitive. While we believe that our technology, development experience, and scientific knowledge provide competitive advantages, we face potential competition from many different sources, including major pharmaceutical, specialty pharmaceutical, and biotechnology companies, academic institutions, governmental agencies, and public and private research institutions.

Many of our competitors may have significantly greater financial resources, and expertise in research and development, manufacturing, preclinical studies, conducting clinical trials, obtaining regulatory approvals, and marketing approved medicines 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. These competitors also compete with us in recruiting and retaining qualified scientific and management personnel and in establishing clinical trial sites and patient registration for clinical trials, as well as in acquiring technologies

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complementary to or necessary for our programs. Smaller or early-stage companies may also prove to be significant competitors, particularly through collaborative arrangements with large and established companies.

The key competitive factors affecting the success of our product candidates, if approved, are likely to be their efficacy, safety, convenience, price, the effectiveness of companion diagnostics in guiding the use of related therapeutics, if any, 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 medicines that are safer, more effective, more convenient, less expensive, or have fewer or less severe side effects than any medicines we may develop. Our competitors also may obtain FDA or other regulatory approval for their medicines more rapidly than us, 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 medicines. There are many generic medicines currently on the market for certain indications that we are pursuing, and additional generics are expected to become available over the coming years. We expect that any of our therapeutic product candidates that are approved will be priced at a significant premium over competitive generic medicines.

Any product candidates that we successfully develop and commercialize will compete with existing therapies and new therapies that may become available in the future. IGALMI® and any of our other product candidates that are approved, if any, will compete with the drugs discussed below, in addition to any other drugs currently in development.

Drugs used for the acute treatment of agitation related to schizophrenia and bipolar disorder are antipsychotics frequently administered via IM injection that typically requires patient restraint. These include IM aripiprazole, olanzapine, ziprasidone, and haloperidol. Oral products include the sublingually administered atypical antipsychotic Asenapine, as well as benzodiazepines, lorazepam, and midazolam. The typical antipsychotic Adasuve® (loxapine) from Alexza is delivered via inhalation.

Neuroscience Manufacturing

We do not have manufacturing facilities. We currently rely on strategic manufacturing partners, in particular ARx, LLC (“ARx”), and expect to continue to rely on third parties for the manufacture of our product candidates for clinical research and our products for commercialization efforts. ARx has agreed to exclusively manufacture and supply our supply of film formulation of dexmedetomidine to be used for the commercial supply of IGALMI® and for ongoing clinical trials of BXCL501, subject to certain alternative supply provisions.

BXCL501 drug product is manufactured using commercially available components and packaging materials. The equipment employed for manufacturing and analysis is consistent with standard pharmaceutical production.

Neuroscience Commercialization

We plan to retain worldwide commercialization rights for IGALMI® and other approved product candidates, if any, but could consider collaboration opportunities to maximize returns or facilitate commercialization efforts in foreign jurisdictions. For additional information regarding our commercialization efforts for IGALMI®, see above under “IGALMI® Commercial Strategy.”

As product candidates advance through our pipeline, our commercialization plans may change. Clinical data, the size of the development programs, the size of the target market, the required commercial infrastructure, and manufacturing needs may all influence global commercialization strategies.

Neuroscience Intellectual Property

Our policy is to protect and enhance the proprietary technologies, inventions, and improvements that are commercially important to our business by filing patent applications in the U.S. and other jurisdictions related to our proprietary technology, inventions, improvements, and product candidates. We also rely on trademarks, trade secrets,

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and know-how relating to our proprietary technologies and product candidates, continuing innovation, and in-licensing technology and products. This reliance is expected to develop, maintain, and strengthen our proprietary position for novel therapeutics and novel formulations of existing therapeutics across multiple therapeutic areas. We also plan to rely on data exclusivity, market exclusivity, and patent term extensions when available.

We have multiple patent families filed to protect our Neuroscience program, including BXCL501. As of February 20, 2025, our neuroscience patent portfolio included five Patent Cooperation Treaty (“PCT”) applications not yet in national phase, 13 U.S. utility applications, 16 issued U.S. utility patents, 76 pending non-U.S. utility applications, 24 allowed or granted non-U.S. patents (including four in Japan), one pending U.S. design patent application, and 39 allowed or registered design patents (including two in Japan). Thirteen U.S. utility patents, directed to our proprietary sublingual film formulation of Dex and methods of treating agitation, are listed in the FDA’s Approved Drug Products with Therapeutic Equivalence Evaluations (commonly known as the “Orange Book”) for IGALMI® with expiration dates between 2037 and 2043. In the formulation family, we have granted or allowed patents in China, Europe, Eurasia, Japan, Mexico, and the U.S., and pending applications in the U.S., China, and other major markets. We expect that patents issued in this family will expire no earlier than 2039. We have also filed applications in additional patent families that are relevant to BXCL501. We have one granted European patent and applications pending in the U.S. and Japan directed to methods of treating insomnia using sublingual Dex. We expect that patents issued from these applications, will expire no earlier than 2035. We also have granted patents and pending applications filed in major markets, including the U.S., Europe, Japan, and China, directed to methods of treating agitation. We expect that patents issued from these applications, will expire between 2039 and 2043. We also have four PCT applications directed to treating mania, depression, stress and agitation. If patents are issued from those cases, we expect them to expire in 2043 or 2044.

In August 2024, the Company received a Notice of Allowance from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (“USPTO”) for U.S. Patent Application No. 18/600,431 (the “’431 Application”). The ’431 Application claims methods of treating agitation using an oromucosal formulation of dexmedetomidine. The ‘431 Application issued as U.S. Patent No. 12,138,247 (the ‘247 Patent) patent, issued on November 2024, and is expected to expire no earlier than January 12, 2043. The ’247 Patent is listed in the Orange Book for IGALMI®.

The term of individual patents depends upon the legal term for patents in the countries in which they are obtained. In most countries, including the U.S., the patent term is 20 years from the earliest filing date of a non-provisional patent application. Depending upon the timing, duration, and specifics of FDA approval of our product candidates, a U.S. patent that we own or license may be eligible for limited patent term extension under the Drug Price Competition and Patent Term Restoration Act of 1984 (a.k.a., the “Hatch-Waxman Act”). The act permits a patent restoration term of up to five years as compensation for patent term lost during product development and the drug approval regulatory review process. However, patent term restoration cannot extend the remaining term of a patent beyond a total of 14 years from the product’s approval date. The patent term restoration period is generally one-half the time between the effective date of an IND, and the submission date of a new drug application (“NDA”), plus the time between the submission date of an NDA and the approval of that application. Only one patent applicable to an approved drug is eligible for the extension, and the application for extension must be made prior to patent expiration. The USPTO, in consultation with the FDA, reviews and approves the application for any patent term extension or restoration. In the future, we intend to apply for restorations of patent term for some of our currently owned or licensed patents to add patent life beyond their current expiration date, depending on the expected length of clinical trials and other factors involved in the submission of the relevant NDA.

The term of a patent can also be extended by PTA established in 35 U.S.C. 154(b). The intention of the PTA is to accommodate for delays caused by the USPTO during the prosecution of a US utility or plant patent application. Under PTA, the USPTO delay is divided into three types: type A (delays after 14 months from the filing date of the application until the USPTO issues a first Office Action and delays after four months from the filing of certain actions by the applicant until the USPTO responds to such actions); type B (delays after three years from the earliest effective filing date until a patent is granted); and type C (delays due to interferences, secrecy orders, and successful appeals). The total amount of PTA is calculated by adding the types A, B, and C delays, and then subtracting any delay that is overlapped among three types or that is attributable to the applicant.

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The term of a patent can also be shortened by a terminal disclaimer. A terminal disclaimer is a statement filed by a patent owner in which the owner disclaims or dedicates to the public the terminal part of the term of a patent. Often, the terminal disclaimer is filed in cases where at least one claim of a pending application would have been obvious in light of at least one claim in an earlier-filed patent, (or non-statutory obviousness-type double patenting rejection).

The patent positions of companies such as ours are generally uncertain and involve complex legal and factual questions. No consistent policy regarding the scope of claims allowable in patents in the field of method of use patents or reformulation patents has emerged in the U.S. patent laws and their interpretation outside of the U.S. are also uncertain. Changes in either the patent laws or their interpretation in the U.S. and other countries may diminish our ability to protect our technology or product candidates and enforce the patent rights that we license, and also could affect the value of such intellectual property. In particular, our ability to stop third parties from making, using, selling, offering to sell, or importing products that infringe our intellectual property will depend in part on our success in obtaining and enforcing patent claims that cover our technology, inventions, and improvements. With respect to both licensed and company owned intellectual property, we cannot guarantee that patents will be granted with respect to any of our pending patent applications or with respect to any patent applications we may file in the future, nor can we be sure that any patents that may be granted to us in the future will be commercially useful in protecting our products, the methods of use, or the manufacture of those products. In addition, if a pending patent application is granted, it is possible that only a subset of the claims that are currently contained in the pending patent application will be issued. Further, the coverage claimed in a patent application can be significantly reduced before the patent is issued, and its scope can be reinterpreted after issuance. Patent and other intellectual property rights in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology space are evolving and involve many risks and uncertainties. For example, third parties may have blocking patents that could be used to prevent us from commercializing our product candidates and practicing our proprietary technology, and the issued patents that we in-license and those that may issue in the future may be challenged, invalidated, or circumvented, which could limit our ability to stop competitors from marketing related products or could limit the term of patent protection that otherwise may exist for our product candidates. In addition, the scope of the rights granted under any issued patents may not provide us with protection or competitive advantages against competitors with similar technology. Furthermore, our competitors may independently develop similar technologies outside the scope of the rights granted under any issued patents that we own or exclusively in license. For these reasons, we may face competition with respect to our product candidates. Moreover, because of the extensive time required for development, testing, and regulatory review of a potential product, it is possible that, before any particular product candidate can be commercialized, any patent protection for such product may expire or remain in force for only a short period following commercialization, thereby reducing the commercial advantage the patent provides. For additional information regarding intellectual property regulations and risks, see below under “Immuno-Oncology Intellectual Property” and Part I, Item 1A, “Risk Factors - Risks Related to Our Intellectual Property.”

Immuno-Oncology

On April 19, 2022, we announced the formation of a wholly owned subsidiary, OnkosXcel to develop potentially transformative medicines in oncology. OnkosXcel uses proprietary AI capabilities to drive the capital-efficient development of innovative anti-cancer therapeutics. On March 14, 2023, we announced that OnkosXcel had confidentially submitted a draft registration statement on Form S-1 with the SEC relating to the proposed initial public offering of its common stock following its conversion into a corporation. The Company is continuing to evaluate strategic options for OnkosXcel. With the Company’s Reprioritization announcement on August 14, 2023, further work on the immuno-oncology programs described below has generally been paused, except as noted below.

Our approach to drug discovery leverages the application and methodology of our proprietary AI-based research and development platform, complemented by EvolverAI, utilized in the successful development of IGALMI® with the aim of efficiently identifying and developing immuno-oncology product candidates. We believe that BXCL701 reflects the potential of this discovery approach in immuno-oncology. BXCL701 is an investigational, oral innate immune activator which demonstrated a 25% composite response rate in a Phase 2a clinical trial to treat patients with small cell neuroendocrine carcinoma (“SCNC”) phenotype metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer (“mCRPC”). On February 12, 2024, the Company announced that the FDA has designated as a Fast Track development program the investigation of BXCL701 in combination with a checkpoint inhibitor for the treatment of patients with metastatic SCNC with progression on chemotherapy and no evidence of microsatellite instability. We have finalized a potential

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registrational trial design in mCRPC patients with SCNC phenotype, however in light of our Clinical Prioritization, we have not met with the FDA to discuss this, nor plan at the current time to initiate this trial.

mCRPC is often characterized as a “cold” tumor, which is a tumor with an immunosuppressive tumor microenvironment (“TME”) and poor immune cell infiltration. Currently approved checkpoint inhibitors (“CPIs”) that target programmed cell death 1 (“PD-1”) or cytotoxic T-lymphocyte-associated protein 4 (“CTLA-4") have failed to demonstrate meaningful single-agent activity against such difficult-to-treat tumor types, including mCRPC. BXCL701 is designed to promote an immune-induced inflammatory response in the TME primarily via inhibition of dipeptidyl peptidases (“DPP”) 8 and 9, which we believe can provide enhanced CPIs therapeutic utility. We believe BXCL701 can potentially provide significant benefits for the approximately 20% of the estimated 299,010 men who will be diagnosed with prostate cancer in the U.S. in 2024 and are expected to progress to the more aggressive mCRPC form of the disease, including approximately 20%, or 11,960, of those patients who will develop the SCNC phenotype, for which there are currently limited treatment options. Immune checkpoints represent a myriad of inhibitory pathways that act to regulate the duration and intensity of an antigen-induced immune response and factor prominently in mediating immune tolerance. They function as critical gatekeepers that prevent the indiscriminate attack of normal host cells by components of the immune system. Certain cancers co-opt these pathways and overexpress immune checkpoint molecules to camouflage themselves to avoid detection and destruction. CPIs, designed to harness the intrinsic power resident in the immune system, work by disabling the suppressive function of immune checkpoints, allowing the immune system to bypass such cancers’ shield of immune tolerance. CPIs are expected to generate sales of more than $50 billion worldwide by 2025, up from sales of approximately $29 billion in 2020. While CPIs have proven to be a significant advancement in cancer therapy, those currently approved by the FDA do not produce meaningful results in a majority of patients, as the clinical benefit is generally viewed to be limited to between 13% and 30% of cancer patients, and the duration of response is relatively short.

We believe the limited efficacy of approved CPIs results primarily from their intervention at later stages of the immune response. As a result, other targets and pathways can be exploited by the tumor to create a TME that can evade the enhanced immunological response enabled by approved CPIs. While numerous agents designed to target the earlier stages of an immune response are in development for use in combination with CPIs, their activity is restricted to a single component of the immune response. In contrast, we have developed BXCL701 to simultaneously address multiple components of the immune response, including:

Accordingly, we believe BXCL701 may have utility in stimulating increased activation, proliferation, and infiltration of tumor cells by immune effector cells, enabling its potential application in combination with currently approved CPIs, across a range of solid tumors and hematological malignancies, to potentially:

● Convert immunological cold tumors into ones sensitive to CPIs;

● Enhance hot tumors’ response rate and depth of response to CPIs; and

● Restore CPI sensitivity to tumors that were previously responsive.

Central to our drug discovery initiatives are proprietary, AI-driven platform technologies we employ to identify novel therapeutic uses for approved therapeutics and candidates in clinical evaluation. The first and most advanced of

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our AI-driven discovery programs is our innate immune modulation program, which supported the pursuit of BXCL701 as a development candidate. We believe the application of this program provides us actionable insights into the inflammasome, a component of the innate immune system responsible for activation of the inflammatory response.

Our Immuno-Oncology Programs

Below is a summary of the status of our immuno-oncology clinical development programs as of the date of this Annual Report on Form 10-K. We believe our product candidates, if successfully developed and approved, have the potential to become compelling treatment options for their respective indications. With our Reprioritization announced on August 14, 2023, further work on our immuno-oncology program has been paused, other than as noted below.

Immuno-Oncology Clinical Trials

Leveraging the insights enabled by the application and methodology of our proprietary AI-based platform complemented by EvolverAI, which was used to identify novel therapeutic uses for our approved therapeutics and product candidates in clinical evaluation, and our industry expertise, we are pursuing two proprietary discovery programs to advance our goal of developing anti-cancer therapeutics. The first program, which encompasses BXCL701 across a range of indications, is based on the application of innate immune modulation technology. This program has been constructed to embrace key distinguishing characteristics of the innate immune system and we believe it is supported by our development efforts. This approach has driven the development of BXCL701, which we are currently evaluating in a Phase 1b/2a clinical proof-of-concept trial as a potential treatment for mCRPC with either SCNC or adenocarcinoma phenotype. Fundamental to the innate immune modulation program is BXCL701’s potential to:

● Convert cold tumors into ones sensitive to CPIs;

● Enhance hot tumors’ response rate and depth of response to CPIs; and

● Restore CPI sensitivity to tumors which had previously been responsive.

BXCL701 as a Potential Treatment for mCRPC

Prostate cancer is the most common malignancy and the second-leading cause of cancer-related deaths in men in the U.S. According to the American Cancer Society, approximately 299,010 men will be diagnosed with, and 35,250 men will die of, prostate cancer in 2024. The majority of these cases are classified as adenocarcinomas and involve low risk, localized or regional disease for which the five-year survival rate ranges from 60% to 99%. However, an estimated 20%

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of these newly diagnosed cases will progress to the more aggressive metastatic disease. The five-year survival rate for men with metastatic prostate cancer drops significantly, to approximately 30%. Approximately 20% of patients with mCRPC will develop the SCNC phenotype, which is characterized by poor prognosis and low survival rate with a five-year life expectancy of 14%.

Prostate function requires the presence of various androgens, such as testosterone. Early cancerous prostate cells typically also require androgens to proliferate. Accordingly, aggressive forms of prostate cancer can initially be treated using androgen deprivation therapy (“ADT”). While ADT offers temporary therapeutic benefit, in almost all patients the treatment eventually loses efficacy, referred to as “castration resistance.” Cases of castration-resistant prostate cancer (“CRPC”) are generally treated with a second-generation androgen receptor (“AR”) inhibitor, such as XTANDIâ (enzalutamide), or an androgen synthesis inhibitor, such as ZYTIGAâ (abiraterone), which targets the enzyme CYP17 to block the production of testosterone. These therapeutics have widely become the standard of care, though only ZYTIGA has been approved to treat mCRPC, as well as metastatic high-risk castration-sensitive prostate cancer. XTANDI has been approved to treat CRPC and metastatic castration-sensitive prostate cancer.

Virtually all patients who initially respond to ZYTIGA and XTANDI are expected to progress to even more aggressive forms of prostate cancer requiring further treatment. Patients whose disease has progressed after treatment with these second-generation targeted endocrine therapies are administered a docetaxel containing drug regimen that provides a survival benefit of only 10 months. The poly-ADP ribose polymerase (“PARP”) inhibitors LYNPARZAâ (olaparib) and RUBRACAâ (rucaparib) are approved for the treatment of mCRPC in patients whose disease has progressed after receiving XTANDI or ZYTIGA, but their approval is limited to instances of mCRPC linked to a BRCA gene mutation. As such, an unmet medical need remains for patients with mCRPC who are not eligible for PARP inhibitor treatment after treatment with the targeted endocrine therapy and docetaxel.

In addition, a number of men, both newly diagnosed patients and men whose disease has progressed after second-generation targeted endocrine therapy, will develop an aggressive tumor that typically expresses very little AR and accordingly does not respond to therapeutics targeting the AR signaling pathway. Prostate cancer with this phenotype is referred to as SCNC, for which there is currently no effective treatment. The incidence of SCNC is increasing with the widespread use of AR inhibitor therapy. Treatment protocols for patients with SCNC typically involve cytotoxic chemotherapies despite their short duration of response and considerable toxicities. These patients represent an additional unmet medical need among men with prostate cancer. We believe BXCL701 may prove efficacious in addressing the unmet needs of both adenocarcinoma and SCNC prostate cancer phenotypes.

mCRPC is often characterized as a cold tumor, or a tumor with an immunosuppressive TME and poor immune cell infiltration. Currently approved CPIs, which target PD-1 and CTLA-4, have not demonstrated significant single-agent therapeutic activity. For instance, a Phase 2 investigator sponsored trial (“IST”) to assess the efficacy of the PD-L1 inhibitor avelumab, marketed by EMD Serono and Pfizer as BAVENCIOâ, to treat mCRPC with SCNC phenotype, as well as aggressive variant prostate cancer with adenocarcinoma histology, generated an ORR of 6.7% (representing 1 of 15 patients who was known to be microsatellite instability-high, an established marker of response to CPIs).

We believe the limited efficacy of CPIs results primarily from their intervention at later stages of the immune response. As a result, other targets and pathways can be exploited by the tumor to create a TME that can evade the enhanced immunological response enabled by approved CPIs. BXCL701 is designed to act on multiple components of immune system functioning, including:

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We believe BXCL701 may have utility in stimulating increased activation, proliferation, and infiltration of tumor cells by immune effector cells, enabling its potential use in combination with currently approved CPIs to treat cold tumors, such as mCRPC. We elected to pursue mCRPC as an indication for BXCL701 due to its enrichment for DPP mutations, which are especially prevalent in tumors with SCNC phenotype.

BXCL701 has been evaluated in a Phase 1b/2a clinical proof-of-concept trial that we sponsored to investigate its potential efficacy when used in combination with pembrolizumab. Enrollment in this trial is complete, and the data are described below.

We received initial comments from the FDA on our proposed clinical development plan and received feedback regarding dose-optimization for use in future studies. However, the start of any such additional trial is paused following the Company’s Reprioritization. The Phase 1b portion of our Phase 1b/2 clinical trial was a dose escalation safety lead-in which employed a standard 3 x 3 trial design to determine the recommended Phase 2 dose (“RP2D”). During each 21-day treatment cycle, 200 mg of pembrolizumab were administered intravenously on day one, with BXCL701 taken twice daily on days one through 14, for a minimum of two cycles. The results of this Phase 1b trial, which were presented at The Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer’s 35th Anniversary Annual Meeting, allowed us to identify 0.3 mg, taken twice daily, as the RP2D.

The Phase 2a portion of the trial was segregated into two 28-patient trial cohorts, one cohort consisting of mCRPC patients with SCNC phenotype and a second cohort consisting of mCRPC patients with adenocarcinoma phenotype. Initially, we focused on mCRPC with SCNC phenotype as the primary patient population for BXCL701, since DPP9 is amplified in approximately 17% of treatment-emergent mCRPC with SCNC phenotype, compared to 5% or less in the broader prostate cancer population. However, we also observed responses in mCRPC patients with adenocarcinoma phenotype who were microsatellite stable in the Phase 1b portion of the trial. On this basis, we widened our Phase 2a trial to include relapsed mCRPC patients with either SCNC or adenocarcinoma phenotype. Both cohorts employed a Simon two-stage trial design of 15 trial participants followed by 13 additional patients. The primary endpoint of the Phase 2a portion of this trial was a composite response rate, determined as either a RECIST 1.1 response (defined as a

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reduction in RECIST score of 30% or more), and/or a reduction in prostate specific antigen (“PSA”) level of 50% or more, and/or a conversion in circulating tumor cells (“CTCs”) from 5 or more CTCs/7.5 milliliter (“ml”) to less than 5 CTCs/7.5 ml. Secondary endpoints included duration of response, progression-free survival, overall survival, changes in circulating cytokines, and certain disease-specific biomarkers.

We believe the results observed in the Phase 2a trial of BXCL701 administered in combination with pembrolizumab support further development.

We were particularly encouraged by the results observed in the cohort consisting of mCRPC patients with SCNC phenotype. Updated Phase 2a results for the SCNC cohort were presented at the 30th Annual Prostate Cancer Foundation Scientific Retreat (PCF 2023). BXCL701 in combination with pembrolizumab demonstrated a 25% (seven out of 28 evaluable patients) composite response rate in mCRPC patients with SCNC phenotype, for whom there is no standard of care. As of a data cutoff of September 6, 2023, five of these responders were RECIST 1.1 responders (four confirmed responses and one unconfirmed response) with decreases in tumor size ranging from -45% to -67% and a median duration of response of 7.6 months.

AEs consistent with cytokine activation, including fever, nausea, chills, fatigue, headache, and dizziness were observed during the trial and were generally mild to moderate. SAEs experienced by six trial participants - one patient hospitalized with Grade 1 orthostatic hypotension, one patient hospitalized with Grade 3 hypotension and acute kidney injury (“AKI”), which resolved, one patient with Grade 3 hypothyroidism which resolved, one patient with Grade 3 colitis, one patient with Grade 3 generalized oedema, and one patient hospitalized with Grade 4/5 tumor lysis syndrome/AKI, which resulted in fatality after the patient voluntarily discontinued dialysis - were reported as related or possibly related to BXCL701 or pembrolizumab, though there was no evidence that BXCL701 potentiated immune-related AEs associated with CPIs. The table below summarizes treatment-related AEs observed in the SCNC cohort as of December 19, 2022.

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On October 10, 2023, we reported positive overall survival (OS) results from the Phase 2a portion of the trial in SCNC patients. BXCL701 in combination with pembrolizumab demonstrated a compelling median OS and 12-month survival rate. As of a data cutoff of September 6, 2023, evaluable patients with SCNC (n = 28) showed a median OS of 13.6 months (95% CI 10.9–NR), and a 12-month survival rate of 56.5%.

On February 12, 2024 the Company announced that the FDA designated as a Fast Track development program the investigation of BXCL701 in combination with a checkpoint inhibitor for treatment of patients with metastatic SCNC with progression on chemotherapy and no evidence of microsatellite instability.

The Phase 2a trial has also been completed for the adenocarcinoma cohort. Updated results for this trial cohort were also presented at PCF 2023. BXCL701 in combination with pembrolizumab demonstrated a 21% (six out of 29 evaluable patients) composite response rate in mCRPC patients with adenocarcinoma phenotype, for whom there are limited treatment options. As of a cutoff date of September 6, 2023, five of these composite responders were RECIST 1.1 responders (four confirmed responses and one unconfirmed response) with decreases in tumor size ranging from -30% to -99% and a median duration of response to 19 months.

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As of the cutoff date of December 19, 2022, the majority of AEs experienced by patients in the adenocarcinoma cohort were low grade. AEs consistent with cytokine activation were observed, including fever, myalgia, nausea, chills, fatigue, dyspnea, headache and dizziness. SAEs experienced by five patients (12%) were reported as possibly related to BXCL701 or pembrolizumab: two reports of hypotension; one report of dizziness; one report of peripheral edema; one report of pyrexia; one report of Myasthenia Gravis; and one report of Cytokine Release Syndrome. Two patients (5%) discontinued therapy due to AEs. There was no evidence that BXCL701 potentiated immune-related AEs related to CPIs. The table below summarizes treatment-related AEs observed in the adenocarcinoma cohort.

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On November 8, 2023, we reported positive OS results from the Phase 2a portion of the trial in patients with adenocarcinoma. As of a data cutoff of September 6, 2023, among evaluable patients with adenocarcinoma (n = 29) BXCL701 in combination with pembrolizumab demonstrated a median OS of 15.5 months (95% CI 9.6–NR), and a 12-month survival rate of 59.3%.

BXCL701 as a Potential Treatment for Small Cell Lung Cancer (“SCLC”)

The American Cancer Society estimates that in 2024, about 35,187 cases of SCLC will be diagnosed in the U.S. Approximately 60-70% of these patients present with extensive disease, and first-line therapy for a majority of these patients involves the combination of a CPI with platinum-based chemotherapy or etoposide.

We are encouraged by the therapeutic potential of BXCL701 for SCLC given the activity it has demonstrated in the ongoing SCNC clinical trial. We are preparing the protocol for a Phase 1b/2 trial design to be a dose-escalation safety lead-in to establish a RP2D. However, the start of any such trial is paused following the Reprioritization.

BXCL701 as a Potential Treatment for Other Cancers

In addition to its potential use in combination with CPIs to treat mCRPC, an immunologically cold tumor, we are developing BXCL701 as a therapeutic for pancreatic cancer, and other solid tumors with greater, or “non-cold,” immunological activity that are nonetheless regarded as difficult-to-treat, and hematological malignancies. We believe the synergistic potential of BXCL701 and CPIs, when administered in combination, could increase cancer cell susceptibility to an enhanced immune response, potentially increasing the clinical benefit of CPIs, whose single-agent efficacy in treating these tumor types is generally viewed to be limited to between 13% and 30% of cancer patients and the duration of response to treatment is often short. As such, we envision the potential therapeutic benefit of BXCL701 increasing the sensitivity of cold tumors to CPI therapy, enabling the potential treatment of a range of cancers including pancreatic cancer, breast cancer, colorectal cancer, and ovarian cancer, as well as enhancing the depth of response to CPIs in other cancers. In addition, based on the preclinical observation that BXCL701 showed direct cytotoxic activity

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against certain leukemic cells, we have initiated clinical development targeting relapsed or refractory acute myeloid leukemia (“AML”).

Pancreatic Cancer

The American Cancer Society estimated that in 2024, approximately 66,440 cases of pancreatic cancer were expected to be diagnosed in the U.S. We are supporting a Phase 2 investigator-sponsored trial (“IST”) sponsored by Georgetown Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center (“Georgetown Lombardi”), designed to evaluate the use of BXCL701 along with pembrolizumab to treat pancreatic cancer. Few therapeutic options are available for patients with this disease, which has a five-year survival rate of less than 10%, among the lowest of all cancers. Pancreatic cancer has among the highest levels of overexpression and amplification of DPPs. Preclinical models demonstrated synergy between DPP inhibition with BXCL701 and anti-PD-1 antibody in the pancreatic cancer tumor microenvironment. Based on these preclinical observations, Georgetown Lombardi has initiated a Phase 2 IST to assess the safety of BXCL701 when administered in combination with pembrolizumab (safety lead-in), as well as to estimate the 18-week progression-free survival rate (primary objective of the efficacy phase) in previously treated metastatic pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma. This trial started in the third quarter of 2023. On February 6, 2024, we announced the completion of patient enrollment in the safety lead-in portion of the trial. As part of the trial’s safety lead-in, the first six patients have been enrolled and will be observed for a six-week safety window period. The trial is then expected to enroll approximately 39 patients in its efficacy phase in a Simon 2-stage single-arm, open-label design (19 patients in stage 1 and 20 patients in stage 2). Patients will be monitored radiographically and by tumor markers for response assessment. Tumor biopsies and blood samples will also be collected over the course of treatment to better understand the potential mechanism of action for the combination. The human proof of concept portion of the trial started in the first half of 2024. On April 24, 2024, we announced that an abstract entitled “Phase II trial of BXCL701 and pembrolizumab in patients with metastatic pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (EXPEL-PANC): Preliminary findings,” was selected for presentation at the poster session at the 2024 American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) Annual Meeting that took place in Chicago, Illinois from May 31 to June 4, 2024. Investigators reported that, as of the applicable cutoff date, one patient was progression-free at 18 weeks, three patients showed substantial reductions in serum CA19-9, a tumor marker that may correlate with increased T-cell infiltration, and one patient showed a best response of partial responses, out of six patients that had been treated with the combination.

Relapsed or Refractory AML

The American Cancer Society estimated that in 2024, approximately 20,800 new cases of AML were expected to be diagnosed in the U.S. We are supporting a Phase 1b IST sponsored by the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute (“Dana-Farber”) designed to evaluate the use of BXCL701, along with the current standard of care to treat relapsed or refractory AML. We believe that pyroptosis triggered by BXCL701 may provide potent single agent cytotoxicity directed towards AML. We also believe that DPP9 copy number may provide an actionable biomarker, as high copy number has been observed to correlate with BXCL701 toxicity in human AML cell lines. DPP8/9 inhibition has been shown to be cytotoxic to THP-1 cells, monocytic cancer cells cultured from a patient with AML, but not other cell lines, suggesting a specific vulnerability of AML to these inhibitors which we believe can be exploited for therapeutic benefit. Based on these preclinical observations, Dana-Farber has initiated a Phase 1b trial to assess the safety of BXCL701 and to determine the maximum tolerated dose or the RP2D of BXCL701 as a single agent. This trial started in the first quarter of 2023. Subject to successful completion of this Phase 1b trial, we anticipate that Dana-Farber will conduct further studies to determine BXCL701's objective response rate in AML in combination with the standard of care.

Other Potential Anti-cancer Programs

We collaborated with the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in a Phase 2a IST to evaluate the potential efficacy of BXCL701 administered in combination with pembrolizumab in patients with advanced solid cancer. The design of this open label trial included two cohorts and incorporated a two-stage configuration, which allowed for an expansion of patient enrollment to a total of 17 patients in each cohort if a RECIST 1.1 complete response or partial response was observed in at least one of the initial nine patients. The first cohort enrolled patients who previously had not received CPI therapy, with a second cohort consisting of patients that were either refractory to CPI therapy or had relapsed while on CPI therapy, meaning that no further response to CPI treatment is anticipated among patients in the second cohort. Trial participants received 200 mg of pembrolizumab on day 1 of a 21-day cycle, with 0.2 mg of

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BXCL701 administered twice-daily (“BID”) on days 1 through 7 during the first cycle, the dose increasing to 0.3 mg BID on Days 8 through 14 during the first and the subsequent cycles. Evaluable trial participants were required to receive a minimum of two treatment cycles. A preliminary assessment of BXCL701 dosed in combination with a CPI, as of completion of the first stage, noted responses in one patient in each of the CPI naïve and CPI refractory/relapsed cohorts, including a partial response in CPI-naïve, microsatellite stable endometrial carcinoma, PD-L1 negative (CPS <1) and a partial response in CPI-refractory uveal melanoma. These preliminary results were presented at the 2021 American Society of Clinical Oncology annual meeting (ASCO 2021). Patient enrollment in this trial was completed in the third quarter of 2022.

We believe BXCL701 may have potential application in breast cancer, as its use in combination with monoclonal antibody therapy generated encouraging in vivo data in a preclinical disease model where enhanced antibody-dependent cellular cytotoxicity was observed.

The FDA has granted BXCL701 orphan drug designation for the treatment of AML, stage IIb to IV melanoma, pancreatic cancer, and soft tissue sarcoma. As we consider BXCL701’s therapeutic potential for additional indications that represent unmet medical needs, we intend to apply for additional orphan drug designations for BXCL701.

Biomarker Development Initiatives Intended to Complement BXCL701 Administration

We are also actively engaged in the identification and development of predictive biomarkers that we believe could be used in conjunction with BXCL701 to predict the likelihood of patient response to therapy across the range of targeted indications. Based on preliminary data from AML patients, we believe DPP9 copy number could correlate to BXCL701 response rate, with a greater likelihood of BXCL701 cytotoxicity in patients with increased DPP9 copy number. We are pursuing its use in our biomarker discovery activities as a potential companion diagnostic. At the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer’s 38th Annual Meeting (SITC 2023), we presented data from the Phase 2a trial in SCNC patients, which indicated DPP9 overexpression is a potential response-predictive biomarker of BXCL701 and pembrolizumab combination treatment in mCRPC patients with SCNC phenotype.

Immuno-Oncology Manufacturing

We rely on third party contract manufacturing organizations to support development and manufacture of product candidates for our clinical trials, and, if any of our current or future product candidates receives marketing approval, we expect to rely on such manufacturers to meet commercial demand. We expect this strategy will enable us to maintain a more efficient infrastructure, avoiding dependence on our own manufacturing facility and equipment, while simultaneously enabling us to focus our expertise on the clinical development and future commercialization of our products. Drug substance is produced by Aptuit (Oxford) Ltd, an Evotec Company, and drug product by Pharma Services (Patheon) by Thermo Fisher Scientific. We expect to enter into commercial supply agreements with these manufacturers prior to any potential approval of BXCL701.

BXCL701 drug product is manufactured via conventional pharmaceutical processing procedures, employing commercially available excipients and packaging materials. The procedure and equipment employed for manufacture and analysis are consistent with standard organic synthesis or pharmaceutical production, and are transferable to a range of manufacturing facilities, if needed. We have selected a larger third-party drug product manufacturer and will be executing technology transfer of drug product manufacture to a larger manufacturer. We also plan to maintain the current drug substance and product manufacturer as part of our supply chain strategy.

Immuno-Oncology Competition

The biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries have made substantial investments in recent years into the rapid development of novel immunotherapies for the treatment of a range of pathologies, including infectious diseases and cancers, making this a highly competitive market. We believe BXCL701 is the only innate immune system activator in clinical development specifically addressing the cold tumor problem in immuno-oncology.

We face substantial competition from multiple sources, including large and specialty pharmaceutical, biopharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, academic research institutions and governmental agencies, and public

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and private research institutions. Our competitors compete with us on the level of the technologies employed, or on the level of development of product candidates. In addition, many small biotechnology companies have formed collaborations with large, established companies to (i) obtain support for their research, development, and commercialization of products or (ii) combine several treatment approaches to develop longer lasting or more efficacious treatments that may potentially directly compete with our current or future product candidates. We anticipate that we will continue to face increasing competition as new therapies and combinations thereof, technologies, and data emerge within the field of immunotherapy and, furthermore, within the treatment of infectious diseases and cancers.

In addition to the current standard of care treatments for patients with infectious diseases or cancers, numerous commercial and academic preclinical studies and clinical trials are being undertaken by a large number of parties to assess novel technologies and product candidates in the field of immunotherapy. Results from these studies and trials have fueled increasing levels of interest in the field of immunotherapy.

Large pharmaceutical companies that have commercialized or are developing immunotherapies to treat cancer include AstraZeneca AB, Bristol-Myers Squibb Company, Merck & Co., Inc., Novartis AG, Pfizer Inc., and F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd.

We face significant competition from pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies that target specific tumor-associated antigens using immune cells or other cytotoxic modalities. These generally include immune cell redirecting therapeutics such as T cell engagers, adoptive cellular therapies such as CAR-Ts, antibody drug conjugates, targeted radiopharmaceuticals, targeted immunotoxin, and targeted cancer vaccines.

Clinical stage companies that compete with us directly on the level of the development of product candidates targeting the innate immune system include Amgen Inc., Mirati Therapeutics, Inc., Bristol- Myers Squibb Company, Ryvu Therapeutics, Merck & Co., Inc., Replimune Group Inc., Nektar Therapeutics, Novartis AG, Xbiotech Inc., Stingthera, Inc., AstraZeneca AB, F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd and Aravive, Inc. Clinical stage companies that compete with us directly on the level of the development of product candidates targeting the mCRPC include Astellas Pharma Inc., Pfizer Inc., Bayer AG, Janssen, Sanofi S.A., Clovis Oncology, Inc., AstraZeneca AB, Merck & Co., Inc., GSK plc, Tempest Therapeutics, Inc., Zenith Epigenetics Ltd. and Gossamer Bio, Inc. Clinical stage companies that compete with us directly on the level of the development of product candidates utilizing the therapeutic potential of synthetic lethality include Repare Therapeutics Inc., IDEAYA Biosciences, Inc. and Tango Therapeutics, Inc.

Many of our competitors, either alone or in combination with their respective strategic partners, have significantly greater financial resources and expertise in research and development, manufacturing, the regulatory approval process, and marketing than we do. Mergers and acquisition activity in the pharmaceutical, biopharmaceutical and biotechnology sector is likely to result in greater resource concentration among a smaller number of our competitors. Smaller or early-stage companies may also prove to be significant competitors, particularly through sizeable collaborative arrangements with 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.

Our commercial opportunity could be reduced or eliminated if one or more of our competitors develop and commercialize products that are safer, more effective, better tolerated, or of greater convenience or economic benefit than our proposed product offerings. Our competitors also may be in a position to obtain FDA or other regulatory approval for their products more rapidly, resulting in a stronger or dominant market position before we are able to enter the market. The key competitive factors affecting the success of all of our programs are likely to be product safety, efficacy, convenience and treatment cost.

Immuno-Oncology Intellectual Property

Intellectual property is of vital importance in our field and in biotechnology generally. We seek to protect and enhance proprietary technology, inventions, and improvements that are commercially important to the development of our business by seeking, maintaining, enforcing, and defending patent and other intellectual property rights, whether developed internally or licensed from third parties. We will also seek to rely on regulatory protection afforded through

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inclusion in expedited development and review, data exclusivity, market exclusivity, and patent term extensions where available.

As of February 20, 2025, we have multiple patent families filed to protect our immuno-oncology program, including our core patent family directed to methods of using BXCL701 with immune checkpoint inhibitors, which is granted in the U.S., Japan, Australia, Canada, Russia, China, India, Taiwan, South Africa, Mexico, New Zealand, Europe and United Arab Emirates. Additional applications in this family are pending in major markets. Patents issued from this family are expected to expire no earlier than 2036. We have an additional patent issued in the U.S. directed to a method of selecting patients based on a biomarker and methods of treating certain cancers, with an expected expiration date no earlier than 2039. A corresponding European Patent case directed to selecting patients is issued and is expected to expire no earlier than 2039.

Additional applications are directed to administering BXCL701 in combination with various other molecules, biomarkers, and dosing regimens. We also have three PCT applications directed to novel formulations of BXCL701, various dosing regimens, methods of use, combination therapies, and to methods of treating small cell lung cancer. We expect that any patents issuing from the PCT and provisional applications will expire no earlier than 2043 to 2044.

We expect to file additional patent applications in support of current and new immuno-oncology clinical candidates as well as new platform and core technologies. For additional information regarding intellectual property regulations and risks, see above under “—Neuroscience—Neuroscience Intellectual Property” and Part I, Item 1A, “Risk Factors - Risks Related to Our Intellectual Property.”

Our Relationship with BioXcel LLC

As of March 21, 2025, BioXcel LLC holds an ownership interest of approximately 8.8% in the Company and our pipeline compounds were identified by applying our growing internal AI capabilities, along with BioXcel LLC’s EvolverAI, a proprietary pharmaceutical discovery and development engine, for drug re-innovation.

We entered into the Amended and Restated Asset Contribution Agreement (the “Contribution Agreement”), pursuant to which BioXcel LLC, agreed to contribute BioXcel LLC’s rights, title and interest in BXCL501, BXCL701, BXCL502 and BXCL702, and all of the assets and liabilities associated in consideration for (i) 592,500 shares of our common stock, (ii) $1 million upon completion of an initial public offering, (iii) $500,000 upon the later of the 12-month anniversary of an initial public offering and the first dosing of a patient in the bridging bioavailability/bioequivalence study for the BXCL501 program, (iv) $500,000 upon the later of the 12 month anniversary of an initial public offering and the first dosing of a patient in the Phase 2 proof of concept open-label monotherapy or combination trial with Keytruda for the BXCL701 program and (v) a one-time payment of $5 million within 60 days after the achievement of $50 million in cumulative net sales of any product or combination of products resulting from the development and commercialization of any one of the contributed product candidates or a product derived therefrom. As of December 31, 2024, all of the foregoing have been paid except for (v).

We entered into a Separation and Shared Services Agreement with BioXcel LLC that took effect on June 30, 2017, as amended and restated thereafter (the “Services Agreement”), pursuant to which services provided by BioXcel LLC through its subsidiaries in India and the U.S. will continue indefinitely, as agreed upon by the parties. These services include certain intellectual property prosecution and management and research and development activities. The Company had an option, exercisable until December 31, 2024, to enter into a collaborative services agreement with BioXcel LLC pursuant to which BioXcel LLC shall perform product identification and related services for us utilizing EvolverAI, its proprietary pharmaceutical discovery and development engine. To maintain the ability to exercise the foregoing option, pursuant to an amendment to the Services Agreement effective as of April 19, 2022, the Company agreed to pay BioXcel LLC $18,000 per month from March 13, 2023 to December 31, 2024. This option was not exercised. However, BioXcel LLC continues to perform certain administrative services under the terms of the expired contract.

The parties were obligated to negotiate the collaborative services agreement in good faith and to incorporate reasonable market-based terms, including consideration for BioXcel LLC reflecting a low, single-digit royalty on net sales and reasonable development and commercialization milestone payments, provided that (i) development milestone

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payments did not exceed $10 million in the aggregate and were not to be payable prior to proof of concept in humans and (ii) commercialization milestone payments were to be based on reaching annual net sales levels, were to be limited to 3% of the applicable net sales level, and were not exceed $30 million in the aggregate. However, subsequent to December 31, 2024 no development activity has been carried out by BioXcel LLC and none is contemplated.

Service charges recorded under the Services Agreement were $1.3 million for each of the years ended December 31, 2024 and 2023.

Government Regulation

Government Regulation and Product Approval

Government authorities in the U.S., at the federal, state and local level, and other countries extensively regulate, among other things, the research, development, testing, manufacture, quality control, approval, labeling, packaging, storage, record-keeping, promotion, advertising, distribution, marketing and export and import of drug products. A new drug must be approved by the FDA through the NDA process before it may be legally marketed in the U.S. We, along with any third-party contractors, will be required to navigate the various preclinical, clinical and commercial approval requirements of the governing regulatory agencies of the countries in which we wish to conduct studies or seek approval of our products and product candidates. The process of obtaining regulatory approvals and the subsequent compliance with applicable U.S. federal, state, and local and foreign statutes and regulations require the expenditure of substantial time and financial resources.

U.S. Drug Development Process

In the U.S., the FDA regulates drugs under the federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (“FDCA”), and its implementing regulations. The process required by the FDA before a drug may be marketed in the U.S. generally involves the following:

● satisfactory completion of an FDA advisory committee review, if applicable;

Prior to beginning the first clinical trial with a product candidate in the U.S., a sponsor must submit an IND to the FDA. An IND is a request for allowance from the FDA to administer an investigational new drug product to humans. The central focus of an IND submission is on the general investigational plan and the protocol(s) for clinical studies. The

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IND also includes results of animal and in vitro studies assessing the toxicology, pharmacokinetics, pharmacology, and pharmacodynamic characteristics of the product; chemistry, manufacturing, and controls information; and any available human data or literature to support the use of the investigational product. An IND must become effective before human clinical trials may begin. The IND automatically becomes effective 30 days after receipt by the FDA, unless the FDA, within the 30-day time period, raises safety concerns or questions about the proposed clinical trial. In such a case, the IND may be placed on clinical hold and the IND sponsor and the FDA must resolve any outstanding concerns or questions before any clinical trials can begin. Submission of an IND may or may not result in FDA allowance to begin a clinical trial.

Clinical trials involve the administration of the investigational product to human subjects under the supervision of qualified investigators in accordance with GCPs, which include among other things, the requirement that all research subjects provide their informed consent for their participation in any clinical study. Clinical trials are conducted under protocols detailing, among other things, the objectives of the study, the parameters to be used in monitoring safety and the effectiveness criteria to be evaluated. A separate submission to the existing IND must be made for each successive clinical trial conducted during product development and for any subsequent protocol amendments. While the IND is active, progress reports summarizing the results of the clinical trials and nonclinical studies performed since the last progress report, among other information, must be submitted at least annually to the FDA, and written IND safety reports must be submitted to the FDA and its investigators for actual or suspected serious and adverse events, along with any findings from other studies suggesting a significant risk to humans exposed to the same or similar drugs and findings from animal or in vitro testing suggesting a significant risk to humans, as well as any clinically important increased incidence of a suspected serious adverse reaction compared to that listed in the protocol or investigator brochure.

Furthermore, an independent IRB for each site proposing to conduct the clinical trial must review and approve the plan for any clinical trial and its informed consent form before the clinical trial begins at that site and must monitor the study until completed. Some studies also include oversight by an independent group of qualified experts organized by the clinical study sponsor, known as a data safety monitoring board, which provides authorization for whether a study can move forward at designated check points, based on access to data from the study, and may halt the clinical trial if it determines that there is an unacceptable safety risk for subjects or other for other grounds, such as no demonstration of efficacy. The FDA or the sponsor may suspend a clinical trial at any time on various grounds, including a finding that the research subjects or patients 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. There are also requirements governing the reporting of ongoing clinical studies and clinical study results to public registries.

Human clinical trials are typically conducted in three sequential phases that may overlap or be combined:

In some cases, the FDA may require, or companies may voluntarily pursue, additional clinical trials after a product is approved to gain more information about the product. These so-called Phase 4 studies may be conducted after initial marketing approval and may be used to gain additional experience from the treatment of patients in the intended

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therapeutic indication. In certain instances, the FDA may mandate the performance of Phase 4 clinical trials as a condition of approval of an NDA.

Concurrent with clinical trials, companies usually complete additional animal studies and must also develop additional information about the chemistry and physical characteristics of the drug and finalize a process for manufacturing the product in commercial quantities in accordance with cGMP requirements. The manufacturing process must be capable of consistently producing quality batches of the product candidate and, among other things, the manufacturer must develop methods for testing the identity, strength, quality and purity of the final drug. In addition, appropriate packaging must be selected and tested, and stability studies must be conducted to demonstrate that the product candidate does not undergo unacceptable deterioration over its shelf life.

In addition, during the development of a drug, sponsors are given opportunities to periodically meet with or seek feedback from the FDA. These interactions may be requested, for example, prior to submission of an IND, at the end of Phase 2, and before an NDA is submitted. These interactions can provide an opportunity for the sponsor to share information about the data gathered to date, for the FDA to provide advice, and for the sponsor and the FDA to reach alignment on the next phase of development.

U.S. Review and Approval Process

Assuming successful completion of all required testing in accordance with all applicable regulatory requirements, the results of product development, including results from preclinical and other non-clinical studies and clinical trials, along with descriptions of the manufacturing process, analytical tests conducted on the chemistry of the drug, proposed labeling and other relevant information are submitted to the FDA as part of an NDA requesting approval to market the product. Data can come from company-sponsored clinical studies intended to test the safety and effectiveness of a use of the product, or from a number of alternative sources, including studies initiated by independent investigators. The submission of an NDA is subject to the payment of substantial user fees; a waiver of such fees may be obtained under certain limited circumstances. Additionally, no user fees are assessed on NDAs for products designated as orphan drugs, unless the product also includes a non-orphan indication.

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 NDA must be resubmitted with the additional information. The resubmitted application also is subject to review before the FDA accepts it for filing. Once filed, the FDA reviews an NDA to determine, among other things, whether a product is safe and effective for its intended use and whether its manufacturing is cGMP-compliant to assure and preserve the product’s identity, strength, quality and purity. Under the Prescription Drug User Fee Act guidelines that are currently in effect, the FDA has a goal of ten months from the filing date to complete a standard review of an NDA for a drug that is a new molecular entity, and of ten months from the date of NDA receipt to complete a standard review of an NDA for a drug that is not a new molecular entity.

The FDA may refer an application for a novel drug to an advisory committee. An advisory committee is a panel of independent experts, including clinicians and other scientific experts, that review, evaluate and provide a recommendation as to whether the NDA 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 will typically inspect the facility or facilities where the product is manufactured. The FDA will not approve an application unless it determines that the manufacturing processes and facilities comply with cGMP and are 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 GCPs.

After the FDA evaluates an NDA and conducts inspections of manufacturing facilities where the investigational product and/or its drug substance will be produced, the FDA may issue an approval letter or a Complete Response Letter (“CRL”). An approval letter authorizes commercial marketing and sale of the product with specific prescribing information for specific indications. A CRL usually describes the specific deficiencies in the NDA identified by the FDA

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and may require additional clinical data, including additional clinical trials, or other significant and time-consuming requirements related to clinical trials, nonclinical studies or manufacturing. If a CRL is issued, the sponsor must resubmit the NDA or, address all of the deficiencies identified in the letter, or withdraw the application. Even if such data and information are submitted, the FDA may decide that the NDA does not satisfy the criteria for approval.

If regulatory approval of a product is granted, such approval will be granted for specific indications and may entail limitations on the indicated uses for which such product may be marketed. For example, the FDA may approve the NDA with a Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategy (“REMS”) to ensure the benefits of the product outweigh its risks. A REMS is a safety strategy to manage a known or potential serious risk associated with a medicine and to enable patients to have continued access to such medicines by managing their safe use, and could include medication guides, physician communication plans, or elements to assure safe use, such as restricted distribution methods, patient registries, and other risk minimization tools. The FDA also may condition approval on, among other things, changes to proposed labeling or the development of adequate controls and specifications. The FDA may also require one or more post-market studies and additional surveillance programs to further assess and monitor the product’s safety and effectiveness after commercialization and may limit further marketing of the product based on the results of these post-marketing studies.

In addition, the Pediatric Research Equity Act (“PREA”), requires a sponsor to conduct pediatric clinical trials for most drugs, for a new active ingredient, new indication, new dosage form, new dosing regimen or new route of administration. Under PREA, original NDAs and supplements must contain a pediatric assessment unless the sponsor has received a deferral or waiver. The required assessment must evaluate the safety and effectiveness of the product for the claimed indications in all relevant pediatric subpopulations and support dosing and administration for each pediatric subpopulation for which the product is safe and effective. The sponsor or FDA may request a deferral of pediatric clinical trials for some or all of the pediatric subpopulations. A deferral may be granted for several reasons, including a finding that the drug is ready for approval for use in adults before pediatric clinical trials are complete or that additional safety or effectiveness data needs to be collected before the pediatric clinical trials begin. The FDA must send a non-compliance letter to any sponsor that fails to submit the required assessment, keep a deferral current or fails to submit a request for approval of a pediatric formulation.

Expedited Development and Review Programs

The FDA offers expedited development and review programs for qualifying product candidates. For example, the Fast Track program is intended to expedite or facilitate the process for reviewing product candidates that are intended to treat a serious or life-threatening disease or condition and demonstrate the potential to address unmet medical needs for the disease or condition. Fast Track designation applies to the combination of the product candidate and the specific indication for which it is being studied. The sponsor of a Fast Track product candidate has opportunities for more frequent interactions with the applicable FDA review team during product development and, once an NDA is submitted, the NDA may be eligible for priority review. An NDA for a Fast Track product candidate may also be eligible for rolling review, where the FDA may consider for review sections of the NDA on a rolling basis before the complete application is submitted, if the sponsor provides a schedule for the submission of the sections of the NDA, the FDA agrees to accept sections of the NDA and determines that the schedule is acceptable, and the sponsor pays any required user fees upon submission of the first section of the NDA.

A product candidate intended to treat a serious or life-threatening disease or condition may also be eligible for Breakthrough Therapy designation to expedite its development and review. A product candidate can receive Breakthrough Therapy designation if preliminary clinical evidence indicates that the product candidate, alone or in combination with one or more other drugs or biologics, may demonstrate substantial improvement over existing therapies on one or more clinically significant endpoints, such as substantial treatment effects observed early in clinical development. The Breakthrough Therapy designation includes the Fast Track program features, as well as more intensive FDA interaction and guidance beginning as early as Phase 1 and an organizational commitment to expedite the development and review of the product candidate, including involvement of senior managers.

Any application for a drug submitted to the FDA for approval, including a product candidate with a Fast Track designation and/or Breakthrough Therapy designation, may be eligible for other FDA review programs intended to expedite the FDA review and approval process, such as priority review. An NDA is eligible for priority review if the product candidate is designed to treat a serious or life-threatening disease or condition, and if approved, would provide a

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significant improvement in safety or effectiveness compared to available alternatives for such disease or condition. For new-molecular-entity NDAs, priority review designation means the FDA’s goal is to take action on the application within six months of the 60-day filing date, or with respect to non-new-molecular-entity NDAs, within six months of the NDA receipt date.

Additionally, depending on the design of the applicable clinical studies, product candidates studied for their safety and effectiveness in treating serious or life-threatening diseases or conditions may receive accelerated approval upon a determination that the product has an effect on a surrogate endpoint that is reasonably likely to predict clinical benefit, or on a clinical endpoint that can be measured earlier than irreversible morbidity or mortality, that is reasonably likely to predict an effect on irreversible morbidity or mortality or other clinical benefit, taking into account the severity, rarity, or prevalence of the condition and the availability or lack of alternative treatments. As a condition of accelerated approval, the FDA will generally require the sponsor to perform adequate and well-controlled confirmatory clinical studies to verify and describe the anticipated effect on irreversible morbidity or mortality or other clinical benefit, and may require that such confirmatory studies be underway prior to granting accelerated approval. Products receiving accelerated approval may be subject to expedited withdrawal procedures if the sponsor fails to conduct the required confirmatory studies or if such studies fail to verify the predicted clinical benefit. In addition, the FDA currently requires pre-approval of promotional materials as a condition for accelerated approval, which could adversely impact the timing of the commercial launch of the relevant product.

Fast Track designation, Breakthrough Therapy designation, priority review, and accelerated approval do not change the standards for approval, but such designations may expedite the development or approval process. Even if a product candidate qualifies for one or more of these programs, the FDA may later decide that the product no longer meets the conditions to qualify for such program or may decide that the time period for FDA review or approval will not be shortened.

Orphan Drug Designation and Exclusivity

Under the Orphan Drug Act, the FDA may grant orphan designation to a drug intended to treat a rare disease or condition, defined as a disease or condition with a patient population of fewer than 200,000 individuals in the U.S., or a patient population greater than 200,000 individuals in the U.S. and when there is no reasonable expectation that the cost of developing and making available the drug in the U.S. will be recovered from sales in the U.S. for that drug. Orphan drug designation must be requested before submitting an NDA. After the FDA grants orphan drug designation, the generic identity of the therapeutic agent and its potential orphan use are disclosed publicly by the FDA.

If a product that has orphan drug designation subsequently receives the first FDA approval for a particular active ingredient for the disease for which it has such designation, the product is entitled to orphan product exclusivity, which means that the FDA may not approve any other applications, including a full NDA, to market the same drug for the same disease or condition for seven years, except in limited circumstances, such as a showing of clinical superiority to the product with orphan drug exclusivity or if the FDA finds that the holder of the orphan drug exclusivity has not shown that it can assure the availability of sufficient quantities of the orphan drug to meet the needs of patients with the disease or condition for which the drug was designated. Orphan drug exclusivity does not prevent the FDA from approving a different drug for the same disease or condition, or the same drug for a different disease or condition. Among the other benefits of orphan drug designation are tax credits for certain research costs and a waiver of the NDA user fee.

A designated orphan drug may not receive orphan drug exclusivity if it is approved for a use that is broader than the disease or condition for which it received orphan designation. In addition, orphan drug exclusive marketing rights in the U.S. may be lost if the FDA later determines that the request for designation was materially defective or, as noted above, if a second applicant demonstrates that its product is clinically superior to the approved product with orphan exclusivity or the manufacturer of the approved product is unable to assure sufficient quantities of the product to meet the needs of patients with the rare disease or condition.

Post-approval Requirements

Drug products manufactured or distributed pursuant to FDA approvals are subject to pervasive and continuing regulation by the FDA, including, among other things, requirements relating to record-keeping, reporting of adverse

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events, periodic reporting, product sampling and distribution, and advertising and promotion of 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 program fees for any marketed products. Drug manufacturers and their subcontractors are required to register their establishments with the FDA and certain state agencies, and are subject to periodic unannounced inspections by the FDA and certain state agencies for compliance with cGMP, which impose certain procedural and documentation requirements upon us and our third-party manufacturers. Changes to the manufacturing process are strictly regulated, and, depending on the significance of the change, may require prior FDA approval before being implemented. FDA regulations also require investigation and correction of any deviations from cGMP and impose reporting requirements. Accordingly, manufacturers must continue to expend time, money, and effort in the area of production and quality control to maintain compliance with cGMP and other aspects of regulatory compliance.

The FDA may withdraw approval if compliance with regulatory requirements and standards is not maintained or if problems occur after the product reaches the market. 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 revisions to the approved labeling to add new safety information; imposition of post-market studies or clinical studies to assess new safety risks; or imposition of distribution restrictions or other restrictions under a REMS program. Other potential consequences include, among other things:

● fines, warning letters, or untitled letters;

● clinical holds on clinical studies;

● injunctions or the imposition of civil or criminal penalties.

The FDA closely regulates the marketing, labeling, advertising, and promotion of drug products. A company can make only those claims relating to safety and efficacy, purity and potency that are approved by the FDA 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. Failure to comply with these requirements can result in, among other things, adverse publicity, warning letters, corrective advertising and potential civil and criminal penalties. Physicians may prescribe, in their independent professional medical judgment, legally available products for uses that are not described in the product’s labeling and that differ from those approved by the FDA. Physicians may believe that such off-label uses are the best treatment for many patients in varied circumstances. The FDA does not regulate the behavior of physicians in their choice of treatments. The FDA does, however, restrict manufacturers’ communications on the subject of off-label use of their products. However, companies may share truthful and not misleading information that is otherwise consistent with a product’s FDA-approved labelling.

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Hatch-Waxman Act

Section 505 of the FDCA describes three types of marketing applications that may be submitted to the FDA to request marketing authorization for a new drug. A Section 505(b)(1) NDA is an application that contains full reports of investigations of safety and efficacy. A 505(b)(2) NDA is an application that contains full reports of investigations of safety and efficacy but where at least some of the information required for approval comes from investigations that were not conducted by or for the applicant and for which the applicant has not obtained a right of reference or use from the person by or for whom the investigations were conducted. This regulatory pathway enables the applicant to rely, in part, on the FDA's prior findings of safety and efficacy for an existing product, or published literature, in support of its application. Section 505(j) establishes an abbreviated approval process for a generic version of approved drug products through the submission of an Abbreviated New Drug Application (“ANDA”). An ANDA provides for marketing of a generic drug product that has the same active ingredients, dosage form, strength, route of administration, labeling, performance characteristics and intended use, among other things, to a previously approved product. ANDAs are termed "abbreviated" because they are generally not required to include preclinical (animal) and clinical (human) data to establish safety and efficacy. Instead, generic applicants must scientifically demonstrate that their product is bioequivalent to, or performs in the same manner as, the innovator drug through in vitro, in vivo, or other testing. The generic version must deliver the same amount of active ingredients into a subject's bloodstream in the same amount of time as the innovator drug and can often be substituted by pharmacists under prescriptions written for the reference listed drug. 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 drug or a method of using the drug. Upon approval of a drug, each of the patents listed in the application for the drug is then published in the FDA's Orange Book. Drugs listed in the Orange Book can, in turn, be cited by potential competitors in support of approval of an ANDA or 505(b)(2) NDA.

Upon submission of an ANDA or a 505(b)(2) NDA, an applicant must certify to the FDA that (1) no patent information on the drug product that is the subject of the application has been submitted to the FDA; (2) such patent has expired; (3) the date on which such patent expires; or (4) such patent is invalid or will not be infringed upon by the manufacture, use or sale of the drug product for which the application is submitted. Generally, the ANDA or 505(b)(2) NDA cannot be approved until all listed patents have expired, except where the ANDA or 505(b)(2) NDA applicant challenges a listed patent through the last type of certification (a “paragraph IV certification”). If the applicant does not challenge the listed patents or indicates 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 of 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 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. If the paragraph IV certification is challenged by an NDA holder or the patent owner(s) asserts a patent challenge to the paragraph IV certification, the FDA may not approve that application until the earlier of 30 months from the receipt of the notice of the paragraph IV certification, the expiration of the patent, when the infringement case concerning each such patent was favorably decided in the applicant's favor or settled, or such shorter or longer period as may be ordered by a court. This prohibition is generally referred to as the 30-month stay. In instances where an ANDA or 505(b)(2) NDA applicant files a paragraph IV certification, the NDA holder or patent owner(s) regularly take action to trigger the 30-month stay, recognizing that the related patent litigation may take many months or years to resolve. Thus, approval of an ANDA or 505(b)(2) NDA could be delayed for a significant period of time depending on the patent certification the applicant makes and the reference drug sponsor's decision to initiate patent litigation.

The Hatch-Waxman Act establishes periods of non-patent regulatory exclusivity for certain approved drug products, during which the FDA cannot approve (or in some cases accept) an ANDA or 505(b)(2) application that relies on the branded reference drug. For example, the holder of an NDA, including a 505(b)(2) NDA, may obtain five years of non-patent data exclusivity upon approval of a new drug containing new chemical entities that have not been previously approved by the FDA. 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 therapeutic 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 non-infringement. The Hatch-Waxman Act also provides three years of non-patent exclusivity to the holder of an NDA (including a 505(b)(2) NDA) for a

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particular condition of approval, or change to a marketed product, such as a new formulation for a previously approved product, if one or more new clinical studies (other than bioavailability or bioequivalence studies) was essential to the approval of the application and was conducted or sponsored by the applicant. This three-year exclusivity period protects against FDA approval of ANDAs and 505(b)(2) NDAs for the condition of the new drug's approval. As a general matter, the three-year exclusivity 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 efficacy.

FDA Approval and Regulation of Medical Devices and Companion Diagnostics

If safe and effective use of a therapeutic depends on an in vitro diagnostic, then the FDA generally will require approval or clearance of that diagnostic, known as a companion diagnostic, at the same time that the FDA approves the therapeutic product. In August 2014, the FDA issued final guidance clarifying the requirements that apply to approval of therapeutic products and in vitro companion diagnostics. According to the guidance, if the FDA determines that a companion diagnostic device is essential to the safe and effective use of a novel therapeutic product or indication, the FDA generally will not approve the therapeutic product or new therapeutic product indication if the companion diagnostic device is not approved or cleared for that indication. Approval or clearance of the companion diagnostic device will ensure that the device has been adequately evaluated and has adequate performance characteristics in the intended population.

Under the FDCA, in vitro diagnostics, including companion diagnostics, are regulated as medical devices. In the U.S., the FDCA and its implementing regulations, and other federal and state statutes and regulations govern, among other things, medical device design and development, preclinical and clinical testing, premarket clearance or approval, registration and listing, manufacturing, labeling, storage, advertising and promotion, sales and distribution, export and import, and post-market surveillance. Unless an exemption applies, medical devices, including companion diagnostic tests, require marketing clearance or approval from the FDA prior to commercial distribution.

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