Welcome, shareholders. It is my pleasure to welcome you to the PolyNovo Annual General Meeting for FY 2026. My name is Leon Hoare, and I am the Non-executive Chair of the company. We have a quorum present, so I declare the 2026 Annual General Meeting of PolyNovo open. I am delighted to be able to extend a warm welcome to our shareholders joining us here today, and to those who are participating through the online meeting platform. I would like to start by introducing my fellow Directors. From the end, Mr. Andrew Lumsden, Mr. Rob Douglas, Dr. Charmaine Gittleson, our newly appointed Non-executive Directors, Mr. Andrew Price and Mr. Dean Phizacklea. Dr. Robyn Elliott and Ms. Christine Emmanuel-Donnelly, who are unfortunately unable to join us today.
Dr. Robyn Elliott and Ms. Christine Emmanuel-Donnelly are not standing for re-election, and as a result, will retire from the board at the conclusion of today's meeting. On behalf of the board, I thank them for their very significant contribution to the company and wish them well for the future. I would also like to introduce our Company Secretary, Amy Demediuk, and welcome Mr. Bruce Peatey, our CEO. You will hear lots from Bruce shortly. We also have in attendance Ashley Butler, Matt Biernat, and Rekkaa Moorthy from our audit firm, Ernst & Young. Welcome. Also in attendance are members of our executive leadership team sitting in the front row. Before I formally address the meeting to reflect on a year of significant progress for PolyNovo, I would like to share one part of a three-part patient story that we will share at key intervals throughout the meeting.
Shareholders familiar with the 2026 annual report will recognize the patient, Sam Nye, from the Torres Strait, who was bitten by a shark one year ago. We were fortunate to film with him in July and are pleased to share his story with you today. Recovery from such a significant injury is not linear and is enabled by Novo technologies, the care of clinical teams, and support at home. Let's have the video.
To symbolize that you have good character and you are a good person overall, we usually say, "The weaving's tight.
Thursday Island, affectionately known as TI, is one of the Torres Strait Islands, approximately 40 km from the northernmost tip of the Australian mainland.
Life on TI, slow-paced. It is slow. There is literally island time. Every weekend, even during the week, you will see people swimming and fishing. Play footy and just walking around the island. It is just fun.
For Sam Nye, TI is home, and a place where the water is part of everyday life.
Sam is my extrovert. He is my social butterfly. Everybody just flocks to him. He is fearless. Teaching him to swim, it was like, "Oh my God." He was forever, "I want to go to the deep end. I want to swim out further." "Oh, no, no. The tide will take you. You need to come back.
In October 2025, the familiar rhythm of island life changed. As the sun set, what began as an ordinary day quickly became a fight for survival.
Sitting at my dining room table cooking dinner, I had his friend burst through the door saying, "Aunty Shana, something bit Sam." I just grabbed the car keys, grabbed the phone, and jumped in the car and sped down the road. Saw him lying on the rocks and realized his left side was missing. I screamed his name. I did not know. I did not know the shark was there. My focus was on Sam.
In those first moments, there was an immediate community response, shaped by a place where you show up when it matters.
That is the norm. That is what we do up there. The community comes together. We come together, and we help and provide support.
Sam received initial treatment at the hospital on TI while preparations were made to transport him to Townsville, just over 1,000 km away. Even before the specialist team in Townsville had seen Sam in person, the scale of what had happened was clear.
I remember very clearly, I was standing in my kitchen at home. My phone rang. Townsville University Hospital came up. "We've just been informed about a shark attack off the Torres Strait." I immediately sat down at my computer and started researching shark attacks and what might be necessary aspects of their initial resuscitation and management.
Shark attacks are exceptionally rare, and the injuries they leave behind can be complex and life-changing.
His intestines were exposed, his stomach was exposed, and the fact that Sam had managed to swim 20 meters back to shore after this injury is amazing in itself. Testament to his will to survive, and it's just fantastic that he was able to survive that.
There wasn't a thought in my mind that I would lose Sam. It was just, his recovery is going to be different, and I can do different. I would class love as a doing word. It's a responsibility. It's a decision you make every day.
Sam underwent his first surgery just hours after arriving in Townsville.
FY 2026 was a year of very significant progress for PolyNovo. We strengthened the foundations required to support our continued evolution as a global medical technology company. This slide highlights a decade-long journey demonstrating that PolyNovo delivers on growth. In FY 2026, we again delivered strong revenue growth, consistent profitability, and positive cash flow, creating powerful momentum and positioning PolyNovo to pursue its strategic growth opportunities with confidence. Several key clinical, regulatory, and capital programs were advanced in the period. The clinical study report for our U.S. pivotal randomized controlled trial was finalized, and work progressed on the pre-market approval submission for NovoSorb BTM, supporting the full-thickness burn indication in the United States. Bruce will tell you more about this shortly. We also continued expanding our manufacturing capability in Port Melbourne, supporting future capacity requirements.
We have refitted the already new R&D Innovation Centre post the fire of November 2025, and the R&D team now have largely reoccupied the facility. These initiatives represent important milestones for PolyNovo and reflect the increasing maturity, capability, and scale of the organization. We will continue to invest for growth. FY 2026 was also a year of renewal for the board. We have continued to evolve the board's composition and skills mix, bringing additional capabilities, experience, and perspectives to support PolyNovo's next stage of growth. Following Christine Emmanuel-Donnelly and Dr. Robyn Elliott's decision to retire at this meeting, we recently announced the appointments of Dean Phizacklea, Andrew Price as Non-executive Directors. Dr. Charmaine Gittleson also joined the board as a Non-executive Director in April. Charmaine, Dean, and Andrew bring a wide array of complementary skills, expertise, and perspectives that will further strengthen the existing board.
I know shareholders will join me in extending my sincere appreciation to Christine and Robyn for the important role each have played in PolyNovo's development and success. Their stewardship over many years has supported a period of very significant growth and transformation of the company. The board has also reviewed its governance frameworks, its committee structure, including establishing a dedicated nomination committee, and refreshed its charters and its key policies. These updates strengthen oversight, accountability, and strategic alignment as PolyNovo becomes a larger and more complex global company. Key appointments were also made to the company's executive leadership. Bruce Peatey joined as Chief Executive Officer, alongside Dr. Marthe D'Ombrain as Chief Scientific Officer, Amy Demediuk as General Counsel and Company Secretary, and Tyson Parker as Chief Manufacturing and Supply Chain Officer. This has strengthened PolyNovo's capability across global healthcare, R&D, science, governance, manufacturing, audit readiness, and commercial execution.
We have focused on enhancing the caliber of our senior leadership as we build the organization's growth and execution focus. Importantly, as part of our investment in the leadership team, PolyNovo has finalized a comprehensive long-term incentive program to enhance our ability to attract and retain high-caliber executives who can deliver sustained high performance aligned to our shareholders' interest. This new scheme is in place from FY 2027 onwards. Collectively, this progress positions PolyNovo well for the future.
We have renewed leadership, strengthened governance, expanded organizational capability, and advanced several of the clinical, regulatory, and capital programs that will support scale and underpin our next phase of growth. The board is confident in PolyNovo's foundations and opportunities presented by the NovoSorb platform, alongside the team's ability to execute with discipline and purpose. On behalf of the board, I thank our employees, clinicians, and research partners for their contribution throughout the year.
I also thank our shareholders for their continued support and confidence in PolyNovo. Thank you. I will now invite our Chief Executive Officer, Bruce Peatey, to address the meeting. Thanks, Bruce.
Thanks, Leon. Good morning, shareholders. Thank you for your attendance today. PolyNovo's purpose is to redefine what is possible with healing. Our focus is on regenerating tissue lost through burns, trauma, or surgery. Every day, clinicians use our technology to help patients recover from devastating injuries, avoid amputation, and to regain function. We estimate more than 130,000 patients have now been treated with NovoSorb products, and that patient impact remains our greatest motivation. The more time I spend with our customers, the people, clinical partners, the more convinced I am of PolyNovo's potential to make a difference in the treatment of complex tissue defects. The strength of our technology is proven. What has evolved is the business around it. Our ambition for PolyNovo is to remain a high-growth company while becoming a stronger, more resilient, and more scalable business.
PolyNovo combines a trusted platform with deep clinical relationships, manufacturing know-how, and global reach. These advantages have been built over time and are difficult to replicate. That is the opportunity before us, and it is what I want to focus on today. FY 2026 was an important year in PolyNovo's evolution, which saw the company further translate its strategic priorities into tangible progress. We secured regulatory clearances that support expansion, introduced NovoSorb MTX into more hospitals, strengthened the leadership team, and completed our largest manufacturing facility. Together, these actions expanded our commercial reach and strengthened the foundations for the future demand and the next phase of growth. Operating progress was matched by greater financial discipline. Underlying EBITDA increased by 50.4% year-on-year, and the business generated AUD 9.4 million in free cash flow. Our strengthened balance sheet gives us the capacity to invest in growth.
FY 2026 demonstrated that PolyNovo can expand its clinical and commercial platform while improving the financial strength of the business. Our strategy for the next phase has three connected priorities: scale our core tissue regeneration business, unlock the NovoSorb platform potential, and build the capabilities required to support a significantly larger global company. The first is the principal driver of near-term performance. The second creates a longer-term value for the NovoSorb platform, and the third enables them both, while maintaining quality and financial discipline and improving operating leverage. Our largest near-term opportunity is to deepen adoption where we already have credibility, reaching more clinicians and treating a broader range of patients within existing accounts. That starts with burns, where NovoSorb BTM is well-established and where further growth will be supported by stronger clinical evidence and broader regulatory positioning. The pivotal BARDA-funded randomized control trial is central to that effort.
Upon approval, the PMA provides an indication for full-thickness burns in the U.S. and has the potential not only to strengthen our position in the United States, it will also support broader adoption in burns and provide a foundation for future opportunities in other major markets. We expect to submit the PMA to the FDA ahead of the previously indicated end-of-year calendar timing. All manufacturing, validation, and clinical activities required for the submission are complete, and our focus now is on finalizing a high-quality, comprehensive submission package. Complex wound applications are becoming an increasingly important growth engine for PolyNovo. This is not a shift away from burns. Rather, it reflects the expanding relevance of our NovoSorb technology.
In the United States, these applications have delivered a three year compound annual growth rate of 52.8%, and we estimate the addressable patient population across trauma, surgical reconstruction, and limb salvage is three to four times larger than burns alone. In the first randomized controlled trial of NovoSorb BTM against standard of care in complex diabetic foot wounds at high risk of amputation, wounds treated with NovoSorb BTM healed 2.7 times faster. This finding offers encouraging evidence that our technology may be relevant to this clinically important patient group and supports further study. NovoSorb SynPath provides another route to broaden access into complex wound treatments in the U.S. With launch priorities shaped by reimbursement, site economics, and clinical workflow, we are currently building that local evidence required to support commercial launch this calendar year.
We see SynPath as an additional growth opportunity, with its revenue contribution building over the near to medium term. In summary, the core business opportunity is diversified across deeper burns adoption, growth in complex wounds, and entry into new settings of care. This is expected to improve the quality of growth over time. The second priority is unlocking the broader potential of NovoSorb as a platform technology. We see significant potential in the platform. Our focus is on converting that potential into value more quickly. We will be selective in where we invest. We will back programs where there is significant unmet clinical needs, a compelling commercial opportunity, and a clear advantage for PolyNovo. Where another party is better placed to take an application forward, we will actively consider partnering rather than building capability ourselves.
With our Chief Scientific Officer now on board, we have commenced a comprehensive review of the R&D pipeline to identify the opportunities with the greatest potential to create value. That review will test existing programs, such as hernia and breast reconstruction, and new programs through a more rigorous product development process, supported by external scientific and clinical subject matter experts where appropriate. The objective is a sharper, more focused pipeline and faster decisions about what moves forward. We will give investors greater visibility as those projects evolve. The third priority is to ensure that we have the manufacturing, commercial, and organizational capabilities to support a substantially larger global business. Our largest manufacturing facility has been completed. Its modular design provides the ability to increase output as demand grows.
While manufacturing performance during the first half of FY 2026 was impacted by the PMA submission, this is now complete, and production will solely focus on commercial output moving forward. We expect to begin transitioning manufacturing to the new facility in the second half of FY 2027. We are building the commercial and organizational capabilities required to scale, adding qualified talent to commercial leadership, enhancing marketing and clinical capabilities, and expanding sales coverage where appropriate. These investments are intended to improve execution and delivery of our strategic priorities, and we will measure investment effectiveness by the growth, productivity, and operating leverage they deliver. We have entered FY 2027 with strong commercial momentum. While we do not currently provide formal financial guidance, we see a path to do so in the future.
As we diversify into a broader range of clinical applications, we are building a procedural mix that should support more consistent and predictable revenue growth over time. We intend to allocate capital selectively, maintain a strong balance sheet, and improve operating leverage as the business scales.
In FY 2027, our focus is on the following key priorities: PMA submission ahead of this calendar year end, presentation of the findings from the pivotal randomized control trial at the American Burn Association annual meeting in April, with a podium slot reserved, commercial availability of SynPath in the U.S. outpatients this calendar year, with additional market-appropriate sizes planned to launch later in FY 2027, transition to our new manufacturing facility starting in the second half of FY 2027, key pipeline and partner engagement updates, and continued growth of NovoSorb MTX through the expansion into new markets and increased adoption in the markets it already serves.
PolyNovo has strong foundations. We have a proven platform supported by growing clinical evidence, a portfolio of products with expanding global reach, scalable manufacturing, and a strengthened financial position. The next phase is about converting a decade of clinical trust into a larger, more valuable business. That means turning clinical credibility into broader adoption, broader adoption into commercial scale, and commercial scale into lasting returns. That is how our impact on patients and clinicians become long-term value for shareholders. My responsibility, alongside the board and the leadership team, is to pursue that opportunity with drive and discipline. We will invest in markets, evidence, and capabilities that create the greatest long-term value while remaining focused on measurable progress, operating leverage, and cash generation. We will continue to build PolyNovo into a tissue regeneration platform company capable of serving many more patients.
On behalf of the board and the leadership team, I thank our employees, our customers, clinical and research partners, and shareholders for their continued support. I will now pass back to the Chair.
Thanks, Bruce. Okay, we will move on to some questions, I expect. For clarity, online attendees can submit questions at any time. To ask a question, select the Q&A icon, type your question into the text box. Once you have finished typing, please hit the send button. Please note that while you can submit questions from now on, I will not address them until the relevant time in the meeting. Questions may be moderated or amalgamated together if we receive multiple questions on the one topic or theme. If we run out of time to answer all your questions, we will answer them in due course via email. To ask a verbal question, please follow the instructions written below the broadcast on your screen. While shareholders add their questions and/or make their way to the microphones in the room, we will play the second part of Sam's story.
This is Sam's CT scan from when he first presented, and if we look here, all of the muscles are missing from the left lower side of his chest and his abdominal wall, and down into the gluteal to the buttock region down here. His intestines are sitting outside of his body here, and the left kidney and the spleen up here are both intact and uninjured. So, just demonstrated the extent of his injury to us, but that there was no major organ or vessel injury on the inside. His injury was massively extensive. Basically, he had lost skin, subcutaneous fat, and muscle from the lower aspect of his left chest all the way around to his paraspinal muscles on the back. No one exactly knows how this should be reconstructed, and there is not necessarily any right answer, but what is the right thing for Sam?
We had initial discussions with the plastic surgeons and orthopedic surgeons, as well as ourselves and the pediatric surgical team, as well as discussing with the pediatric plastic surgeons in Brisbane and the adult abdominal wall reconstruction surgeons, none of whom had any experience in managing an injury like this, but would have managed other major injuries or complex reconstructions. It was important to get as many ideas as possible.
At Townsville University Hospital, Sam's care became the work of a multidisciplinary team.
The next step was to figure out how we were going to fill in this massive defect.
It was like no injury I think either of us have ever seen or dealt with before.
I'd never rehabbed anyone with a shark bite.
Will he ever walk again? Will he get back to doing the things that pre-injury Sam did?
Initially, as we were deciding between a free muscle flap and using the dermal substitutes, we were trying to decide around, well, would those options affect him in his growth? Because at the time, he was a 14 year-old boy and has a few years of growing ahead of him, which makes the reconstruction more complex as well.
One of our initial concerns was with the extent of the deficit, the severity of the muscle lost, to do something like a muscle flap was potentially going to take stability away from the side that Sam still had his muscles intact to give to the other side to close the deficit.
I thought outside the box a little bit and said, "Well, hang on, maybe we can use BTM to get coverage here.
NovoSorb matrices support the regeneration of dermal tissue when lost to trauma, burn, or surgery.
The fact that we now have dermal substitutes just opens up other treatment avenues to patients with catastrophic injuries, such as Sam.
Sam's case was obviously a very exceptional case. However, in terms of managing wounds and embracing BTM, our team is very much well-versed in using the products and treatment, which we'd similarly use with Sam. We were very confident that we could manage Sam and provide the treatment that he needed here.
Care was shaped around who Sam was, not just what had happened to him.
We, as a nursing team and a part of the multidisciplinary team, worked together really closely to make sure that Sam was cared for in a very holistic and culturally safe way. Patience, determination, family, love, kindness, it all helps in the big scheme of things. I remember his first stand, which was very exciting, and can now walk independently without any aids.
They said, "You can stand up today." When he stood, he was like, "Can we try walking?" He walked a good distance. He walked about 4, 5 meters. Today is 27 surgeries.
Hey, guys.
Hey.
How's it going?
I'm good.
What have you been up to this week?
Nothing.
Nothing? Chilling? Behaving yourself?
Hey, good man.
When we had our first argument, I was like, "Oh, he's back." And I was just smiling at him, and he was like, "Why are you smiling?" And I'm like, "Because you're well enough now that you're arguing with me.
Part three awaits. I will now open it up to the room for general questions. Shareholders joining us in person today are invited to make their way up to the microphone at the front of the room. Please introduce yourself. We are keen to hear from as many shareholders as possible, so please keep your comments and questions concise so we can accommodate as many shareholders as possible. Shareholders are welcome to return to the microphone should they wish to ask further questions. Amy, are there any questions online?
Thank you, Chair. Yes, there are a few questions that have come through online. I'll start with this one. "PolyNovo has educated the market that it is a sales-driven company and that profits will follow sales. It has lost all blue sky valuation through a complete failure to develop any new products over the last 12 years. To exemplify, PolyNovo has successfully built a global sales and distribution network for its products, including BTM and MTX, and is continuing to increase its revenue lines each year. However, while our flagship products carry an exceptional 90% plus manufacturing gross margin, PNV statutory net profit margin sits at a relatively minute 4.9%, with no sign of improving, as maintaining and increasing the sales run rate currently demands an increasing human capital footprint of over 300 personnel.
Can the board please provide a clear operational roadmap detailing how it plans to leverage PolyNovo's sales force to scale our statutory profits without such imposing proportional increase in variable corporate and operating overheads?
Thank you for the short first question. Thank you for the shareholder presenting that question. It is a good question. We have an invest to grow mantra. We expect to be a fast-growing company commercially. We have, as Bruce very articulately outlined, a number of elements that build into that. One is our commercial team executing directly, one is our platform, and one is getting better and better at our capability, and within that, growing our profitability over time. We are balancing that around invest versus dropping to profit. Reminding everyone, our growth in FY 2026 was about 21% in constant currency. Our EBITDA, underlying EBITDA, grew about 50%, and we generated $9+ million in free cash flow. So, those fundamentals are doing well. To your point on people, our people costs grew only about 4%, so we are outstripping our profit and our sales growth by some margin.
Our corporate and admin costs actually dropped slightly. There is a whole lot of reasons for that, but they did. So, our people costs barely moved, and our corporate costs and admin costs were fairly much stable. So, our overall mix of metrics was compelling. We would always like a bigger return, but overall, a very strong set of results. Particularly as we generated strong cash, we paid off our remaining debt, and we effectively funded our operations center or our factory build, and we have only got a remaining about $1.5 million to pay out on that CapEx. So, we are in good shape in that respect. We are growing well. We could be growing better. Our mix is looking solid. Thank you.
Thank you, Chair. I will give you a short one this time to balance it out. Will you move to quarterly trading updates in future?
As Bruce said, we can see ourselves going to quarterly updates at a point in the future. We are not at that point. We still have a significant percentage of our business that is burns-related, and burns incidence is variable. And whilst that continues to be a substantial part of our business, and it is lessening as we grow MTX, it will lessen as we grow SynPath and the like, it is still quite a variable journey in terms of consistency of sales performance. So, we see a quarterly guidance element to our business as we mature, but we are not there as yet.
Thank you. "PolyNovo has no debt, strong cash position, and a new manufacturing facility. Is there a possibility of a small dividend? At the end of the 2026 financial year, PolyNovo had no debt, as you mentioned, cash of $ 35 million, $ 23 million operating cash flow, and manufacturing expansion mostly complete. With no new expansion or opportunities being outlined that require significant capital, is there a possibility of a small dividend this year?
I guess the first answer is that the board and management take capital management very seriously. And our view to dividend is that is a future event. It is not a near-term event that we can see today. So, no to the answer to your direct question online. Thank you for the question. We have a strong focus, and I think we need to be doing more in terms of our ability to add to our portfolio, to add to our research and development spend over time, and to be funding our growth without having to go to any form of capital raise as well. So, our mix is generating the ability to grow at pace, but we are very committed to investing in that growth. Dividend is a nice thing to think about, but not yet.
Thank you. "Can and will CSR data be released to the market at the time of PMA submission? Can the data then be used to support entry into the large Japanese market? Japan seems to be of little urgency to the company.
Good question. I think I will get Bruce to answer that, if you like.
Sure, I will give you a break. At submission for PMA, we plan to release high-level findings from the study. The actual study will be presented, as I mentioned, at the ABA in April in Chicago. For market entry into Japan, that would be a key element of that evidence package required for registration, although we are also going through a detailed business review of the value of Japan, and the ability to generate profitable, sustainable revenue in that market. Looking at the reimbursement landscape is a critical part about joining a new market, and that is where we are at now. The study results would be part of that submission, yes.
As Bruce mentioned, they will be formally presented at the American Burn Conference in April, which we are looking forward to, and the headline results shortly when we announce PMA submission. Thank you. Amy.
Thanks, both. Both MTX entry into Europe and SynPath into the U.S. seem unduly delayed. Is the stated emphasis of the new board around disciplined execution, diligence, and process coming at the cost of dynamism and action?
It's a valid observation in some ways. The production and the development team have been, and the quality and reg team have been very focused on PMA, and putting a lot of resource into getting that right, and that's getting close, as Bruce covered. In terms of MTX, the pace of growth in the U.S. has been fantastic. I mean, could it be more? Of course, it could be more, but it effectively doubled in FY 2026. We're getting closer to having the U.K. approval, and that's the journey we're on at the moment. Shortly after that, we'll follow with the EU pathway as well for MTX. Bruce covered, and I'll get him to add a couple words to this as well, covered SynPath, so we will have first commercial availability inside this calendar year. Bruce, do you want to add to those?
Sure. We've learned a lot about the outpatients market over the course of this year. The key drivers for that business or that part of the market is very different from what you see in an inpatient setting. Reimbursement is key. We have a reimbursement code. That's not a problem. We have the product. Not a problem. It's those clinical pathways that are part of an outpatients system, as well as the site economics that have caused all of the turbulence within that market over this year, in particular with changes in reimbursement policies in January. We have that pathway. We're working through to ensure that as SynPath goes to market, it's more about the confidence of the provider that they will get reimbursed for that product. This is different to what we have in a hospital.
The confidence around the product, the confidence around having a reimbursement code is really steps along the way. The last step is making sure that we've got that local evidence that proves that a provider will get reimbursed if they use our product.
I'll add to that. We've invested in a market access capability in our U.S.A. team to better understand and to deep dive all of that reimbursement journey. I mean, the really good with the SynPath journey for our business is today, we're not selling it. We will be shortly. But today, we're not selling it, and we sell within the hospital environment. I mean, Bruce mentioned some of the market or the addressable market opportunity can be measured in the many billions. We're not even in that space yet. But we do have a reimbursement path to understand better and to make sure we're well ready for that entry. What we're focused on is making sure we can leverage SynPath into the hospital environment in our first step. Amy.
Thank you. What is the process from here regarding outcomes with BARDA?
Okay. I will let Bruce take that.
Sure. We have a development contract with BARDA at this point in time. It has been going for several years, linked to the pivotal study and the PMA submission. Once we go through that process, as you go towards the approval and attaining the approval, that relationship changed to a commercial contract. Working with BARDA, there is definitely separation between those two parts of the relationship. As we finalize our development contract, then we start the process of a commercial discussion.
Thank you.
Thank you. Is our new production facility producing saleable product yet?
No, it's not. It's very close. We actually enjoyed a walkthrough of the new facility yesterday. It looks highly impressive. The team have done a terrific job building, commissioning, and getting it ready to go. Not quite go. Bruce, do you want to comment on the timing?
Yeah. Building it is the easy part. As you build a facility, then moving in all of the equipment, validating that equipment, and then making sure that facility then is registered in all the countries that we sell. Going through that process, it will be a transitioning period. We've got two facilities now. This is the third. We'll transition lines over, really over a course of 12 - 18 months it will take to get it all across when we start, and we'll start in the second half of FY 2027.
Great. Thank you.
In years past, we were aiming to make India a huge customer base. It seemed to be going well, but recently, it has become apparent that staff have been reduced on the ground. Can you please give us an update as to our prospects in India?
I'll give a couple of comments, and I'll get Bruce to pick it up as well. India continues to be a core market for the business. We have a direct team. We don't have direct teams in many countries. We have U.K., we have U.S., we have Australia and New Zealand, and we have India. The pace of growth in our Indian business is strong. It's been a bit of a journey of discovery, understanding the intricacies of the largely tender-based market in India. But we see the pace of growth, and it's been published, the pace of growth continuing at a high level. Bruce, do you want to add to that?
Yes. Well, firstly, there's no reduction in the staff within India. It is a direct business as well as the way India works is that you work with multiple distribution partners as well to cover such a large land mass and population. That team, and under the leadership that we have there, has built a very solid business. In my experience, the work that has been done to build a strong foundation of not only a growing business, but a compliant business that we can be assured has sustainable growth in the long term, it's very important to me and to the organization. So, we are seeing growth. It is acting as I would expect India to act. Tenders take longer for governments to release or hospitals to release. We are winning tenders that we started working on three years ago. So, I'm very pleased with the progress of India.
I see there's more progress to have, and more importantly, we've got foundations of a sustainable business for the long term.
As we published in our full-year results, we grew the Indian business 53% last year, or in the FY 2026. Amy?
Another market-related question. What proportion of revenue in five years' time do you expect to be earned from non-U.S. markets? Do you have any specific targets for revenue in non-U.S. markets that you can discuss?
Specific targets five years out, no, we don't. About 25% of our revenue comes outside the U.S. today. You would think there'd be some sort of similarity to that as we grow, that the pie will grow. As Bruce covered with SynPath in particular, as we start to take that outpatient journey, and that's a very big market catchment, and if we can work the reimbursement piece, we see a big upside in the U.S.A. coming over and above what we do in the hospital sector. But equally, we have a lot of geographies. Japan's been mentioned earlier. India's been mentioned earlier. We're not direct in many countries. We have great partners in many countries, particularly, say, Europe, for example. The leadership team's done a very strong deep dive on our market strategy, our global strategy, and that's got a number of elements.
Bruce has highlighted the sort of three key focus areas. Geographic spread will come when it makes financial sense and when the market opportunity meets the investment required.
Yeah, I just think as far as the ratio is concerned, I'm not fixed to a number on what that should be in five years' time. We've got, as we've mentioned, growth potential in the U.S., in now even more settings, but particularly in those complex wound applications within the hospital setting. That growth trajectory in the U.S., also looking at going deeper into markets that we're already in the markets outside of the U.S., I think that is a path for us to grow, selectively adding new markets now that have high potential rather than aiming for a number of countries we need to be in. I could see them growing at a similar rate. I wouldn't see that the ratio would shift. As Leon mentioned, as long as that pie is growing fast enough, that's what I'm looking for.
That's really the focus on the question being geography, but as Bruce also pointed out, we've got the whole platform element to come into our growth pathway, which will also become a part of our ratio of sales, as we build outside our core current products. Amy?
Thank you, Chair. We also have a few questions relating to the NovoSorb technology itself. The first is, when is the board going to commit to properly expanding the PNV technology as a multi-platform one by properly scheduling in and committing to the pathway to commercializing such applications as hernia repair? Hernia has been touted as a very real application for many years now, but nothing has happened.
Yeah, I think there's valid criticism in the company talking hernia for a number of years, and not coming to an outcome. I think it's important that, and Bruce covered this in part, with our new Chief Scientific Officer, Marthe D'Ombrain, on board, we're resourcing and we're focusing with a lot of capability in our development pathway. We're very strongly committed to our product portfolio journey, and Bruce has covered BTM, MTX, SynPath, but we've got to unlock a lot of what we do, and a lot of what our NovoSorb platform provides for us. Some of it being in-house, some of it being external advisors, some of it will be advisory engagement, and some of it will be via us adding business development capability, which we don't have today, as effective as it should be.
Bruce and Marthe are actively targeting business development to be the outreach, looking for how we leverage what we have in platform and bring it to third parties. Unlikely much of that will be in our hands. It will be in partners or via licensing or the like. Bruce, do you want to add anything to that?
Well, I think you covered it well, Leon. The one thing I would say is that we have got a strong team in place. We have got a strong team in R&D. The output, I have mentioned a number of times, I am not comfortable with the velocity that we have had out of our pipeline. How do we resolve that? Working through having a leadership now and looking at, what is the process that is holding us back from moving these through the pipeline? That has been the focus since day one for Marthe, actually before day one for Marthe joining, and I am very confident with that progress. You cannot see that visibly out. The only thing that we will be judged by is the output from that pipeline, and we know that.
Building that strong foundation, building the process that lets us do this repeatedly and more and more with greater velocity, that is our focus.
Thanks, Bruce. Amy?
Given the diabetic foot ulcer trial demonstrated superior healing time with the use of BTM, what is PolyNovo's strategy to enter this market?
Yeah. I think that's a slightly more complicated answer. The DFU was a very small-scale study, and we were very delighted to have it done. It was focused on the higher-grade diabetic foot type or ulcer type, not the lower grade, which is where lots of clinical applications are focused. It was not statistically significant, but the key finding was pace. We had a terrific outcome in terms of how rapidly BTM could impact. It's also a pretty big change of paradigm for clinicians because, whether it should be BTM or MTX will be for clinicians as they continue that journey to optimize. In the U.S., that could be SynPath as well.
In terms of DFU, we've responded in part to that with SynPath having a reimbursement code in the U.S., and that will give us access, and we see that pathway inside the hospital, including outpatients, as addressable soon. Outside the hospital, we need to think pretty carefully because it's a multi-billion dollar market, but it's a complicated coding and funding and market access piece that we're working on. Outside of the U.S., we've got BTM and MTX in, say, for example, in Australia and New Zealand, and that's available to clinicians now. So we should be able to be leveraging that opportunity, and soon in the U.K. Good.
Yeah, all I would say is when you look at diabetic foot ulcers and the treatment of those cases in the U.S. in the outpatient setting, this is the specific area that caused concern and caused the policy to be adjusted by the CMS early in the year. This is not about product quality. We are very pleased with the results out of that study, and we think that, as the authors mentioned, it's a single site. They suggest that there should be more study in this case, to add to that research. But it's the site economics that we spoke about, as well as the clinical workflow, which is the challenge in the outpatients. It's having not only the reimbursement rate, but incentive or reimbursement linked to repeat applications. That is not applicable to SynPath or BTM as a product.
So that's that evidence we've provided to CMS to make sure that they're aware of this evidence as well. But essentially, there's two elements of this, not only just the economics, but also the clinical workflow that we're addressing in diabetic foot ulcer. Now, in that outpatient setting, with SynPath, there are other procedures that we are perfectly aligned with. A great example is skin cancer repair, particularly a Mohs reconstruction surgery, where having a single application of a product fits perfectly with what is needed. So you'll see that is where we'll focus first.
Thanks, Amy.
Thank you, Chair. There are a couple of other questions, but they have now been addressed by the other responses provided by you and Bruce.
Okay.
So with that said, we might invite anyone in the room
Sure
If there's any live questions, shareholders are welcome.
Thank you. Please come forward to the microphone. Feel free to introduce yourself, please.
Hello, my name's Greg Hearn. I'm a shareholder.
Hi, Greg.
The stuff we hear about the medical is quite amazing, fantastic. From the shareholder point of view, what's your measure of growth as a shareholder?
What's our measure of growth as a shareholder?
Of growth for a shareholder.
Well, it's a few elements. It's clearly the commercial performance. If I'm a shareholder, and I'm sitting and watching the company, I want the revenue to grow.
I want the profitability to grow.
Yeah.
I want us to be able to generate cash. That's the first set. I want us to be broadening the scope of what we do as a business, and there's a lot of elements to that. We covered earlier, we want to be leveraging across multiple areas, including platform, which we're not doing nearly as effectively today. We clearly want the share price to be buoyant. We want it to be reflecting value of the business.
Okay.
That would be the measurements.
I noticed the earnings per share pretty much halved over the last year, and the profit, 4% I think was mentioned. How does doing the same thing create a different result going forward?
Sure. Well, just over three years ago, we had no profit. The underlying EBITDA was about 9.5%. So, our profitability is significantly improving. That's a balance, because it's a balance of how much do we want to reinvest. We've paid out the capital build. We've generated strong free cash flow. So, that mix is improving.
Okay.
Whether we dial up EBITDA at greater pace would be a choice of how much do we reinvest. But we see the EBITDA pathway as improving. And we had a number of one-offs that we adjusted for last year, but underlying, we can see over that journey continuing to improve somewhat. How hard? It's going to be investment decisions.
Good on you. Thank you.
Thank you. Yes, please.
Good morning, Chair. Good morning, all.
Morning.
My name's Christine Haydon, and I'm here on behalf of the Australian I'm a volunteer monitor for the Australian Shareholders Association, and I'm holding proxy votes on behalf of retail shareholders.
Morning, Christine.
I've got some general questions, just a few.
Sure
in relation to the board, and we are acknowledging the work that you've already done in terms of governance. But the board have published in the annual report a collective director skills matrix. Shareholders, of course, vote for individual directors, and we believe that investors should be able to understand the skills of specific directors, and the skills that they bring to the board, and particularly when we're talking AI, cybersecurity, data, and technology, and they become increasingly important in this world, and they're part of the strategy and risks that the company deals with. So, we're asking for next year, can we possibly have specific skills for the board in terms of where they are at, so that we know when we're voting for someone, what their main contributions are?
Secondly, we'd just like to say that we see there. We're just taking information that you have provided in the annual report, but we see a perceived weakness in the technical or technology, digital, and cyber skills. And we wondered where you're heading in that respect, and also whether that sits in the audit and risk committee, or whether that sits somewhere else. So, maybe you could talk to that.
Sure.
And then I've got one more question.
Okay.
Thank you.
All right. So, the board skills, broadly in governance, we've uplifted a dramatic amount of our mandate and our charter, and we've published, I think, about seven different charter updates. We've added a nomination committee to allow us to focus on board skills and capability, particularly as we've gone out and recruited three new directors. We focused, and we announced this very strongly, on that mix of skills to try and identify gaps or opportunities to leverage and get better at. I think in terms of the profiles that we've presented for each of the directors that are up for election today, there's a strong reflection of what their backgrounds are and what a number of their capabilities are. We'll certainly take on board the comment.
At the moment, we don't have a plan to separate that out by person, and we're certainly committed that as an aggregate board that we should be addressing the majority of ideal skills mix. As to your second question, digital and cyber and the like, I think every board is now very sensitized to digital, cyber, security, AI, and the like. We're talking about it very regularly. We've got a number of elements of controls in the building, with people and process. We've uplifted with our new IT commitments, controls, a threshold of safety elements, but also a facilitating benefit as well. So, we don't see cyber and digital as only a threat. We see it as a facilitator of how to do our business more effectively. So, Bruce and the leadership team are looking at things like AI and going, "How can we embed as we grow?
How can we optimize our process and our development and our design and our ways of working utilizing AI?" We don't see it as a leverage point to reduce. We see it as facilitating to get better and bigger and faster. The last element of that would be, as we continue with our board skills review and the like, I think digital, cyber, and AI will play a part in that continued refresh.
Thank you.
Sorry, perhaps before we have the third question, can I just check if there is any other shareholders in the room who intend to ask a question? I just want to make sure everybody gets a turn.
One more. Two more.
If that is okay. We just would like to spread it around, so if that is all right, if we can just allow
Yeah, it is okay. I mean, it was a very quick question.
Okay.
If I can.
Okay.
Is there a director shareholder policy?
Formally, at the moment, there is not. There will be.
We have got a plan in place to have that, and you will see it in the FY 2027 annual report.
Okay.
We are just working through the process to make sure that there is a lot of regulation and elements that we need to be careful of, but it is definitely a pathway that we are looking at. It will also potentially include an element of fees being taken as equity as well.
Okay.
But we are looking through that at the moment.
Thank you.
Thank you very much. There are a few people, so please feel free to come to the microphone.
We might just have a two-question limit, and if we could keep both the questions and the answers short. Thank you.
My name is Gilbert Fry.
Gilbert.
I am a longstanding shareholder. I was going to ask the question about how the company was going to go forward and boost its share price. My question is about the R&D fire.
Yep.
There has been a lot of talk about new products not coming through.
Yeah.
My question is, what sort of material and research was actually lost in the fire, and have you had to go back and redo it?
Yeah. We're sort of unfortunate and fortunate. Unfortunate that we had a fire, and fortunate that we weren't really in and operating. We've maintained our existing R&D labs, and that's where the R&D team remained. As we've completed our rebuild, because this happened in November last year, the team's gradually reoccupying. I don't think we lost anything of material performance or progress. Bruce, do you want to touch on that as well, please?
That's right. We were able to maintain our working in R&D despite the fire. It was one month after they opened the doors to move in. They hadn't fully moved in, still working out of the current R&D facility, and with the partners that we work. It's not all being done in the one building anyway. Transitioning back now, so I think that'll be good to be behind us.
Yeah.
Fantastic. Thank you.
Thank you. Other gentlemen?
George Shaw is my name. I've been a shareholder for over 20 years through PolyNovo and its previous iterations.
George.
Been an absolute delighted shareholder with the products that you're producing. But I'm just wondering whether the board has the same confidence in the company that I've got. When I look at the annual report, it partly alluded to what you said before, and I see directors not having shares or only having a few shares, apart from you, Chairman. I'm just wondering whether the board has the same confidence that I've got in the company.
Yeah. Thank you for the question. I partly addressed it with the earlier response around we will have a share, sorry, a director equity policy soon, and it will translate into an equity holding. We broadly expect our directors to be reflecting their fees across probably a three-year journey. That's what we're thinking at, and we'll put that into some formal policy going forward. Again, I'll restate, we did have a number of elements to adjust for. We've got four directors that have joined us in the last 12 months, three here today, and we fully expect that all the directors will be holding stock. I have great confidence in the business. I am passionate about the business.
I was delighted that Bruce also spontaneously acquired some shares as well, even though he will have a very strong equity pathway, as will the executive team, with our new LTI program that we've launched. They, over time, will all have substantial skin in the game. That will come through both STI and LTI. In terms of passion for growth, PolyNovo has unlimited potential. If I don't reflect that in my responses, I need to do that more effectively. It's for us to get more capable on delivering across those fronts.
I think we had one more shareholder who wanted to ask a question.
We did at the back.
Oh.
Thank you.
Thank you. After that, we might need to wrap up Q&A.
Move on? Sure.
But to the extent there are any unanswered questions, we will follow up offline.
Thank you.
Yeah, good afternoon. Craig Hogan's my name, a shareholder. It was mentioned about increasing the manufacturing footprint perhaps.
Yep.
Or augmenting it. Could there be a bit of more color given around that? Is there pressure out of the U.S. to manufacture in that location or some other reason?
What we've got with the new plant, and again, Bruce said, in this financial year, we will be live and fully commissioned, or mostly fully commissioned. That gives us very significant capacity and headroom. The board made that decision some years ago, and the build, and I think the ratio we used at the time was it would give us about five times capacity. I think in the near term for building the PolyNovo suite of products that we know today, that's got good runway, and I'll be delighted when we have a capacity issue. In terms of the U.S.A. element, there is some dialogue on that, but we don't see any compelling reason to be doing that in the near term.
Even if we were confronted by the ever-changing tariff journey in the U.S., we are fortunate to have a low cost of goods, in fact, a very small cost of goods, and we think that impact would be minimal. We've got a well-planned-out capacity strategy. I'll enjoy sitting here and talking to people about that as we fill that capacity, but I don't think we have any other short-term plans.
Thank you.
Thank you. Okay. Thank you for your questions. We will move on. The notice of meeting was dispatched to shareholders in accordance with the company's constitution and Corporations Act, and is also available on the ASX. I take the notice of meeting as read. Today's meeting is being held as a hybrid meeting, in person here at the RACV Club, and online via the Computershare meeting platform. The first item of business on the notice of meeting is to receive and consider the annual financial report, director's report, and auditor's report for the company and its consolidated entities for the financial year ended 30 June 2026. There is no resolution on this item. I will now give shareholders the opportunity to ask questions or make any comments on the financial statements specifically and/or reports.
Shareholders may also ask our auditor questions relevant to the conduct of the audit, the preparation and the content of the auditor's report, the accounting policies adopted by the company in preparing the financial statements, and the independence of the auditor. Are there any questions relating to those elements today?
Chair, there's a question online. Why are there no long-term incentives or financial targets in the REM report?
Yep. Thank you. The REM report mentions that an LTI, in fact, an updated STI program will be rolled out and applicable for FY 2027. That is now in play. We are delighted to engage the executive team with a comprehensive suite of STI and LTI. The elements that will come into play around those will be a threshold, a target, and an outperform. Under the threshold, there will not be any payment. Then a graduated series of equity reward and cash reward. Those elements will be fully reflected in the FY 2027 REM report.
Thank you, Chair. One more online relevant to the REM report. Were there any material protest votes on any of today's resolution, including on this REM report item? Which proxy advisers covered us, and did they recommend against any item?
Okay. Onto the proxies. We have four proxies covering us. ISS, ACSI, Glass Lewis, and I am forgetting the fourth. Excuse me. ISS, Glass Lewis, ACSI.
Ownership Matters.
Ownership Matters. Thank you. Mental blank. All four voted for all resolutions. You will see the voting as we move through each of the resolutions.
Thank you.
Okay. Okay. Voting on all resolutions will be conducted by poll, and I now declare voting open. If you have already voted before the meeting and do not wish to change your vote, no further action is required. If you are voting online, select the voting icon in the navigation bar and choose your voting option for each resolution. Your vote will be recorded automatically, and you may change it at any time until I declare voting closed. Those attending in person should complete their voting cards, the blue cards that you would have received, which Computershare will collect before voting closes. Any directed proxies will be automatically cast as directed. I appoint Angela Liapis, who is just walking in the room. No, no, someone. Angela Liapis of Computershare Investor Services as returning officer. Final poll results will be released to the ASX following the meeting.
If you need technical assistance, please contact Computershare. You have a phone number there available to you. I now move to the formal resolution set out in the notice of meeting as required under the Corporations Act. Each resolution will be decided by poll. As stated in the notice of meeting, I intend to vote all undirected proxy votes given to me as Chair in favor of each resolution. We will now move to consider the first resolution, the remuneration report. The Corporations Act requires the company's annual report to include a remuneration report, which sets out the remuneration arrangements and outcomes for our Directors and senior executives. Shareholders will be asked to vote on the adoption of this report. The vote is advisory and is not binding on the company, but the outcome and shareholder feedback will be taken into account when reviewing Director and executive remuneration.
A voting exclusion applies to this resolution as set out in the notice of annual general meeting. The board recommends that eligible shareholders vote in favor of this resolution. I now put the following resolution to the meeting, that the remuneration report for the year ended 30 June 2026 be adopted. Are there any questions on the remuneration report from the audience here today? Or any online, Amy?
No, we've covered those.
Okay. Thank you. We'll move on. Resolution two, election of Dr. Charmaine Gittleson. Dr. Charmaine Gittleson was appointed to the board on April 1st, 2026, and now stands for election by shareholders. The board, with Dr. Gittleson abstaining, unanimously recommends that shareholders vote in favor of this resolution. I now put the following resolution to the meeting, that Dr. Charmaine Gittleson, who, having been appointed by the board as a director of the company since the last annual general meeting, retires in accordance with the company's constitution and the ASX Listing Rules, and being eligible, offers herself for election as a director to the company. I would like to invite Charmaine to say a few words. Charmaine, would you like to come up and say a few words, please?
Thank you, Chair. Good morning, shareholders. I welcome this opportunity to briefly outline my experience and perspective as I seek your support for election. As Chair mentioned, I joined PolyNovo's board in April this year, and during my time on the board, I've gained an appreciation of the strength of PolyNovo's technology, as well as of the opportunities and challenges of scaling an innovative Australian medical technology business internationally. I believe I bring three complementary strengths from my experience to this board. First, clinical and regulatory expertise.
I have been fortunate enough to register, to develop and register multiple products across global regulatory jurisdictions, and I have a deep understanding of how to create and use strong clinical evidence to support clinician confidence, regulatory approvals, and broader market adoption. Having worked and lived overseas for a decade, I also have strong international commercial exposure. I understand the complexities of entering and expanding in global healthcare markets, and the importance of making disciplined investment decisions to support sustainable growth. Thirdly, governance and strategic oversight. Through my time as Chair and Non-executive Director of ASX-listed and private healthcare companies, I have had to learn, and have learnt, much about governance, and understand the importance of constructive challenge at the board level, accountability of the board, and maintaining a clear focus on shareholder value. I think all of these aspects are very relevant to where PolyNovo is today.
I do believe that we have significant opportunities ahead, and as a team, we appreciate realizing those opportunities will require commercial focus, disciplined execution, and sound governance. I am committed to bringing my experience, my independent judgment, and my energy to helping PolyNovo achieve its potential, which is to deliver better outcomes for patients and sustainable value for shareholders. Thank you, and I greatly appreciate your support.
Thanks, Charmaine. Are there any questions from the audience today?
Is Mr. Williams standing up to ask a question?
No? Okay. There is one question
Sure
online, that relates to the election of Dr. Gittleson, and also of our other two Directors.
Which recruitment firm assisted with the recruitment of the new Directors, including Dr. Gittleson? Was it a competitive process, and did any of the new Directors know any of our existing Directors or KMP before engaging with the recruitment process?
Okay. We don't disclose who the firm was. We worked in confidentiality agreements with the search firm. We had a very extensive and rigorous search process. We went many months on each of the three individuals. We scanned a very broad population. In fact, we went through a process of lots to less to less, and then eventually into interview panels. We had our nomination committee involved in Dean and Andrew, and we had our REM committee involved in Charmaine's search. And we're very comfortable that we brought lots of rigor and lots of skills alignment to what we looked for. And in all three, we had all of the Board Directors meet and interview with the Directors up for election today. And we were very rigorous in making sure that the overall completeness of skills were complementary and filled gaps that we had.
In terms of did any of them know, I think- Certainly not that I'm aware of, that I can think of. There may have been a couple of company linkages, but it's not in a personal linkage. Certainly from the board directors, as we were going out, we were introducing ourselves to these individuals, as they were to us.
Nothing further online.
Okay, great. Thank you. Thank you. We will move on to resolution three, election of Mr. Dean Phizacklea. Mr. Dean Phizacklea was appointed to the board on 18 September 2026, and now stands for election by shareholders. The board, with Mr. Phizacklea abstaining, unanimously recommends that shareholders vote in favor of this resolution. I now put the following resolution to the meeting, that Mr. Dean Phizacklea, who, having been appointed by the board as a director of the company since the last annual general meeting, retires in accordance with the company's constitution and the ASX Listing Rules, and being eligible, offers himself for election as a director of the company. I would like to invite Dean to say a few words.
Good afternoon, shareholders. I stand before you today excited about the opportunity, but also the privilege of serving as a board member of PolyNovo, should I be elected. I believe my 30 years of experience across global medical device and pharmaceuticals sets me well up to add value to the company's core growth strategy, and in particular, my experiences in building markets, navigating reimbursement, and driving clinical adoption. I've had the wonderful opportunity of both living and working across a number of international markets, and that experience has given me a firsthand view of the different healthcare delivery models you have across the globe, be that through the regulatory pathways, different funding models, but also the different clinical practices.
That perspective and experience has certainly taught me that not only do you need a good product to scale successfully, but you also need deep market insights. You need to understand the clinical adoption and clinical practices, but you also need to build trust and sustained effort in that trust with clinicians, with patients, and payers. I've also had the wonderful opportunity for a significant part of my career in helping shape product innovation that is very much focused on meeting unmet clinical needs. If you do that well, you certainly drive clinical adoption, and certainly you return value to the organization for that investment. I look forward to bringing those experiences to the boardroom in support of PolyNovo's core growth strategy, but also leveraging the wonderful opportunity we have with the NovoSorb platform. I seek your endorsement as a board member for PolyNovo.
Thank you very much.
Good work. Thank you. Thank you, Dean. I should have added, and I didn't, we've been delighted with Charmaine Gittleson's contribution to the board since April. We've had brief insight so far with Dean Phizacklea, and we've enjoyed that meeting. I'll move on to Andrew Lumsden, and the same applies with Andrew. He's sat through his second board meeting yesterday, and it was terrific to have his contribution. Resolution four, election of Mr. Andrew Price. Mr. Andrew Price was appointed to the board on 18 September 2026, and now stands for election by shareholders. The board, with Mr. Price abstaining, unanimously recommends that shareholders vote in favor of this resolution.
I will now put the following resolution to the meeting, that Mr. Andrew Price, who, having been appointed to the board as a Director of the company since the last annual general meeting, retires in accordance with the company's constitution and the ASX Listing Rules, and being eligible, offers himself for election as a Director of the company. I will now invite Andrew to say a few words.
Thank you, Leon, and good afternoon. Great to see an engaged, present group of shareholders. I do hope over time get to meet you as we work on PolyNovo. I am very excited and energized for the opportunity in front of us at PolyNovo, and certainly like to bring my experience to bear to help grow from where we are today. I believe in the platform, I believe in the opportunity, and how we might get there. A little bit of a metaphor, I have 25 odd years working at ResMed, and I started there when it was a smaller company than PolyNovo is today. I have been there to see what it took to get from that to something bigger, and I will try and bring that experience to bear, if I am to be elected at PolyNovo. Three main areas to keep in mind for me in expertise.
I think, first of all, I am very passionate about innovation. I have spent a lot of my experience in product pipeline execution development, and not just in R&D, but across the entire business to get that value returned from the investments you put forward that drive growth. Innovation, definitely key. Second is, I have had a lot of experience on the end-to-end of running supply chains around the world, from early supplier interactions, manufacturing, all the way to distribution and post-market services. Definitely a supply chain angle I would like to bring to bear. The third one will be around, say, quality and regulatory, having worked on the businesses on a level of building the business systems.
For instance, also doing pre-market and post-market activities such as how to manage effectively through recalls or field activities, how to avoid them, and also how to make sure you build the culture of the business to be resilient and have a competitive advantage around those aspects as we build. I look to bring to bear, I should say, those experiences. I look forward to the opportunity, and if you continue to show the voting in front, and for me, I should say, I thank you in advance or thank you as we go forward. Thanks for the opportunity. Back to you, Leon.
Terrific.
Thanks.
Okay, thank you, Andrew. Amy, any questions?
None online. Thank you, Chair.
Okay. No questions. No, we don't. Okay, conclusion of the voting. Shortly, I will close the voting. If you have not yet voted, please do so now. Shareholders in the room should now complete and submit their voting cards to the Computershare staff, and Angela is doing the circuit. We will now play the final part of Sam's video while you complete your voting.
When Sam arrived at Townsville, it was expected that he would spend close to 12 months in hospital before being able to return home. Exceeding the expectations of the clinical team, Sam would return to Thursday Island months ahead of schedule.
He got back home to Thursday Island after being here for five months and got back into his traditional dancing.
He is back doing all the things that he loves. He is dancing, he is fishing, he is even swimming.
I am getting used to it.
You wouldn't even know that he had experienced any injury. He looks like any other normal teenage guy. Because he is still growing, that was a very important part of the planning of how we manage his care, because now that we've managed to reconstruct his injury without sacrificing muscle from another part of his body, it means that if he needs further reconstruction down the line, then that's still available to him. I think this is the most extensive shark injury that's ever been survived, and certainly the most extensive one that's been reconstructed. It makes me really proud to be a part of the multidisciplinary team here in Townsville.
It was really important to me that Sam received the best care, and now seeing him come through that reconstructive process, and now nine months down the line, I can confidently say that I'm very happy that the care he received here was world-class and that he wouldn't have gotten any better care in any pediatric hospital in Australia or further afield. I hope that I don't have to treat any patients with injuries as extensive as Sam's are again in the future, but it just makes me more reassured that we have that tool that we can use, and also that our multidisciplinary team here is capable of managing really extensive injuries.
Sam's journey is shaped by many hands, layer by layer.
In Torres Strait culture, the mat travels with the person throughout their life. It is used for storytelling, for teaching, for learning, for meetings, to symbolize that you have good character and you are a good person overall. We usually say, "The weaving's tight," so that means you come from a good family.
From the first responders on TI, the clinicians in Townsville, the family who stayed close, and Sam himself, whose determination to survive underlies it all.
We got to ride this storm, baby. Stay in the boat. It does not matter where we end up, we can still find our way back.
And what a great story. I enjoyed the surgeon's comment. I am not sure how accurate. Let's take him, the most extensive shark bite ever repaired, or words to that effect. PolyNovo, NovoSorb technology at work. I now declare the voting closed. The poll results will be compiled and released to the ASX following the meeting. I will now close today's meeting. I would like to thank all shareholders for their attendance and continued support. We have established leadership in burns, demonstrated growing relevance across complex wounds, strengthened our manufacturing platform, and expanded our global capabilities. Our focus now is execution and turning those advantages into predictable, strong growth, improving operating leverage, and long-term shareholder value. Thank you. I will close the meeting with that.
But for shareholders in the room, we have all our Directors here, and we have many of our leadership team, our executive team here. If you want to ask a question or if you want to introduce yourselves, feel free. We would welcome that. Thank you.