Good morning, and welcome to Editas Medicine's second quarter conference call. All participants are now in a listen-only mode. There will be a question-and-answer session at the end of this call. Please be advised that this call is being recorded at the company's request. I would now like to turn the call over to Cristy Barnett, Corporate Communications and Investor Relations at Editas Medicine.
Thank you, Maria. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to our second quarter 2023 conference call. Earlier this morning, we issued a press release providing our financial results and recent corporate updates. A replay of today's call will be available in the Investors section of our website approximately two hours after its completion. After our prepared remarks, we will open the call for Q&A. As a reminder, various remarks that we make during this call about the company's future expectations, plans, and prospects constitute forward-looking statements for the purposes of the Safe Harbor Provisions under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995.
Actual results may differ materially from those indicated by these forward-looking statements as a result of various important factors, including those discussed in the Risk Factors section of our most recent annual report on Form 10-K, which is on file with the SEC, as updated by our subsequent filings. In addition, any forward-looking statements represent our views only as of today and should not be relied upon as representing our views as of any subsequent date. Except as required by law, we specifically disclaim any obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements, even if our views change. Now, I will turn the call over to our CEO, Gilmore O'Neill.
Thanks, Cristy. Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us today for Editas' second quarter earnings call. I am joined today by three other members of the Editas executive team, our Chief Medical Officer, Baisong Mei, our new Chief Financial Officer, Erick Lucera, and our new Chief Scientific Officer, Linda Burkly. I joined Editas one year ago, tasked with guiding its evolution from platform development company to commercial therapeutics company. In January of this year, we shared Editas' strategy and a set of objectives for 2023. The strategy, just as a reminder, comprises three pillars. First, to accelerate the clinical development of EDIT-301, our autologous ex vivo cell therapy for sickle cell disease and beta thalassemia, and drive toward approval and launch.
Second, to strengthen our discovery organization by dividing it into an advanced technology group and a translational therapeutics discovery group, and so sharpen our discovery focus to in vivo editing therapies. Third, expand our business development activities to partner complementary technological capabilities that can advance our in vivo pipeline development, in addition to outlicensing our robust IP and know-how to maximize the use of CRISPR-based medicines.
Our 2023 objectives are: providing a clinical update from the EDIT-301 RUBY trial by the end of 2023; providing a clinical update from EDIT-301 EdiTHAL trial for transfusion-dependent thalassemia by the end of 2023; dosing 20 total patients in our EDIT-301 RUBY trial by year-end; hiring a new chief scientific officer with specific expertise aligned to our vision, which we have just done; advancing discovery of in vivo editing of hematopoietic stem cells and other tissues; and leveraging our robust IP portfolio and business development to drive value and complement core gene editing technology capabilities. How have we executed against this strategy and these objectives in the second quarter? On the leadership side, we made two important hires to drive our new strategy.
Just last week, we announced that Linda Burkly, a respected scientist and highly experienced and successful therapeutics discovery leader, has joined Editas as our new Chief Scientific Officer. Linda has an outstanding track record of inventing or contributing to the foundations of multiple approved medicines and late-stage clinical candidates. We are looking forward to Linda's leadership as we build on the current in vivo editing work in hematopoietic stem cells and other tissues. 8 weeks ago, we announced that Erick Lucera, a highly experienced former biotech buy-side investor, Chief Financial Officer, and strategic corporate finance executive, had joined Editas as our new Chief Financial Officer. You will hear from him later on this call. As a reminder, under our new target selection criteria, we will select therapeutic targets that allow our genome editing approach to differentiate maximally from the current standard of care for serious diseases.
The target selection criteria will work to identify targets that maximize the probability of technical, regulatory, and commercial success. Linda will tell you about these developments at a future date. We remain on track to dose 20 RUBY patients by the end of 2023, and we commenced parallel dosing of patients in our EdiTHAL trial in the second quarter of this year. In June of this year, we presented clinical data from our RUBY trial at the European Hematology Association's annual scientific meeting and data from both our RUBY and EdiTHAL trials at a company-sponsored webinar. We remain on track to provide another clinical trial update by year-end for both trials. We will share a further update on enrollment progress in the coming months.
Baisong will share further details regarding the development of EDIT-301 in his remarks, as well as recapitulate the RUBY and EdiTHAL takeaways and clinical data that we provided in June. As we have previously stated, we plan to engage with the FDA in the second half of the year. After EHA and our company-sponsored webinar, we raised approximately $117 million in net proceeds from our follow-on issuance of common stock, extending our cash runway into the third quarter of 2025 as we continue our advancement of EDIT-301 towards BLA, prepare for commercial manufacturing of EDIT-301, and build our pipeline to transform the treatment of serious diseases.
As we progress towards our goal of delivering life-changing medicines to patients, we also continue to expand our footprint to support our manufacturing and quality management for clinical supply and for preparation of commercial launch. We recently increased our clean room capacity and are moving to a new Azzur Devens facility. This new facility and increased capacity will support the scaling of EDIT-301 program, manufacturing clinical supply for our RUBY and EdiTHAL trials, and prepare us for commercial readiness. Turning to our intellectual property position, as a reminder, Editas holds a large portfolio of foundational U.S. and international patents and is the exclusive licensee of Harvard University's and Broad Institute's Cas9 patent estates, covering Cas9 use in making human medicines. Only a small fraction of these patents are involved in the ongoing U.S. PTO interference proceedings.
We remain confident that our IP portfolio provides meaningful value now and in the future. We are energized by the promising efficacy and safety data that we shared in June, stating that EDIT-301 may be a clinically differentiated, one-time, durable medicine that can provide life-changing clinical medicine or benefits to patients with sickle cell disease and beta thalassemia long term, specifically driving early and robust correction of anemia and sustained increases in fetal hemoglobin. With our sharpened strategic focus, our world-class scientists and employees, and our keen drive and execution, we continue to build momentum to progress our strategy to deliver differentiated editing medicines to patients with serious genetic diseases. We look forward to updating you on our progress in executing our new strategy throughout the year. Now, I will turn the call over to Baisong Mei, our Chief Medical Officer.
Thank you, Gilmore. Good morning, everyone. Let's start with the EDIT-301 RUBY trial for severe sickle cell disease. As Gilmore said in his stated in his remarks, we continue to dose and enroll patients in RUBY trial. As we have previously shared, we began parallel dosing of patients in RUBY trial earlier this year, and we remain on track to dose total 20 patients in RUBY trial by year-end, and to provide additional clinical data by year-end. We will share further update on enrollment progress in the coming months. As Gilmore also mentioned, we plan to engage with FDA in the second half of the year. In the EdiTHAL trial of EDIT-301 for transfusion-dependent beta thalassemia, or TDT, we continue to dose and enroll patients. We commenced the parallel dosing in this trial in the second quarter.
We remain on track to provide an additional clinical update from the EdiTHAL trial by year-end. As we have done for the RUBY trial, we are also taking multiple measures to accelerate the development of EDIT-301 for TDT and have a strong positive momentum. We have enrolled multiple patients who have dosed or have been completed an apheresis cycle and have 30, 34 cells edited or in the process of apheresis. Turning to the EDIT-301 clinical data, in June, we shared promising RUBY clinical data in an oral presentation at a European Hematology Association Congress, or EHA, followed by our company-sponsored webinar, where we also presented positive initial data from the first patient treated in the EdiTHAL trial.
The RUBY data from the EHA covered safety and efficacy data from the first four patients treated, including 10-month data from the first patient and 6-month data from the second patient. The data including total hemoglobin and the fetal hemoglobin. Excitingly, the data were consistent with the clinical results we shared in last December. I would like to take a few minutes to recap some of the RUBY and EdiTHAL key takeaways from our presentations in June. These include the following: The EDIT-301 drives early, robust correction of anemia to a normal physiological range of total hemoglobin in as early as four months after EDIT-301 infusion. EDIT-301 drives robust, sustained increase in fetal hemoglobin in excess of 40%. All four dosed RUBY sickle cell patients remain free of vaso-occlusive events, or VOE, since EDIT-301 treatment.
All dosed patients, 4 Ruby patients and 1 EdiTHAL patient, showed successful neutrophil engraftment within 1 month of dosing and have stopped red blood cell transfusion. EDIT-301 was well tolerated by patients, the safety profile was consistent with myeloablative busulfan conditioning and autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplant. The trajectory of correction of anemia and increased expression of fetal hemoglobin was consistent across EDIT-301-treated sickle cell patients and beta thalassemia patients at the same follow-up time points. Looking at the data in more detail, Ruby study patient 1 total hemoglobin reached normal physiological level by five months after EDIT-301 infusion, and these normal levels persisted during the 10-month follow-up. Patient 1's fetal hemoglobin fraction increased to 45.5% five months after EDIT-301 treatment, persisted during the 10-month follow-up.
The increase of total hemoglobin and the fetal hemoglobin of the RUBY patient two, three, and four followed the same trajectory as Patient 1. For EdiTHAL, the first patient experience with EDIT-301 resembled that of four RUBY patients. This first EdiTHAL patient achieved a fetal hemoglobin fraction of 34.9%, or over four grams per deciliter, in just one and a half months after EDIT-301 treatment. We continue to believe that EDIT-301 can potentially provide robust clinical benefit to patients, potentially provide clinical differentiation in the long term. As we have previously stated, the choice of CRISPR enzyme and the gene-editing target to switch on fetal hemoglobin expression matters. EDIT-301 uses our proprietary AsCas12a enzyme to edit HB G1/2 promoter. AsCas12a increases editing efficiency and significantly reduce off-target editing when compared to other CRISPR nuclease, including Cas9.
HBG1/2 editing in human CD34+ cells, resulting in greater red blood cell protection, normal predictive capacity, and improved red blood cell health when compared to editing of BCL11A. Based on clinical data so far, we believe that sustained normal level of total hemoglobin could be a potential point of differentiation for EDIT-301. As a reminder, a sustained normal total hemoglobin level is an important clinical outcome for patients, as the correction of anemia can significantly improve quality of life and ameliorate end organ damage. As I shared last quarter, I've been visiting our RUBY and EdiTHAL trial, our clinical trial sites, and continuously speaking with investigators. I appreciate the enthusiasm and support from the investigators and study sites. I'm pleased with the momentum of EDIT-301 in patient recruitment, apheresis, editing, and dosing in both studies.
I'm excited to hear from the investigators that the patients dosed with EDIT-301 already see positive changes in their lives. We look forward to sharing additional updates as the year progresses, including additional RUBY and EdiTHAL clinical trial data by year-end. I will turn the call over to Erick, our Chief Financial Officer, to review our financials.
Thank you, Baisong Mei. Good morning to everyone. Let me first say that I'm excited to be speaking to you today. I came to Editas because I was impressed by the quality of the company's science, its leadership in the gene editing field, its strong IP portfolio, and its highly differentiated work from other players in the field. I was eager to take this opportunity and join Editas at this pivotal time. We just shared exciting human data for our lead asset, and we're preparing our regulatory and commercialization strategy. I look forward to leveraging my experience to help the company execute our vision to bring innovative medicines to patients and drive shareholder returns. With that, I'd like to refer you to our press release issued earlier today for a summary of our financial results for the 2Q 2023.
In future quarters, I will give more guidance, and for now, I'll take this opportunity to briefly review a few items. Our cash, cash equivalents, and marketable securities as of June 30th, were $480 million, compared to $402 million as of March 31, 2023. We expect our existing cash, cash equivalents, and marketable securities to fund our operating expenses and capital expenditures into the 3Q 2025. Revenue for the 2Q 2023 was $2.9 million, compared to $6.4 million in the same period last year. The decrease is related to a program license opt-in from our collaborator, Bristol Myers Squibb, that occurred in the 2Q 2022 that did not occur in the 2Q 2023.
G&A expenses for the quarter were $17.2 million, which remained relatively flat from $16.9 million for the second quarter of 2022. The slight increase in expense is primarily attributable to increased professional services expenses to support BD activities, partially offset by a decrease in stock compensation expense. R&D expenses this quarter were $29.8 million, representing a decrease from $43.7 million from the second quarter of 2022. The decrease in expenses reflects the focus on execution following the strategic reprioritization of our portfolio, offset by increased activities to accelerate the development of EDIT-301.
Overall, Editas remains in a strong financial position, and our sharpened discovery focus, coupled with our recent capital raise, allow us to concentrate our talent and extend our cash runway further into 2025, which provides ample resources to support our continued progress in the RUBY and EdiTHAL clinical trials of EDIT-301, continue commercial manufacturing preparation, and advance our discovery efforts. As a former investor, I know the value of buy side and sell side knowledge, and I look forward to working with the company and hearing from our shareholders as we work to advance our gene-editing medicines. With that, I will hand the call back to Gilmore.
Thank you, Erick. It has been an exciting year for Editas thus far and a fulfilling first full year for me at Editas. We look forward to continuing our transformation and sharing our progress with you. As a reminder, our strategic objectives for the year include providing a clinical update from the EDIT-301 RUBY study by end of this year, providing a clinical data update from EDIT-301 EdiTHAL trial for transfusion dependent thalassemia by the end of 2023, dosing 20 total patients in our EDIT-301 RUBY study by year-end, advancing discovery of in vivo editing of hematopoietic stem cells and other tissues, and leveraging our robust IP portfolio for business development to drive value and complement our gene editing technology capabilities. As always, it must be said that we could not achieve our objectives without the support of our patients, investigators, employees, and you.
Thanks very much for your interest in Editas, and we're happy to answer questions now. Thank you.
At this time, we will be conducting a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad. A confirmation tone will indicate that your line is in the question queue. You may press star two if you would like to remove your question from the queue. We ask that you limit your questions to one and a follow-up so that others may have an opportunity to ask questions. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the star keys. One moment, please, while we poll for questions. Our first question comes from Terence Flynn with Morgan Stanley. Please proceed with your question.
Great. Good morning. Thanks for taking the questions. Two for me. I was just wondering if you could provide any update on the timelines for your first in vivo program. Then secondly, on the Azenta facility, what's going to be required there from an FDA perspective? Do you have to make any changes or do any bridging work to use product from the two facilities in the expanded trials? Thank you.
Thanks very much, Terence, for your questions. Apropos the in vivo, as I've said, our focus is on maximizing the progeny of technical and commercial success with clear positive differentiation against the standard of care. The work is continuing to progress. I'm particularly delighted to welcome Linda Burkly here, whose leadership is really going to double down and really help us drive this forward. We'll update you on, on timelines at an appropriate time, when Linda has had a chance to really settle in and, you know, make her mark.
With regard to the Azenta facility, we anticipate from a regulatory point of view, obviously, we are engaging or planning to engage with the FDA in this half of the year and are on track to have those conversations. We don't anticipate significant or major work in the transition. It essentially, the processes we have are largely locked down. As I say, we are engaging with the agencies just to ensure that we are fully aligned on our readiness for commercialization there.
Our next question comes from Samantha Semenkow with Citi. Please proceed with your question.
Hi, good morning. Thank you for taking the question. You know, now that you have Linda on the team, could you discuss some of the challenges of in vivo delivery to hematopoietic stem cells and how you're thinking about mitigating these challenges going forward? Thank you.
Yeah, thanks very much, Samantha, for your question. Linda, has to say, has just joined, so I'm going to talk about how she and I, and Linda, if you want to add anything, please feel free. One of the things is that Linda and I are really highly aligned philosophically on our approach to this. We have made, we actually have some ongoing work, and work is progressing on there, that. The challenges, obviously, are to deliver the executive functional enzyme and guides to the hematopoietic stem cells. The good news is that, you know, we feel that we have certainly solved two of the three challenges.
The first being that we have human validation of our Cas12a enzyme, thanks to our 301 program, and also we have validated in man, in our clinical trials, the use of our targeting of the gamma-globin promoter. The specific targeting and delivering of those mechanisms to the hematopoietic stem cell is something that they're working on currently, and we'd be happy to update you more on specifics and progress there at an appropriate time.
Our next question comes from Greg Harrison with Bank of America. Please proceed with your question.
Hey, good morning, and thanks for taking the question. What feedback have you had from physicians, you know, since the recent update at EHA on the 301 program regarding a clinically meaningful data set in sickle cell, especially with respect to hemoglobin response and, you know, what are they looking for from the next update?
Thanks very much, Greg. I'm going to ask Baisong Mei to take that question.
Thanks. Thanks, Greg, for that question. Absolutely, we, we receive very positive feedback from our investigators as well as patient community. From investigators, they're really glad to see the consistency of our results and the normalization of the total hemoglobin. I actually asked a specific point question to one of our investigators and said: "You know, how do you feel the normalization of total hemoglobin and with the value?" He would say, "That's absolutely very important." His, his own patient that already told him about the energy that he, that the patient has and the difference they have, and their life change in there, too. That's both from clinical observation and the patient life-wise perspective.
Relate to the data from patient community perspective, after the, the June presentation, our volume of patient inquiries increased 10 times over that period of time after the, after the presentation.
We're very pleased on that, too, and we continue to see, receive inquiries, not only in U.S., but also Canada, and we are helping them to, to moving through and understand the trial and find eligibility, whether they can join us or not. Very, very good.
Great. Thanks for taking the question. Great to hear the progress.
Thank you, Greg.
Our next question comes from Joon Lee with Truist Securities. Please proceed with your question.
Hi. Congrats on the progress, and thanks for taking our questions. Your cash guidance into the third quarter of 2025 is pretty specific. What's baked into that guidance? Specifically, does that include preclinical and IND-enabling studies of in vivo programs, and/or BLA and pre-commercial activities for EDIT-301? In fact, is it your intention to commercialize EDIT-301 yourself, or would you be looking to a partner to help you with the heavy lifting on the commercial effort? Thank you.
I think, Joon, I'll, I'll let Erick start.
Yeah. With respect to the specific dollars that are included into the cash runway guidance, you know, we're including all of the BLA activities and everything we need to do to prepare for that within the guidance. With respect to IND-enabling studies, we do have some early preclinical research amounts in that, and, you know, we'll see what Lynda comes up with in the future as to whether or not, you know, we reallocate some dollars from other programs or not. That's where we are at this point with respect to guidance and in terms of commercialization with a partner.
Yes, Joon, we, we, we actually see commercialization as, you, a, a, a nice upside, particularly for making sure we expand our global footprint. We previously stated that we certainly want to partner ex-US. Obviously, as we, we talk to partners or potential partners, if the terms really line up with where we are to ensure that we can maximize value for patients, shareholders, we, we could consider, you know, co-commercialization in addition to global co-development and commercialization i-in the United States.
Thank you.
Thanks, Joon.
Our next question comes from Gena Wang with Barclays. Please proceed with your question.
Thank you. Two very quick questions. Regarding the in vivo target, is it fair to say it will be a liver-targeted and with a lipid nanoparticle delivery? Regarding the manufacturing, just follow up, so you do have a Azenta facility, and what is your plan for commercial manufacturing capacity in the future? Will you, wholly, say, in the U.S., try to do all wholly in, in-house, or would you plan to also collaborate with the CDMO regarding the manufacturing commercial supply?
Thanks very much, Gina. With regard to the in vivo targets, obviously, we've talked about hematopoietic stem cells of an area of particular interest because of our 301 work on the human validation or AsCas12a and gamma-globin promoter. The liver is definitely on our list of potential tissues beyond hematopoietic stem cells. I think you can reasonably infer, you know, with the cessation of our activities with AAV, that we're interested in non-AAV technologies, and LNPs is certainly an area of interest and one that we have been working on in the past. Actually talked about working on over the past year plus. With regard to manufacturing, thanks for asking about that.
We actually, with the announcement of our Azenta deal, this is, essentially, enables us to build towards our commercial capacity and readiness, for launch. With regard to the more specific, elements of around capacity and our predictions, that's something that we are working through and would talk about, in the, future.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Our next question comes from Dae Gon Ha with Stifel. Please proceed with your question.
Hey, good morning. Thanks for taking the question. Two from me as well. One, with regards to Baisong Mei, your remark on total hemoglobin as being a differentiation, I guess, at what point do you kind of draw the line in the sand and look at that as a differentiator from potential competitors? As a follow-up to that, you know, Vertex last night announced that there will be an AdCom for Exa-cel. I guess, what are you kind of thinking about in terms of point of contention or debate or discussion as we approach that, and how would you see the AsCas12a targeting HBG promoter as potentially raising another AdCom when you guys go down that line? Thanks so much.
Thanks for that question. It. Regarding the total hemoglobin and related differentiation, we are in the current protocol, we're already actively looking into that. As I outlined previously, we are looking for three category of things. One is come from hematological and other lab values. The other one, the second, is the end organ function. The third would be patient reported outcome and quality of life. Maybe a few words on the last two. We In the current protocol, we monitor key organ functions, but such as cardiovascular, pulmonary, and renal function. We have multiple measure to measure the function. We believe that the total hemoglobin increase will impact the quality of life and end organ health. That's why we focus on the end organ function.
Then regarding reported patient-reported outcome, this could be a very important part of that for differentiation. For example, fatigue is the main one of the main complaint by sickle cell patients, and that, already data to show that fatigue can really related to the anemia on that, too. Similarly for pain, that's also another another the complaint that patients have, and we also have clear close monitoring of those patient-reported outcome, among many other things we can share more on.
Yeah.
And then-
Go ahead.
Yeah, do you want to add for the differentiation?
No, no, please. I think that's fine.
Your second question is about AdCom. Yes, we, we heard the news about the AdCom, which of course, this is a normal area that FDA ask AdCom, which is not a surprise. We feel that will help us to learn more about how their data look like and how the, the expert committee is view about, or additionally, how the FDA feels about. Relate to, to our own mechanism of action, we do not believe the target of AsCas12a cause additional concern from mechanism action perspective. You know, as I mentioned before, we actually, our targeting of HB G1/2 promoter is mimicking the natural mechanism of hereditary persistence of fetal hemoglobin on that.
That's kind of the nature of mutation we are targeting there, too. We're looking forward to see the outcome, and the, the, the information from the AdCom from the, from the, the Exa-cel.
Great. Thanks so much.
Our next question comes from Phil Nadeau with Cowen and Company. Please proceed with your question.
Morning. Thanks for taking our questions, two from us as well. First, in terms of the year-end update on RUBY and EdiTHAL, what is your most recent thinking about the number of patients that will be disclosed for both trials and, and the follow-up for the patients in the disclosures?
Yeah, thanks for that question, Phil. Sorry, I'm just jumping in. Yes, we, we are, we are on track to those total of 20 patients by year-end. We are, we are, not disclosing the specific data to be released at the year-end, but we are on track to provide a clinical update for both studies at the year-end.
Great. Then, second question on the interference proceedings that you referenced in the prepared remarks. Can you remind us what are the next steps in those proceedings and when they could conclude?
Yes, thanks, Phil. The oral, really, it's the scheduling of oral presentations is the next step. Those oral presentations have yet to be scheduled. What we'd anticipate is a judgment in early to mid 2024. It's worth stating that we are confident that we prevail as we have before, both in front of the Federal Circuit Appeals Court, as well as with the U.S. PTO.
That's very helpful.
Thank you.
Thanks for taking our questions.
Thanks.
Our next question comes from Yanan Zhu with Wells Fargo. Please proceed with your question.
Hi, thanks for taking the questions. I wanted to ask about your FDA interaction in the second half of the year. What will be the focus there? Do you think you have enough data to inquire about pivotal path? Do you think the kind of treatment afforded to the competitor in terms of 17 patients forming the basis for a pivotal cohort and the length of follow-up could be similarly afforded to your to EDIT-301 as well? Also, lastly, do you think you have enough differentiation on the total hemoglobin to request a Breakthrough Therapy designation? Thanks.
Thanks very much, Yanan, for that, detailed question. I'll, I'll start. With regard to the FDA interactions that we are planning for this year or this half of the year, we will be talking about multiple elements, including our CMC, as I've said, as well as having a clinical interaction. With regard to the clinical data, I'm glad that you highlighted, you know, where we see Vertex's BLA and the acceptance of an efficacy cohort of 17 patients, with about 18 months of follow-up data, which I think is a helpful precedent and certainly an element of guidance that we can actually use.
Then, as Baisong has said, the, the Ad Comm that will be scheduled towards the end of this year, by the FDA, I think will actually also be very illuminating as we continue in our continuous process of aligning with the agency and understanding how we can come to agreement on what will be ultimately our pivotal path and BLA filing strategy. With regard to differentiation, Beisong, I don't know if you want to add anything.
Yeah, yeah. Thanks. Yanan, I think your question about differentiation is related to the part, to the eligibility for Breakthrough designation. We are carefully looking into, into the regulatory designations and, and, and multiple different things in there. Certainly, we are excited by the data we have seen so far, and we are evaluating very carefully and on this path.
Very helpful.
... relate to your earlier question about, you know, saving inpatients from, from the Exa-cel. As Gilmore mentioned, that, we will know more, especially after the outcome. It's a good reference for us. That we still require the final alignment with FDA on what data package is required.
I think the good thing that I should have, of course, highlighted was that we are on track to dose 20 patients by the end of this year. That number, you know, is, is a helpful number for lining up with what we see with the BLA acceptance for Exa-cel. Thank you.
Great. Very helpful. Thank you.
Our next question comes from Rick Bienkowski with Cantor Fitzgerald. Please proceed with your question.
Hi, everyone. Good morning, and welcome to Linda and Eric. Thanks for taking the questions. I wanted to get some clarification on manufacturing. The expanded agreement with the Azenta Group seems to be focused on clinical and commercial readiness for U.S. markets, given that the footprint is based in Massachusetts. Does the company have any manufacturing capabilities in European markets, or would any European-based manufacturing have to come from another potential partner?
Thanks very much, Rick. You're quite right in reminding everyone that we have this exciting new agreement with Azenta as we get ready for BLA and commercial launch. With regard to ex-US, I think we've been consistent in our messaging that we actually would prefer and actually expect a partner to help us with the ex-U.S. from the point of view, expanding our footprint. Obviously, when we talk about that, we talk about in terms of co-development, co-commercialization, and all the activities necessary for that.
I got it, and I, I do have one quick follow-up.
Sure.
One of the areas of development that was highlighted back in January of this year was exploring the use of milder conditioning regimens for stem cell transplant. My question is, once a milder conditioning regimen is developed, I was curious how this could potentially be folded into clinical trials and what the, what the approval pathway looks like here for use with EDIT-301.
Thanks very much, Rick, for that, and reminding us that importance, because obviously, by creating, or by the development of, milder conditioning, we see a path to increasing eligibility for sickle cell disease and TD patients, which are very serious diseases. Again, back to milder conditioning, you can extend or expand the milder... or, sorry, the eligible population. We continue to evaluate that, and it's a question really of balancing the reduction of toxicities with engraftment efficacy. In general terms, we see milder conditioning as something that the transplant sites will use, and as they grow comfortable with it, they will expand it across their use protocols. That's how we actually would see it enabling autologous ex vivo therapeutics.
Got it. Thanks for taking the questions.
Thank you.
Our next question comes from Rich Law with Credit Suisse. Please proceed with your question.
Hi, guys. Good morning. My congrats to both Erick and Linda for joining the company. So the question I have is that, can you provide insight to how the partner programs are progressing? So the 11 alpha-beta T-cell programs with BMS and the NK cell with Shoreline Biosciences, and when do you expect these programs to be disclosed in more details? I have a second follow-up question as well.
Sure. Thanks very much, Rich. With regard to the BMS alpha-beta T-cells, you, you know, we're actually happy with the progress. There have been 11 opt-ins, y-you know, most recently 5 in 2022. 2 of those opt-ins have passed D.C., and the most advanced is in IND-enabling studies. Beyond that, it is BMS that is, obviously in the driving seat and would actually provide more specifics on the program. With regard to Shoreline, we're really delighted to have had the opportunity to divest our NK oncology programs to Shoreline. Shoreline is actually happy with where they're going, and I think really any more specific updates would come from Shoreline.
Great. Thanks for that. Then the 2nd question I have is, following up on the milder conditioning, would that enable the use of therapy in outpatient setting versus inpatient setting?
That is actually, I, I, I think, at the very key of, of the milder conditioning, because it's significantly, it's really a combination of reducing the risk to patients while obviously enabling and, and, and still maintaining an optimal transplant and engraftment outcome. Yes, that is one key element. Certainly, either to do it as an outpatient or substantially reduce the need for inpatient monitoring of the patients. You know, we continue our evaluation of that because we see it as an important element for expanding the eligible patient population.
Great. Thank you so much.
Thanks very much, Rich.
Our next question comes from Jack Allen with Baird. Please proceed with your question.
Great, thank you so much for taking the questions. Congratulations to the team on the progress. Maybe first to start on the clinical side, it seems like you've made a lot of progress dosing patients with sickle cell disease that are adults. I was wondering if you had any comments as it relates to your plans to move into younger patients. I know some of your competitors have moved into patients, 12 to 18 years old. Love to hear any thoughts there. Then I have one quick follow-up.
Thanks, Jack. I'm going to ask Bais ong to take that question.
Yeah, Jack, thanks for, for that question. Absolutely, we are intending to expand this study to all, all age groups. We are actively, actively working on that. With more adult data, we are much more comfortable to go to younger patient population.
Great, thank you so much. Then maybe on the IP front, you mentioned that the hearings have not been scheduled in this interference case quite yet, but I'd love to hear any thoughts you have as it relates to leveraging your IP and, and as some of your competitors, you know, advance to potential approval. I guess, should we, should we think about potentially a settlement coming before approval? Could it come after? I guess, how do you think about conversations surrounding that IP and, and how you're looking to leverage your, your strong position there?
I, I think our key position on our IP is that we really want to ensure that it is used to enable therapeutics for multiple patients with multiple, frankly, in multiple therapeutic areas. Indeed, there's a large number of Cas9 products that are in development across both ex vivo and in vivo, and across multiple disease areas. As we think about leveraging that from an economic or a monetization point of view, we see that that will vary depending on the stage of development and the disease area. Beyond that, we're not going to discuss, you know, individual companies or negotiations.
Got it. Just, sorry, one brief follow-up on the IP. Can you just remind us as to who has the duty to litigate the IP? Is it you or your licensor, from that perspective?
I, I, I think, well, look, I'm not going to talk about the details of our, our, our legal strategy, but you, you know, the key thing about protection of our IP is that, that we will, we will actually protect our IP. Obviously, we want to ensure, and we are open for business and very willing to give licenses, but we will protect our IP.
Great. Thank you so much for the color-
Thank you very much.
Congratulations on the progress.
Thank you so much.
Our next question comes from Jay Olson with Oppenheimer. Please proceed with your question.
Oh, hey, congrats on the new additions to your team, and thank you for taking the questions. Can you provide an update on the number of patients enrolled in the sickle cell and thalassemia trials to date? Since you're on track to dose 20 patients in the sickle cell by year-end, do you have a similar dosing goal for thalassemia? If so, how many? Separately, can you talk about the ex-US opportunity for sickle cell and thalassemia?
I'll ask, Bais ong to address your first question on enrollment.
Yeah. Thank, Jay. We are have great momentum, have been enrolling patients, dosing patients. As I just mentioned, we're on track to dose 20 patients year-end, and we previously announced we actually have 20 patients already enrolled in the last quarter we released. We, we will provide an update on the enrollment in the coming months, and that we can share more information on that end. Regarding the goal of the number of patient doses, the Editasil, we have not disclosed the goal for the Editasil dosing number yet.
Then with regard to the ex-US opportunity, you know, we see actually substantial and real opportunity there. We also see that and believe that the best way to maximize the value for patients and frankly, for us and our shareholders, is to seek a partner with a large footprint. There are number of partners in that space that are potentially very interesting to us. As I say, opportunity is large, and we want to make sure that we optimize the delivery to that opportunity, which is why we're seeking a large partner.
Great. Thanks for taking the questions.
Thanks very much, Jay.
Our next question comes from Manny Hererra with Leerink Partners. Please proceed with your question.
Hey, guys. Thanks for taking the question. Obviously, a lot of questions on this call have been around the clinical trial execution, enrollment, et cetera. I want to dig into endpoints if we could. You've discussed earlier on this call, pain and other sort of fatigue, some quality-of-life issues is important areas of potential differentiation. As clinical trial endpoints, these are pretty notoriously variable and have some element of subjectivity. What efforts have you made, if any, to ensure comparability between your data on these endpoints and that of your competitors who are likely to have an AdCom approval prior, so that we can clearly differentiate, I'm sorry, clearly demonstrate differentiation, if any? Thank you.
Thanks very much. I'm going to ask Baisong to address that.
Yeah. Thanks. Thanks for the question, Manny. A very good question about endpoints, and maybe I should take a step back a little bit on that. After I joined, joined Editas in the middle of last year, and one thing what we were doing was actually to manage the protocol, we actually changed the primary endpoint, as the complete remission of the severe VOE, that is consistent with other, phase 3 clinical trials in a similar, in a similar setting. That's kind of the primary endpoint expected. As I mentioned, there are many endpoints, we are looking into, including the end organ functions and, and the PLOs in there, too.
You have absolutely a very good point about possible variations and especially the PLOS in there, too. We're looking into that direction, that will be we have more data on that and a better understanding. We feel that this is the area that we have, you know, publications in the disease by itself, we will have more information about the axio and the other data, and will allow us to have a understanding of where we stand for those endpoints.
Great. I guess one quick follow-up. You talked a little about how to understand where you guys are on those endpoints. Do you have any evidence you can point us to in the literature, or based on experience and publicly disclosed data from other companies or your own, around what duration of follow-up we would need to be able to compare cross-trial, statistical caveats notwithstanding, and kind of provide clear evidence of where you guys are versus where your competitors are? Like, how long follow-up would we need?
Mm-hmm.
to clearly differentiate on pain, on fatigue, on quality of life?
Yes, yeah. Very, very good question. That's something we are looking into that, too. First of all, I would say there are some information already published, for example, in the allogeneic transplant perspective for sickle cell disease. There are publication in multiple different ends on that to see how patients improve after the hemo- the hemoglobin cell stem cell transplant for those patients. Then in terms of specific endpoints, some will take longer, and other will take a shorter time. For example, we already see the total hemoglobin increase in very short time period, so that's kind of probably taking shorter time-wise. So for some quality of life, it may take six months or 12 months to go.
For the end organ damage, and that's actually space that we're continuing to learn, there are actually publication, for example, to say from, from central nervous system and after the, the allogeneic transplant, they see the improvement, hydrodynamic improvement in the blood vessel in the brain. There's a lot of studies in this, this space. Again, we are still in a new territory, we are looking into that. We're confident that we will be see something over the period of time, and to see some differentiation.
Great. That's very helpful. Thanks, guys.
Thanks, Manny.
I think it's also worth re-emphasizing, of course, that, you know, the biochemical and physiologic differences that we're already describing are certainly generating significant excitement, with, you know, prescribing and treating physicians, and actually also within the patient community, as Beisong alluded to in the, the feedback and the follow-up that we've had since presenting, you know, very exciting data around the correction of anemia, in addition to robust and durable fetal hemoglobin expression at the EHA meetings and our webinar in June.
Our next question comes from Luca Issi with RBC. Please proceed with your question.
Oh, great. Thanks so much for taking my question. Congrats on all the progress. Maybe one more manufacturing. Since you're moving your manufacturing process to a new facility, is it fair to assume that the FDA will ask you to run a clinical bridging study similar to what we've seen from REGENXBIO, or do you think that just analytical comparability study will be sufficient? Again, any color there, much appreciated. Then maybe on R&D, pretty material decline in the R&D spend this quarter versus prior quarter, wondering if you can provide any additional color on what drove that and how should we think about modeling that line going forward. Finally, one last one on BD, any update on partnering LCA10? Thanks so much.
Yeah, thanks very much, Luca. With regard to manufacturing, I, I think a couple of key points. One is that we are manufacturing within the Azenta space. We're already running our clinical supply in a separate Azenta space. With regard to the details and specifics of what will be required, this is a would be part of our alignment and meetings with the FDA as we have outlined. With regard to R&D spend, I, I will start and then ask Eric if he wants to actually add any additional color to the spend.
The key thing about the R&D spend, obviously, was that, following the rollout of our new strategy, where we sharpened our focus on in vivo, and really focused on accelerating our 301 asset, we did actually sharpen and narrow our pipeline. And so that had an impact on spend with, you know, with the divestiture of our NK assets to Shoreline, as well as the cessation of our AAV inherited retinal dystrophy programs. Eric, I don't know if you want to add anything more to that?
No, I, I think you covered that pretty well. I would just add from a philosophical basis that, I think we're all aligned, that we want to be focused on high conviction R&D spend, high conviction assets. We're not really into, quote-unquote, "broad and deep pipelines" and quote-unquote, "lots of shots on goal." You know, we really want to focus our resources on a few assets that we have high conviction on, and I think that's the philosophy that the team here shares, across the board.
I think that's an important piece of guidance, and actually a, a key reason that, you know, Linda has joined us. It's not just about, you know, continuing that, to advance, the work that we have in progress or in vivo, but Linda is very aligned philosophically, with myself and the leadership team when it comes to our approach to selecting targets and maximizing the probability of technical and commercial success, by clearly selecting targets where we can, with our technology, differentiate from the standard of care in a meaningful manner. With regard to the update on LCA10, I will give you a, a more specific update, you know, when, if we have, a taker or a deal.
I will tell you there has been some interest. Obviously, we believe that we saw something, a signal, in the patient dataset that we analyzed. Hope that another firm or sponsor with a specialty interest in that disorder would actually take it forward.
Got it. Thanks so much, guys.
Thanks, Luca.
Our next question comes from Liisa Bayko with Evercore ISI. Please proceed with your question.
Hi, thanks for taking the question. I just had I wanted to drill down a little bit more on the gentler conditioning regimen program. What are you working on in terms of approaching that? What do you think are the most, I guess, promising approaches out there? You know, what, what is your thinking on when something like that could come to market? I guess if someone else developed something like that, is that something you, you think you could fold into your program? Or how do you think about sort of owning something like that versus someone else and your access to it? Thanks.
Thank you very much for the question. Well, at first, I just want to say that I'm super excited to have joined Editas. I'm so impressed with the foundational technology as well as the, really, the truly excellent of this team. Coming to your question, of course, the milder conditioning is, is such a crucial parameter for many therapeutic indications, oncology, so many therapeutic indications, as well as, of course, the sickle cell disease. So it's been sought after to have milder conditioning regimens for, for many years.
We are, of course, monitoring the landscape and keeping very, active, eye on all of the various, approaches that are out there, as well as, I've only been here for seven days, so I'm getting up to speed on what the team is doing internally. I can boot this over to Gilmore for additional comments, but, of course, we are going to be very active in terms of, of this aspect.
Thanks very much, Linda. You know, with regard to how we would fold it in, I think you've actually touched on it, which is that milder conditioning, as Linda said, is generalizable across multiple elements, or I should say, therapeutic areas when it comes to the use of stem cell transplantation. We see any advances, certainly in, in, in systemic therapeutics that impact and can result in milder conditioning, having an impact across expanding the eligibility or the eligible patient population, and obviously, that would have an impact on our therapeutic use.
Obviously, looking beyond milder conditioning, you know, the in vivo targeting of hematopoietic stem cells is an additional step which could eliminate the need for any conditioning, as well as actually further reduce the burden on patients and healthcare systems by eliminating the need for harvesting, freezing, and collecting CD34+ cells. The way we would see it rolling in is we would see the development of a milder conditioning therapeutic by whatever sponsor adopted at transplant centers, in their transplant protocols, and then generalizing across multiple therapeutic spaces that use stem cell transplantation.
Thanks.
Our next question comes from Brian Cheng with JP Morgan. Please proceed with your question.
Hey, guys. Thanks for taking my question this morning. Just one quick one from me on manufacturing. On the Azenta facility, do you have any insight on when this facility could come online? How does that timing potentially fit into the pivotal portion of the ongoing studies? As you will discuss with the FDA on CMC in the second half this year, are there any specific important items that you need to get aligned with the agency? Thank you.
Thanks very much, Brian. With regard to online, the timing of this deal and this expansion is really tied to our BLA readiness planning. So we are happy with the progress with Azenta and the readiness to be online at, at the time that's appropriate to support our BLA. With regard to FDA alignment, I'm not going to go into the specifics here, but essentially, we just want to confirm and agree with our understanding around, you know, the guidance and their interpretation of the guidance and our program as it pertains to a cell therapeutic.
Thank you, Mark.
Thanks, Brian.
Our next question is from Steve Seedhouse with Raymond James. Please proceed with your question.
Hi, good morning. This is Nick out for Steve. We were wondering if and how you're measuring off-target edits or translocations for EDIT-301 in RUBY, or Editasil, and whether or not you plan to share those data. Thank you.
Thanks very much, Nick, for the question. Indeed, we actually have a, a comprehensive, we have a comprehensive set of assays for looking at off-target edits. We're actually very happy with the data we have seen. Interestingly, we actually saw following our proposed set of assays and controls to the agency that many of those remarks were reflected in the guidance that was published after our submissions. We're actually very happy with seeing off-target edits. We believe that it really supports and validates our approach to choose an AsCas12a, a CRISPR enzyme, which, as you know, is differentiated both for its efficiency as well as its specificity, and very low, indeed undetectable, off-target editing.
All is actually moving consistently with the selection of that enzyme and its prioritization in our portfolio.
All right. Thank you.
Thanks very much, Nick.
Ladies and gentlemen, we have reached the end of our question and answer session, which concludes today's call. Thank you once again for your participation. You may now.