AGM 2021

Jun 5, 2021

Press Release

Hi. I'm Andreas Anderson, the CEO of Intevac. Intevac's Annual General Shareholders Meeting 2021 will be conducted by postal voting without fiscal presence. This is a decision that has been made by the board due to the continued spread of the coronavirus and the authorities, regulations and advice to reduce the spread of the infection. I recommend that you use a digital postal voting form from Postra Stapunt SE. Instructions are available on Intervac's webpage. If you have any problems, just contact us and we will assist you. The postal voting form, which is also considered as a notification to the meeting, must be received by InterVac no later than Tuesday, June 8, 2021. Shareholders who do not wish to vote digitally can contact Us at InterVac to receive a postal voting form that can be filled in by hand and sent via email to shareholders at intervac.sa or by letter to InterVac AB. Hereto, The form must have been received by InterVac no later than Tuesday, June 8, 2021. Now I would like to take the opportunity to look back on the last 12 months since the last AGM. And I would like to start with the regulatory process. We submitted the application for market authorization holder in Europe in February 2020. And during the summer, we received the so called day 100 and 20 questions. We answered these in the beginning of the year, here in January 2021. And the next step in that process was to receive the so called 180 day question. And We have now also answered these questions both in written form and orally. And We are on track for what we believe is a positive opinion here in the second half of June 2021. So fantastic progress and really exciting times. Now in preparation for the launch here in the second half of twenty twenty one, the launch of Strangvac, our vaccine against the equine disease strangles. We are preparing the company in many areas such as production, quality and of course, sales and marketing. And in doing that, we have continued to strengthen the organization. And earlier this year, Emma Hartmann joined us in the role as Product Manager. So Emma is a veterinarian educated at the University of Copenhagen. And she most recently comes from Emma Steer, where she had the role as Nordic Product Manager for Equine and Cattle. So Emma brings great experience from one of the largest animal health companies in the world. And she has also worked as a practicing veterinarian. A little bit later than this year, Astrid Laubericht joined us in the role as Quality Assurance Manager. So Astrid is also a veterinarian educated at SLU here in Sweden. And she comes most recently from AstraZeneca, where she has worked with quality assurance. And Astrid has also worked as a practicing veterinarian at District Veterinerna and Evidensia. Shortly after last year's AGM, Doctor. Andrew Waller joined InterWac as Chief Scientific Officer. Andrew is a bacteriological expert within the field of streptococcal infections in animals and especially within Equine Strangles where he is a cited international expert. We have known Andrew for many years and he led the clinical trials at Strangweg from his former employee, Animal Health Trust. Andrew has a great network within veterinary vaccine development and he's a great asset and strength to Intevac both for the launch of StrangVac and in the development of new veterinary vaccines. In conclusion, those are 3 great recruitments. In June last year, we carried out the directed Share issue of approximately 6,500,000 shares, raising about SEK 147,000,000 or close to €15,000,000 And at the end of this Q1 this year, We had about SEK 149 1,000,000, so again around SEK 15,000,000 in the bank. So We have a very strong financial position going forward. So here in April, we were delighted to come to an agreement with Decker Pharmaceuticals for them to become our exclusive distributor of Strangwack in Europe, with the exceptions of the countries where we are going to sell ourselves, which is primarily in the Nordics. Now, Decker is a great partner. They are one of the top 10 animal health companies in the world. And they are particularly strong within equine. So around 7% of Tekra's sales come from the equine segment, which is proportionately a lot, more than twice from most of the comparable companies on that top 10 animal health list. Now traditionally, the animal health segment has been divided into companion animals and livestock are farm animals. And horses, they were traditionally in the farm animal segment and then they've moved over in most companies to the companion animal segment. But within Decra, Decra has kept equine or horses as a separate segment. And we like that focus. We think that is good for development of the sales of Strangwac. Now, Deca is particularly strong in pain management, which gives them great access to Equine Veterinarians. And they are now also focusing on vaccines. So they are bringing an equine herpes virus vaccine to the market also this year alongside the launch of Strangwac. So we think this is going to be really good for us and DeCA to grow together with DeCA within the Equine Segment and Within Veterinary Equine Vaccines, great partner. From the 3rd May to 9th May, Strangles Awareness Week took place, a campaign to raise awareness about equine strangles. This campaign started last year in the UK, where it's led by Red Wings. And this year, it also came to Sweden under the name Stoppakvarkan. Here in Sweden, the campaign is led by SVAR, the National Veterinary Institute. The campaign has received great support from many important question organizations and companies, and we also support this campaign fully. Our Chief Scientific Officer, Doctor. Andrew Waller, participated by making an informative film that was part of the campaign. The Swedish television channel TV4 interviewed 1 of our co founders, professor Janikmar Flock, about the growing problem of antibiotic resistance Staphylococcus aureus bacterias also known as M. A. R. S. In the interview, Professor Flock talked about our vaccine project against staphylococcus aureus infections in dairy cows, where this bacteria is the main cause of mastitis. The interview was released on the 24th February, and it highlighted the importance of vaccine development and how vaccines can play an important role against Staphylococcus aureus and preventing and managing Meresto infections. Vaccine development has made great advances during this year, driven by the need to tackle the COVID-nineteen pandemic. InterX technology using fusions of recombinant protein, is in the forefront of vaccine design against complex pathogens. The need for vaccines against bacterial diseases is growing and we intend to use our expertise to develop more veterinary vaccines. We are making progress most recently in our vaccine development projects against stethagococcus aureus and Certikoccus Suvis. Strangvac is in the forefront of a new generation of veterinary vaccines. And with that, I'd like to thank all employees, partners and shareholders for this Successful year. And I look forward to this very exciting year ahead. Thank you for listening.