Eaton Vance Tax-Advantaged Dividend Income Fund (EVT)
NYSE: EVT · Real-Time Price · USD
26.07
-0.02 (-0.08%)
Apr 30, 2026, 1:22 PM EDT - Market open
← View all transcripts

Partnership

May 10, 2023

Speaker 10

Good morning, good afternoon. Welcome to Evotec. Today is an important day because it's a significant impact that will happen through the new partnership between Sandoz and Just – Evotec Biologics for the world. Why do I say this? When we think about access, this partnership will make a huge contribution in the future. We have uploaded a presentation for this call that I will host together with Matthias Evers, who was pivotal to make this deal happen. When it comes to the presentation, I would like to guide you to page number two, which gives you an overview of the tech partnership for biosimilars that we have initiated together with Sandoz. Before that, let me start by a general definition of what a biosimilar is.

The FDA defines a biosimilar as a biological product that is highly similar or, and has no clinically meaningful differences from an existing FDA-approved reference product. These are differences when it comes to safety, purity and potency. That's a biosimilar. I make this definition because typically when you are discussing with Evotec, we are discussing about small molecules, cell therapies, antibodies. Biosimilars is for us entering into a new world together with one of the leading partners in the industry. The deal rationale and some key elements here are showing you that it's a strategic partnership in the field of biosimilars. It's long-term and covering the development and the commercial manufacturing of biosimilars. The financial terms are significant. There's an undisclosed EUR double-digit million upfront payment that Evotec will receive and that we will recognize in the coming years.

There's future payments, depending on successful development, of up to $640 million. On top of this, you can expect that future payments will be committed to the commercial manufacturing that will happen in the network of Just – Evotec Biologics facilities. From defining here a business model, we are going into what we called here a CDMO plus development model. Maybe we should call it even CDMO plus plus development model because there's really a huge technological component and also risk-sharing component in there. Commitment of commercial manufacturing of several molecules will go into our network of J.PODs. The joint productivity goal that is behind that will make huge impact because ultimately this will drive costs down for biologics and with this, give future access to many, many more patients.

We're talking about a non-exclusive license as well for a so-called S.POD, which could be an option to be set up in the future by Sandoz. When you go to the next page of this presentation, let me remind you for a second what Just – Evotec Biologics stands for. Just was founded by an amazing, talented group, most of them coming out of Amgen. They gave themselves the name Just, which was referencing justice. Justice in the sense of giving more people access to affordable and highly efficient medicine. Why is this so relevant? Today you're still talking about huge underserved populations. You're talking about huge underserved regions and you're talking about huge underserved indications where novel biologics and novel biosimilars will make a huge impact. That's why sharing this culture North Star together with Sandoz brought us together in this partnership.

When you go to page number four, we say and are fully convinced that after a few decades where biosimilars were always a bit in the zone of, we don't really know where this industry is going, now we are very clear where this industry is going, and the era of biosimilars is starting. You see more than 120 biologics that are expected to lose exclusivity until 2030 already. You see 50 blockbuster drugs by 2030, and you see a double-digit market growth in this segment where again, you have only a very small number of globally leading companies, and where Evotec and Sandoz will clearly mark now the top alliance in the industry. With this, and especially to illustrate to you our technological advantages, I hand over to Matthias.

Matthias Evers
Chief Business Officer, Evotec

Thank you, Werner. Good morning, good afternoon also from my side. It's a real honor to speak with all of you on a very special day for Evotec. As Werner said, it's maybe good to first remind us of the value proposition that after all brought Sandoz and Just – Evotec Biologics together. It lies and its foundation is in technology innovation. Technology innovation in continuous manufacturing, but much more. It's actually the use of integrated data analytics, integrated data stream from development to manufacturing and back. This allows a paradigm shift in this industry, and all these shifts depicted on this page are highly relevant for this partnership. For instance, flexible and agile capacity to quickly react whenever clinical material needs to be produced and market demands need to be met.

Attract the facility costs, driving down CapEx, and particularly the last point, how this type of operation allows highly affordable biosimilars that are the magic key in the end to access, as Werner introduced before. Just – Evotec Biologics has a distinctive value proposition in these areas, and this is also what we are leveraging in this type of deal. Before I introduce a little bit more about the deal, let me double-click a little bit into the value proposition of Just – Evotec Biologics, and I will move over to slide 6. This illustration is in absence of pictures of the plant, a bit what is happening in this continuous manufacturing-based paradigm. What you see is certain devices, apparatus, et cetera, that are familiar, but in the Just paradigm, which you see at the bottom, it's highly integrated, first of all.

It's of course, schematic, but you will see a lot of cables, sensors, 24/7 monitoring and an end-to-end integration that, of course, allows highest control, highest quality, and frankly, the absence of a lot of coworkers. Now, for the regulatory-informed people, we don't actually switch out the light. This is more to say we could switch out the light because it's a very light operation when it comes to coworkers. This, of course, has implications on cost as well as on quality. If you move over to slide seven. This highly intensified processing yields much lower costs. I think the driver is, on the one hand, labor costs, but much more so it creates also a highly productive process. Cells are frankly like the way they are treated in this process because they are constantly producing.

Here, I mean, we see the schematics of a 25-day production paradigm where the product is immediately moving away from the cell, so they stay in a much more healthy condition. This type of approach drives productivity of costs, where we believe versus traditional CDMOs based on benchmarks that we have, that we are 75% below. You see later that we operate with an aspiration of, to go to $50 per gram and below. If I can just move us on to page eight and get closer to the deal itself. This is a partnership that stands under the word together. It's a true coming together of companies with globally leading capabilities that are very complementary. Just- Evotec Biologics is clearly bringing into this partnership CMC expertise, manufacturing capabilities, and an emphasis is on really on the development expertise of biosimilars.

Because all the technology introduced, the constant data monitoring gives a very stable data and AI-driven backbone that helps us to be much more predictive and hence much more productive in process development as well as in later manufacturing. Sandoz is a clear leader in the biosimilar field and of course, is bringing in clinical, regulatory, medical, as well as commercial capabilities in the field of biosimilars. What we touched on briefly earlier, the word together stands also for a fully aligned purpose and culture that has been instrumental to bring the teams together already now on the journey towards this partnership and to make it happen. If you move to page nine. Page nine is a bit an illustration of this, what we call a very synergistic collaboration model.

Under this combination of capabilities that I just introduced and that we're not quite actually a CDMO plus because we have joint incentives to drive down costs towards affordable biosimilars. We have a clear scope for this partnership, where Just – Evotec Biologics is bringing all the capabilities we have into the development, into the commercial manufacturing. Over the course of the next years, also, Sandoz may exercise the option to build an S-POD. For us, this is a real precedent of offering the full technology stack into an Sandoz, into a partner-owned facility. To illustrate this last point a little bit further and the importance of it, let us move on to page 10. This describes a bit what does this S-POD option actually entail.

It's a non-exclusive option for a fully Sandoz-owned operated facility. Facility is actually the wrong word because it's actually the option for a full technology stack. Processes, IT, technology, frankly, it's a recipe to make these attractive economics work. The timeline is highly illustrative, but given the rapid timelines to build such a facility, this is an illustrative timeline that could bring us to an S.POD to around 2030. The partnership clearly builds on the expertise on the Just – Evotec Biologics team in terms of design, construction, operating and training the S.POD facility. As a next step on page 11, perhaps as a reminder, how would then the global network of pod facilities look like? We have our J.PLANT original starting point of our network in Seattle, a phase I to clinical supply hub.

We have our J.POD in Redmond, fully equipped for commercial production. First GMP runs already started 2021. We have our J.POD in Toulouse, France, which is in progress of being built up, looking already impressive, not as final as on the picture, but frankly, looking impressive. The S.POD option as discussed before. Let me now move to one more slide 12. Another schematic to illustrate the economics of this partnership. We have disclosed development payments for the development of a portfolio of biosimilars of $640 million as direct commercial value over the coming years. We indicate here commercial manufacturing, so for in-market products, 2030 onwards. We also illustrate here undisclosed payments that lead over into commercial manufacturing, given the joint incentives, given the S.POD option, et cetera.

With that, let me hand over back, to Werner to summarize our presentation.

Speaker 10

Thank you, Matthias. If you go to page 13 of this presentation, let me clearly state that we are just at the beginning of what we think will be a paradigm shift in the world of biologics. We have started our business model by focusing on three customers of the future. One, are foundations and governments, and let me highlight again that we have a wonderful partnership initiated with the Department of Defense, with the NIH and also other mission-driven foundations that are already buying into the concept of fully continuous manufacturing of the future. Our second group of partners are biosimilar players. Here with Sandoz, we are so happy that we have a world-leading player on our side now. The third group that we are partnering with are innovative molecules for novel biologics.

With this, you see that this is the first large-scale industry partnership for Just – Evotec Biologics in the world of biosimilars. As you know, biosimilar players are very sophisticated when it comes to quality, timelines, precision. That's also why we think that this is the validation for fully continuous manufacturing platforms that have been talked about very often in industry, but where we are truly building together with Sandoz, a world-leading alliance. This is introducing for our platform, where we are very often naming our platform, the shared economy platform in the industry, a new portfolio partner, which is excellent from its reputation, excellent from its vision and mission. That's also why we think that this is very good for us to create even further upside next to a CDMO business together with this partner.

We are securing with our J.POD, fully continuous manufacturing technologies, large volumes for the planet, and will give a lot of patients access in the future. You can hear me that this is just a starting point of a new wave and the next wave of alliances to come. If you go to page number 14, you see how this fits into our long-term plan, which we have given out by the year 2020, and where we are very clearly aspiring to not only go way beyond EUR 1 billion in revenues, but also to bring up EBITDA levels to EUR 300 million. The contribution of Just – Evotec Biologics, which is, as you know, still in its startup phase and is today still in its negative territory when it comes to EBITDA contribution, will shift in the year 2024 to a very nice contribution in EBITDAs.

With this, let me highlight again that this is a great day for access for many patients to have best medicine available in the future. Let me thank you for following Evotec. On page number 15, let me thank you also for following Evotec in the future, where you see upcoming dates of our publication of our annual report, where you see our Capital Markets Day announced for the 5th of June, and where you see our AGM, which will be held on the 20th of June in the next weeks as events to highlight into your calendars. We are open for questions. Thank you so much for being with us.

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, at this time, we will begin the question and answer session. The first question is coming from James Quigley from Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.

James Quigley
Executive Director and Equity Research, Morgan Stanley

Great. Thank you for taking my questions. I've got two, please. The Sandoz press release highlighted that it could be an additional 8-9 assets or so through the collaboration as they highlight going from 15+ to 24. Can you give us an idea of which assets these biosimilars are for? Or if not, could you let us know the current market size of the innovator market for the 8-9 biosimilars? What are your expectations around the build-out and timing of these assets moving forward through development and into commercial?

Finally, for that part, are any of those potential first to market opportunities? Secondly, can you give us a little bit more details on the timing and achievement of the $640 million? What milestone needs to be achieved to recognize the revenue? Is it a straight line basis or, is it linked to particular milestones? Should we sort of spread it across the 8 or 9 assets? Is that the most sort of reasonable way to think about it? Thank you.

Speaker 10

Thank you for the questions. Great that you had the time to already see Just - Evotec Biologics. This is also an invitation to everyone on the call. If you are coming to Toulouse or if you're coming to Redmond and want to see the future of biologics manufacturing, then be invited after letting us know that you are coming. For your questions, I hand over to Matthias.

Matthias Evers
Chief Business Officer, Evotec

James, thanks a lot for the question. On the first question of, as you referred to the Sandoz press release and the numbers, I cannot give you a lot here given the confidential nature in a highly competitive market. You can assume that a global leader looks at globally relevant antibodies, and that's a fair assumption you can take, and we have to leave it here. I think in terms of the $640 million, a straight line is a reasonable start. I mean, we did acknowledge that we will start immediately, as you will have noted it, immediately on a portfolio of molecules. I would also signal that it's not the traditional milestone in terms of highly risk-based milestone, but basically a straight line from development from the start toward a launch of a biosimilar.

You can put a straight line up here and don't put very high risk against the milestones to achieve it.

James Quigley
Executive Director and Equity Research, Morgan Stanley

Great. Thank you.

Matthias Evers
Chief Business Officer, Evotec

First in market potential. Clearly first in market potential when it comes to biosimilars.

Speaker 10

Next question, please.

Operator

The next question is coming from Steven Mah from TD Cowen. Please go ahead.

Steven Mah
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst, TD Cowen

Okay. Great. Thank you. Thanks for taking the questions and congratulations on the deal. My question is, what is the timeline for Sandoz to take the S.POD technical license, and does that option expire? To add on to that, can they create more than one S.POD? If so, would that be an additional licensing option, or can they create as many S.PODs as they like? Why make the decision to enable others with your J.POD technology? Wouldn't that be potentially competitive with your existing business? Thank you.

Matthias Evers
Chief Business Officer, Evotec

Steven, Matthias here. Thanks for the question. Let me try to explore that a little bit. I introduced an illustrative timeline and no, at this point of time, it's a long-term or-oriented partnership. The option would not expire. Again, the, it's an option and again, the timeline is illustrated from our perspective. We have talked about a singular option, so it's really, I mean, the tech stack for one S.POD. We are talking here today singular. Of course, we are very open to the idea of multiples and growing this network given the demand we are seeing. We are also not limiting it because that comes to your foundational question, why? Because we feel where we have...

I mean, we really stand behind the shared R&D economy, and we want to provide leverage. This is the real leverage because we respond with this type of technology to a demand the globe has, and we participate in this demand as we talked about undisclosed payments. This is a collaborative economic partnering model with on a, I mean, obviously undisclosed details, but that's our rationale strategically to move into this, yeah, unprecedented move and make such an option available which is non-exclusive to Sandoz. I mean, you can also hear me here saying this is an idea we can, of course, also explore in other spaces. Thanks, Steven.

Steven Mah
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst, TD Cowen

Okay. Got it. Then one follow-up question on that. you know, you talk about the shared R&D economy. Are there royalties attached to the products you're developing for Sandoz?

Speaker 10

We have clear upside attached to that, yes.

Steven Mah
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst, TD Cowen

Okay. it's not just a commercial milestone. There's a commercialization milestone?

Speaker 10

Yeah, upside attached.

Steven Mah
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst, TD Cowen

Okay, got it. Okay, understood. All right. Thanks so much for the questions.

Speaker 10

Pleasure. Next question, please.

Operator

The next question is coming from Sebastiaan van der Schoot from Van Lanschot Kempen. Please go ahead.

Sebastiaan van der Schoot
Executive Director and Senior Equity Analyst, Van Lanschot Kempen

Hi, team. Congrats on the partnership and thank you for taking my questions. I was thinking maybe you can give some insight on to what the requirements are to hit certain development milestones for biosimilars versus other projects involving therapeutics. Is that more based on hitting certain production efficiencies or scaling from lab to clinical commercial supply? Is there any relevance in that you hit certain milestones or not based on how far you get with the production capacity? I was wondering if you can also give some insight. You mentioned a portfolio of biosimilars. Can you maybe give

A certain range what we should think of, and then also, on how many slots are now actually taken in the J.POD facility for Seattle, and are there already slots reserved for the Sandoz collaboration? Thank you.

Speaker 10

Before I hand over to Matthias, let me again stress that we are building a portfolio of partners for our network of J.PODs. That's long-term very important. The portfolio will consist of governments and public institutions and mission-driven foundations. It will consist of biosimilar players. Here with Sandoz we have made a great start. It will consist of innovative molecules going into that. Why is this important? Because that defines, yeah, ultimately a portfolio of value optimal usage of the capacity that we are building. That's why creating that portfolio in the long run, I think will be super important. With this, I hand over on the technical questions to Matthias.

Matthias Evers
Chief Business Officer, Evotec

Sebastiaan, thanks for the set of questions. I mean, I tried a little bit to address it with the question of Steven, but it's good you follow up because, I mean, de facto, Just – Evotec Biologics drives the technical development or some would call it the CMC. That's basically the process starting from a, from a cell clone, producing the antibody, creating, I mean, in terms of analytical requirements, similarity, then scale, developing a process with that process and of course, supporting also clinical supply. After the validation run, then supporting clinical supply and later commercial supply. With regard to the milestones we talked about in the scope of the $640 million, we talk about development, first of all. Development, including supply for clinical trials.

These milestones are very classic milestones, I mean, A, from a regulatory perspective, as you would expect, so to achieve similarity, et cetera. That's why I call them, basically milestones with no particular risk attached. It's average risk of every biosimilar developer we have on this planet. The second component is, given our joint ambition to disrupt the market, we of course, look also at productivity, implying future COGS levels. Werner, I think, answered your second part of the question. I mean, also to state very clearly, we are proud of this partnership with a global leader in biosimilar. Clearly, Sandoz is a priority partner, but we are in the partnering model with different parties. In that sense, this is not limiting as we grow and build out the network.

Speaker 10

Next question, please.

Operator

The next question is coming from Peter Welford from Jefferies. Please go ahead.

Peter Welford
Research Analyst, Jefferies

Hi. Thank you so much. I think I've got three questions left. Firstly, are any of the biosimilars you're considering to the manufacturing, are any of them existing biosimilars that Sandoz already commercializes at all? Because obviously they are having to transition some of that manufacturing away from the parent. Curious whether are we talking about here in all cases, biosimilars that are yet to enter clinical trials, and hence therefore, you know, really starting afresh. Secondly then, just are there any particular types of biologic that you think the Evotec, Just technology platform is perhaps ideally suited to? I guess I'm thinking both in terms of potency, if you like, and volumes, but also potentially some novel sort of biosimilars.

In particular, does it encompass the potential to include antibody drug conjugates at all, or is this purely naked antibodies? Final-- Sorry, the third question, apologies, I can go back to them if you want me. Just on the artificial intelligence point of view, do you think, is this a case that you believe with the upfront sort of AI-driven parts, you are better placed to generate cells that result in biosimilar-like molecules? I guess what you've got to do is create cells that will be more efficient, but equally productive antibody that is obviously highly similar to the originator. Is that where you see AI as being most relevant or am I misunderstanding potentially how you could utilize that? Thank you.

Speaker 10

Hi, Peter, thank you for your great questions. The first question is truly excellent, I hope you understand that we cannot give you an answer because that would directly go to the strategy of our partners, and we are not allowed to comment on that. The second part of your question is wherever there's an Fc region in the composition, the technology is enormously powerful. Let's call it that way. That's also where you then can see a dramatic shift in costs. This Fc region is something that really stands out for the technology. On the third part of your questions, I would hand over to Matthias.

Matthias Evers
Chief Business Officer, Evotec

Hey, Peter. Thanks. Let me also quickly start a small comment to add on question number two, because I think, yes, large mass market products are well fit for our technology, so to go for large volumes. We are not commenting on the portfolio of molecules for Sandoz. We are not. That said, as Just – Evotec Biologics, we are highly interested in ADCs, given the specific market, the market growth, and also the capabilities within Evotec as a group across small and large molecules. Now to the third question, and you basically invite me to do the magic and say, "Yes, AI will provide us the best service." I won't go there.

We do believe that, the end-to-end data stream, the monitoring allows us to come up with much more predictive choices that help us to develop much more stable, much more predictive processes. One example is, you might remember from the visit, where we said we don't need intermediate in engineering runs. We believe, yes, the technology stack as a whole is much better or is well-suited for biosimilars development. I would just not say it only plays part on the sales, but it's every step along the way in terms of process stability, process predictability, where it plays a role, and I believe that's also why Sandoz starts this partnership with us.

Speaker 10

Maybe let me also make a comment on top of the ADC comment that Matthias made. If you look at a recent investment that we made into a company called Tubulis, a German-based ADC company, then you see that Evotec has seen the wave of ADCs coming already years ago, and also that we think that this is a very interesting market to come that absolutely suits the synergies of technologies that we are providing here. Tubulis recently also announced a quite interesting partnership with BMS in the field of ADCs.

Peter Welford
Research Analyst, Jefferies

That's great. Thank you.

Operator

The next question is coming from Douglas Tsao from H.C. Wainwright & Co. Please go ahead.

Douglas Tsao
Managing Director and Senior Analyst, H.C. Wainwright & Co.

Hi, good morning. Thanks for taking the question. Just one for me. I was just curious, if you could help us understand in terms of development of the pipeline and the new opportunities, are you getting involved in terms of early feasibility, and how much visibility do you have over the long term in terms of the targets? Thank you.

Speaker 10

Matthias?

Matthias Evers
Chief Business Officer, Evotec

Douglas, good question. Yes, we get involved early. That's how I would answer it. This is a strategic partnership, and yes.

Douglas Tsao
Managing Director and Senior Analyst, H.C. Wainwright & Co.

I guess, do you have the full range of targets over the next several years, or is there some element of that to be determined? I'm also curious, are you participating in sort of the strategy around IT, just given the fact manufacturing patents are so often part of the patent at stake for the innovator? Thank you.

Matthias Evers
Chief Business Officer, Evotec

Yeah, Douglas, it's good you follow up that I understand a little bit where you're going with this question. I would call it a strategic partnership, and this needs actually in a business like the biosimilars, very early in involvement, given how important the technical development into CMC. There are obviously choices on the IP side, and those choices need to be made jointly. That said, Sandoz is clearly the driving its its portfolio, and we are neither here discussing or in that sense, playing a role in portfolio choices.

Douglas Tsao
Managing Director and Senior Analyst, H.C. Wainwright & Co.

Great. Thank you so much.

Speaker 10

Okay, great. Thank you.

Next question, please.

Operator

The next question is coming from James Quigley from Morgan Stanley.

James Quigley
Executive Director and Equity Research, Morgan Stanley

Hello, thank you for taking my follow-ups. Just a couple. In terms of this, to the second question, in terms. Sorry, Werner, yeah.

Speaker 10

Of course, there will always be exclusivity on one molecule for one partner. That's something where we will clearly always.

Matthias Evers
Chief Business Officer, Evotec

Yeah.

Speaker 10

Be exclusive on one molecule with one partner.

Matthias Evers
Chief Business Officer, Evotec

Thanks, Werner. In terms of contracting volume, as you have observed the movie, James, I mean, we had an non-disclosed feasibility work with a non-disclosed biosimilars partner that we showed already on top of the numbers initially. I think it's an add-on to the numbers we provided. We will provide further details in the coming quarters. That is to make the link to the numbers we showed previously. In terms of how the commercials unfold, I think, for your modeling, we disclose the $640 million associated with development for the next couple of years, as I called it, a straight line earlier to your first question.

In terms of gating items, On the S.POD , it's an option Sandoz can take, as we disclosed. That would link to upsides, as Werner mentioned further, but we can't give further details at this point of time.

James Quigley
Executive Director and Equity Research, Morgan Stanley

Got it. Totally understood. Thank you very much.

Matthias Evers
Chief Business Officer, Evotec

Pleasure.

Speaker 10

if there are no further questions... Oh, sorry, there are.

Operator

There are further questions. The next question is coming from Joseph Hedden from Rx Securities. Please go ahead. I'm sorry, I misclicked. The next question is coming from Charles Weston from RBC.

Charles Weston
Managing Director and Healthcare Equity Research, RBC Capital Markets

Hello. I also have 3 questions, if I can, please. First of all, back to the $640 million. You've described it as a straight line. I'm wondering if you can describe what the angle of that straight line is, i.e., should we be thinking about $640 divided by, let's say, 6 or 7 each year? Is it a smaller amount in the 1st year and a much larger amount in the 2nd year? A flat line or a diagonal line? My 2nd question and 3rd, in fact, just some technical questions. Perhaps you covered that on the trip to Washington, you described the $50 per gram as aspirational, I think. How much improvement is required from where it is now?

Secondly, how many grams per year are achievable from a train? Perhaps again, a sort of an aspirational number that you'd hope to achieve in due course, and how much improvement from where you are now would be helpful. Thank you.

Speaker 10

Yeah. Sorry that we cannot give you much more color on the type of the line, but I think what is important is that it's a straight-ish line, I would say, with some variability, of course, starting and ramping up over the year, as we speak. I think that's the important thing. It will be a very important contribution for Action Plan 2025, and EBITDA in 25. That's why the straight line really starts with ramping up now and then becomes a straight line 24 going forward.

Matthias Evers
Chief Business Officer, Evotec

Mm.

Speaker 10

Yeah. On the two other questions, I hand over to Matthias again.

Matthias Evers
Chief Business Officer, Evotec

I mean, the straightish line also because we said, I think was the first question we said, we work on a portfolio and ramp up immediately. It's not a steep slope. It's flattish. I think that's all the help in your modeling we can give you at this moment of time. In terms of the calibration on volumes, how I would calibrate the J.POD has a with its 6 trains, has a capacity to go to 2 tons of output. That's maybe a true testament of this can serve mass markets, and that's why we are talking about a global access. I think as a footnote, perhaps also worth noting, given the flexibility, we can serve also small patient populations.

I think we look here at globally leading, biosimilar molecules that can provide to larger markets, 2 tons. I believe I missed a sub-question in the middle. Can you maybe add to that again, Charles?

Charles Weston
Managing Director and Healthcare Equity Research, RBC Capital Markets

Yeah. It related to the cost per gram. I think you described the $50 per gram as aspiration. Where would you be now compared to that 50?

Matthias Evers
Chief Business Officer, Evotec

We cannot fully disclose that. We can disclose at this moment of time that this is a joint aspiration. Aspiration meaning not a 10-year aspiration, a very near-term goal. Let me call it like that. It's a very clear near-term goal on a technology roadmap. It's not a 10-year lofty vision because we have already the feasibilities and the groundwork. If factors come in, like higher utilization, further progress, and of course, molecule specifics, we are on the roadmap towards such COGS levels.

Speaker 10

Maybe a follow-on on this, that just everyone on the call understands the capacity build-out that ultimately leads to better COGS. By the end of 2023, we will start to implement the four trains that will go on top of the existing two trains in Redmond. The start of having full capacity available in 2024 in Redmond. J-Pod in Toulouse is built as we speak, so that will take still a while to have it fully constructed and fitted out. That's by earliest in 2025, there will be notable contributions coming out of J-Pod in Toulouse. Just that everyone has this picture and that we are on a journey here. Of building out capacity, and with this also driving down COGS, because COGS will only go down once you have full utilization.

Otherwise you have a lot of costs to, first implement when it comes, for example, to GMP systems, quality systems, and then you can only drive volumes in there. Sorry, to illustrate, the question a bit. Is there a further question? Yes, that's great.

Operator

There is one last question from Joseph Hedden from Rx Securities.

Speaker 10

Great. We found you again. Super.

Operator

Please go ahead.

Joseph Hedden
Equity Analyst, Rx Securities

Hi. Thanks for taking my questions. Congratulations on the deal. My one's just on timelines. How much improvement do you believe J.POD and the J.DESIGN suite in general can bring to speeding up typical biosimilar development timelines? Was that a key part of attracting Sandoz or is really it driven by cost per gram? Thanks.

Speaker 10

I mean, it really goes in all dimensions, and time is of course, of essence, but most importantly, yeah, you really have to go to cost of goods because timelines for clinical development for everyone when it comes to biosimilars is relatively similar. Yeah. That's really why you have to take the cost dimension as the probably most relevant dimension. That's again, why it is a paradigm shift to go to fully continuous manufacturing, because that is the breakthrough technology. This is the enabling technology. This is the switch, like in the automobile industry, you had it from diesel engines to electric engines, where all of a sudden, fully continuous manufacturing and a high degree of automatization will allow you to exactly go for that dimension. Right. Thank you so much. If there are no further questions on that call, let me thank you again for participating.

Let me thank you for appreciating that Just Evotec Biologics is fully serving its purpose of justice and more access. This is a starting point together with Sandoz. With this, thank you so much. Talk to you soon.

Powered by