Welcome to the Jazz Pharmaceuticals plc First Quarter 2018 Earnings Conference Call. Following an introduction from the company, we will open the call to questions. I will now turn the call over to Kathee Littrell, Head of Investor Relations at Jazz Pharmaceuticals.
Thank you, Sabrina, and thank you all for joining our investor call. Today, we reported our First Quarter 2018 Financial Results and updated our 2018 financial guidance. The press release and the slide presentation accompanying this call are available in the Investors section of our website. On the call today are Bruce Cozadd, Chairman and CEO, and Matt Young, CFO, Dan Swisher, President and COO, Mike Miller, Executive Vice President, U.S. Commercial, Allen Yang, Vice President, Hematology, Oncology and Therapeutic Area Head and Acting CMO, will join for the Q&A session. I'd like to remind you that some of the statements we will make on this call relate to future events and performance rather than historical facts and are forward-looking.
Examples of forward-looking statements include those related to our future financial and operating results, including 2018 financial guidance and goals, corporate development efforts, future growth and growth strategy, future product sales and volumes, litigation and intellectual property-related events, inventory and supply challenges, product launches, regulatory submissions, ongoing and future clinical trials, and other product development and regulatory activities, and the timing of these matters. These forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual events, performance and results to differ materially. They are identified and described in today's press release, in the slide presentation accompanying this call, and under Risk Factors in our Form 10-K for the year ended December 31st, 2017, and our Form 10-Q for the quarter ended March 31st, 2018, which we will file shortly.
We undertake no duty or obligation to update our forward-looking statements. On this call, we discuss several non-GAAP financial measures, including adjusted net income and related per share measures and adjusted SG&A and R&D expenses and related measures. We believe these non-GAAP financial measures are helpful in understanding our past financial performance and potential future results. They are not meant to be considered in isolation or as a substitute for comparable reported GAAP measures. Reconciliations of GAAP to non-GAAP financial measures discussed on this call are included in today's press release and slide presentation found in the Investors section of our website. I'll now turn the call over to Bruce.
Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us. We had a strong start to 2018 with continued progress in our preclinical and clinical programs and the successful accomplishment of multiple regulatory milestones. Our focus on driving performance of our key products resulted in robust XYREM net sales and continued growth and demand for VYXEOS in the first quarter of 2018. In March, FDA accepted our NDA submission for solriamfetol for the treatment of patients with excessive sleepiness in narcolepsy and OSA. Last month, we submitted our supplemental NDA for XYREM for pediatric narcolepsy patients with cataplexy and excessive daytime sleepiness. In late April, we entered into an agreement with Spark Therapeutics to purchase for $110 million a rare pediatric disease priority review voucher that will allow Jazz to accelerate the review process by FDA for one of our future regulatory submissions.
Finally, we remain on track with an accelerated assessment for VYXEOS in the EU, leading to a potential approval this summer, and with our planned submission of an MAA for solriamfetol in the EU by year-end. We're very excited about the opportunities ahead for multiple upcoming product launches. Now I'll provide updates on some of our key commercial, legal, regulatory, and R&D activities and then turn the call over to Matt to update you on our financials. In the first quarter, we observed growing VYXEOS demand from key academic institutions and expanding use among community hospitals. Since launch, 236 accounts have ordered VYXEOS, with academic centers representing the largest segment in volume. Three-quarters of the top 75 target accounts have ordered product, and we are pleased with the formulary placement in these important teaching centers.
This is a promising time for AML patients with the recent introduction of multiple new therapeutic agents into the market. KOLs and many AML treaters strongly support the use of VYXEOS in its studied population, and pharmacy directors are working to integrate these new agents into their AML protocols and pharmacy budgets. Guided by our recent market research, our newly dedicated AML sales force is focused on effectively delivering the most critical message for physicians, the overall survival benefit of newly diagnosed high-risk AML patients who receive VYXEOS compared to 7 + 3 in our phase III study, and has extended its coverage within key academic accounts and to high-potential community accounts and outpatient clinics. Our field teams are also concentrating on ensuring that the clinical superiority of VYXEOS in high-risk AML patients and value proposition are well understood by pharmacy directors and other stakeholders in each institution.
We believe that there is significant upside opportunity for VYXEOS growth as we increase demand in our top academic accounts and further prioritize community hospitals. We're also excited to begin our promotional activities to increase physician awareness of the recently published NCCN AML guidelines. With respect to the EU, our VYXEOS team is preparing for potential approval. We've hired key account managers and reimbursement experts and filled medical roles to support a rolling launch of VYXEOS in the EU. This launch will be an ongoing process rather than a one-time event, as we first need to obtain pricing and reimbursement in each country. We are well along in our P&R work with individualized plans ready for focused implementation in every major market country.
We expect that our EU launch of VYXEOS will occur in waves, beginning in countries with the opportunity for favorable early market access, such as the UK, Germany, Austria, the Netherlands, and the Nordic countries. We continue to make progress on our VYXEOS R&D strategy. Our plan includes generating data through multiple avenues to support the use of VYXEOS as the new therapeutic foundation in high-risk AML. We are also implementing initiatives to evaluate VYXEOS in other AML patient segments, such as pediatric patients and adults with standard or intermediate-risk AML, relapsed refractory settings, and in combination with other targeted AML agents. We also expect to expand research into other hematological malignancies, such as MDS.
We look forward to sharing more details on our progress later this year when we anticipate that protocols and contracts will be finalized to support a broad clinical data generation plan through support of ISTs, cooperative group studies, and Jazz-sponsored studies. Turning to Defitelio, our new and dedicated adult transplant team in the U.S. began to reach out to transplant centers beginning in early April. The team continues to focus on VOD-related educational efforts. We believe we are making progress on this front, as our most recent market research indicates that physicians are beginning to recognize, diagnose, and treat VOD earlier. We also believe that the introduction of newer anticancer agents that can increase a patient's risk of developing VOD is further heightening physician awareness and recognition of VOD.
On the development side, our Phase III study in prevention of VOD and our Phase II study in prevention of acute graft versus host disease are enrolling patients. The protocol for our planned pivotal study for the treatment of TA-TMA will be finalized following feedback from FDA and scientific advice from the EMA, with site activation expected in the fourth quarter. Now on to our sleep therapeutic area, starting with XYREM and the low sodium oxybate programs. We were pleased with the strong growth of XYREM in the first quarter of 2018, including bottle volume growth of 9% compared to the same period last year. We believe that the underlying early indicators observed in late 2017 translated into strong volume growth in early 2018.
The average number of active XYREM patients increased to 13,800 in the first quarter of 2018, up 7% compared to the same period last year. During the first quarter, the XYREM Central Pharmacy successfully navigated the typical heavy payer churn, and we observed consistent high payer reimbursement approval rates. The educational efforts of our field reimbursement team continued to impact the approval rates for prior authorizations in key accounts across the country. Our disease awareness education efforts in 2017 are leading to increased diagnosis of new narcolepsy patients. The narcolepsy diagnosis rate for full year 2017 reversed a downward trend, with an uptick in diagnosis rates once again. As a reminder, in 2017, our disease awareness program ran for six months. Our 2018 program is underway and will run the full year.
The observed positive trends in newly diagnosed narcolepsy rates and commercial metrics, such as patient enrollments and first-time prescription fills, support our belief that we can continue to generate volume growth in 2018 and beyond. Turning to a brief legal and intellectual property update on XYREM and an update on progress around the U.S. Department of Justice subpoenas. We recently entered into a settlement with a sixth ANDA filer, resolving our patent infringement litigation and related proceedings against Teva, formerly Watson. In connection with the settlement, we granted Teva a non-exclusive patent license to launch its generic sodium oxybate product as of December 31, 2025, subject to customary acceleration events. Patent litigation is ongoing against the three remaining generic XYREM ANDA filers. Two of the remaining filers, Amneal and Lupin, are in a consolidated case.
Although no trial date has been set in that case, trial could be scheduled as early as the fourth quarter. A brief update related to the subpoenas we received in 2016 and 2017 from the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Massachusetts regarding our support of 501(c)(3) organizations that provide financial assistance to Medicare patients. We have been engaged in discussions with the U.S. Department of Justice about a possible resolution, and last month, we reached an agreement in principle on a proposal for a civil settlement of potential claims by the DOJ subject to the negotiation of a definitive settlement agreement and other contingencies. We recorded an accrual of $57 million in the first quarter related to this matter. On the development front, we remain focused on completing enrollment in our JZP-258 clinical trial in adult narcolepsy patients with cataplexy and excessive sleepiness.
JZP-258 provides a 90% reduction in sodium load compared to the current XYREM formulation. We believe this sodium reduction would be a meaningful improvement in patient safety for a product that treats patients with a chronic, persistent, debilitating disease like narcolepsy, where lifelong therapy is clinically indicated. 2017 hypertension guidelines linked excessive consumption of sodium with an increased risk of stroke, cardiovascular disease, and other adverse outcomes. The FDA commissioner recently communicated the need to reduce sodium intake in the American diet and identified this as an FDA priority. Throughout 2017 and the early part of 2018, we have been actively progressing both of our reduced sodium oxybate product candidates, JZP-258 and JZP-507. Recently, we made the decision to focus our efforts on JZP-258, our product candidate with the 90% reduction in sodium load compared to XYREM.
As a result, we have decided to suspend our NDA submission efforts for JZP-507, our product candidate with a 50% reduction in sodium compared to XYREM, although we could rapidly move towards a submission if our priorities change. We expect to complete enrollment in the JZP-258 phase III study in adult narcolepsy patients in the fourth quarter to support an NDA submission next year, assuming positive safety and efficacy data. Now on to solriamfetol. We announced the FDA acceptance of our NDA submission for solriamfetol in March and have a PDUFA date of December 20. We are planning for a U.S. launch in the first quarter of 2019 following the DEA's scheduling decision for the product.
We are making significant progress with our U.S. launch readiness initiatives, including brand management staffing, disease awareness programs, health economic outcomes research to support the value proposition of solriamfetol, sales force sizing analyses, OSA and narcolepsy market assessments, and payer and patient access plans, among many other initiatives. In late April, solriamfetol phase III results in narcolepsy were presented during the main plenary at the American Academy of Neurology annual meeting, and we expect to have a strong presence at the SLEEP 2018 meeting next month with multiple accepted abstracts and oral presentations. Our team is also progressing toward a planned regulatory submission in the EU late this year for solriamfetol. On the development side, we're pleased with the rate of enrollment in our phase II proof of concept study of solriamfetol in excessive sleepiness in Parkinson's disease, and we expect to complete enrollment by year-end.
Before we turn to other matters, I'd like to take a moment to thank Karen Smith, our outgoing Chief Medical Officer, for her leadership and contributions to Jazz over the last three years. We have appointed Allen Yang, our VP Hematology, Oncology and Therapeutic Area Head, to serve as acting Chief Medical Officer. Allen and other members of our strong R&D leadership team will ensure the continued progress of activities across our R&D portfolio during this transition. We believe that management transitions provide valuable opportunities for us to strengthen organizational leadership by advancing high-performing internal leaders, as well as attracting seasoned and highly capable external candidates as we continue our transformation of Jazz into a leading integrated biopharmaceutical company.
We're encouraged by the progress we made in our highly productive first quarter, which was marked by strong financial results, significant progress with our ongoing regulatory reviews, and the continued advancement of our broadening R&D pipeline. We are excited to continue this momentum as we ramp up for multiple near-term product launches, prepare for additional regulatory filings, and continue to pursue further expansion of our product portfolio through the execution of our corporate development and internal R&D initiatives. Matt, now I'll turn the call over to you.
Thanks, Bruce, and good afternoon, everyone. First quarter 2018 total revenues were $445 million, an increase of 18% compared to the first quarter of 2017. Higher sales of XYREM and sales from the US launch of VYXEOS were the main drivers of the increase. Net sales of XYREM for the quarter were $317 million, up 16% from $272 million in the first quarter of last year. We are updating our guidance range for XYREM net sales for 2018 to $1.32 billion-$1.35 billion from a previous range of $1.31 billion-$1.34 billion, representing expected growth of 11%-14% over 2017.
In the first quarter of 2018, XYREM bottle volume grew 9% over the same period last year. I'll remind you the first quarter of 2017 volume growth was unusually low due to payer mix and heavy payer churn. We are updating our 2018 volume growth guidance to mid-single digits from our previous guidance of low to mid-single digits. Turning to Erwinaze, net sales were $51 million in both the first quarter of 2018 and 2017. Late in the first quarter of 2018, following temporary supply disruptions in several markets, we observed strong demand when supply became available and believe this ordering pattern included some stocking at various institutions.
We are currently again experiencing temporary global supply disruptions and anticipate these may continue to occur from time to time in 2018. We are maintaining our guidance for Erwinaze net sales for 2018 in the range of $190 million-$220 million. Defitelio net sales were $35 million in the first quarter of 2018 versus $36 million in the first quarter of 2017. U.S. product sales in the first quarter of 2018 were consistent with the same period in 2017. I'll remind you that we expect continued inter-quarter variability in Defitelio product sales in both the U.S. and E.U. markets because Defitelio treats an ultra-rare acute condition. We are maintaining our guidance for Defitelio net sales for 2018 in the range of $145 million-$165 million.
The midpoint of our guidance reflects year-over-year growth of approximately 16%. VYXEOS net sales were $26 million in the first quarter of 2018, reflecting a 9% increase over sales in the fourth quarter of 2017. We continue to be pleased by the growing demand for VYXEOS following the U.S. launch in August 2017. We are maintaining our guidance for VYXEOS net sales for 2018 in the range of $130 million-$155 million. For 2018, we expect strong top line growth and are updating our total revenue guidance in the range of $1.88 billion-$1.93 billion from a previous range of $1.86 billion-$1.93 billion.
Turning to operating expenses, adjusted SG&A expenses for the first quarter of 2018 were $132 million or 30% of total revenues, compared to $118 million or 32% of total revenues in the same period of 2017. The increase in adjusted SG&A expenses reflects our investment in the continued US launch of VYXEOS and pre-launch activities for the anticipated approvals of solriamfetol in the US and VYXEOS in the EU. For 2018, our guidance for adjusted SG&A expenses remains in the range of $525 million-$555 million, or 27%-29% of 2018 revenue guidance. Adjusted R&D expenses for the first quarter of 2018 were $47 million or 11% of revenues, compared to $41 million, also 11% of revenues, in the same period of 2017.
Adjusted R&D expenses in the quarter included costs related to our asparaginase, defibrotide and oxybate-related R&D programs, the EU solriamfetol and VYXEOS regulatory submissions, and ongoing support of ImmunoGen's antibody-drug conjugate programs. Our 2018 guidance for adjusted R&D expenses remain in the range of $205 million-$225 million, or approximately 11%-12% of 2018 revenue guidance. First quarter 2018 adjusted net income was $182 million or $2.98 per diluted share, compared to $141 million or $2.31 per diluted share in the first quarter of 2017.
We are narrowing our 2018 non-GAAP adjusted EPS guidance to a range of $12.75-$13.25 per diluted share from a previous range of $12.65-$13.25 per diluted share. In the first quarter, we generated $162 million of cash from operations and used $35 million to repurchase shares, with $148 million remaining under our share repurchase program. We also made milestone payments totaling $11 million related to the FDA's acceptance for the filing of the solriamfetol NDA. As of March 31st, the outstanding principal balance of our long-term debt was $1.8 billion, and we had $708 million in cash equivalents and investments, and $1.25 billion undrawn under our revolver.
Before we take questions, I wanna take a moment to thank Craig Parker, who recently transitioned to a CEO role at a biotech company, for his corporate development contributions and leadership at Jazz. Over the recent years, we've strengthened and broadened the capabilities and scope of our corporate development team, including expanding its life science and commercial acumen. Our activities in corporate development remain a high priority, and we are ready and well-positioned to execute on promising new opportunities to support our growth strategy. Thank you for joining us on the call today, and I'll now turn the call over to Kathee.
Thanks, Matt. We request that you limit your questions to one at a time, and then feel free to reenter the queue if you have further questions. With that said, I'll turn the call back to the operator to open the line for your questions.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, if you do have a question at this time, please press star then one on your touch-tone telephone. If your question has been answered or you wish to remove yourself from the queue, please press the pound key. To prevent any background noise, we ask that you please place your line on mute once your question has been stated. The first question will come from the line of David Amsellem with Piper Jaffray. Your line is now open.
Thanks. I wanted to delve more deeply into your thinking on JZP-507, five oh seven and your suspension of the NDA submission efforts. I guess the question here is that? Should we take that to mean that you're even more excited or enthusiastic regarding JZP-258 ? Or is this just a case where you want to just see what the data looks like for two five eight before you make any decisions on five oh seven? I'm just trying to get a better understanding of your thought process here. Thanks.
Yeah, David, I would say ourJZP- 258 program continues on track. As a result, we think the time difference between a potential approval of 507 and a potential launch of 258 would be relatively brief. As we think about the complexity of transitioning patients and physicians through multiple changes of products, including what that means in terms of operation of our REMS, you know we've been through REMS transitions before, and that does have some disruption factor to those audiences.
We think it's better to focus on getting patients to the product we believe is the bigger improvement over XYREM, which is JZP-258 with its 90% reduction in sodium. You know, as I said in my comments, the JZP-507 NDA submission is ready to go. Should we need to reactivate that for any reason, we could, but we think at this point the best path is the most rapid one toward introducing the better product.
Okay. If I may sneak in a follow-up on JZP-258. Are you expecting or is it reasonable to expect you'll have a differentiated safety language in the label should you get approval, at least regarding sodium content and consumption?
Yeah, this is Dan Swisher. Yeah, it's probably a little preliminary to comment on that until we actually get the phase III clinical results. I think just echoing what Bruce said, you know, we're on track to fully enroll this year, have clinical data, and be prepared for a filing. At that point, you know, we'll be thinking through the label strategy.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Ami Fadia with Leerink Partners. Your line is now open.
Good evening. Thanks for the question. To limit myself to one question, I would ask, given your growth guidance, the growth that you saw with XYREM in this quarter, could you sort of illustrate for us some of the drivers and also help us understand which of these drivers may be more sustainable beyond 2018 as well, and which ones are more specific to some of the difficulties faced in 2017, which, you know, have been resolved and thus are driving growth in 2018? Thank you.
Yeah, maybe I'll start the answer and then hand it over to Mike. You know, I think, Ami, you're right to differentiate a little bit between things that we think are long-term growth trends and things that are more specific to this time period. It's certainly true that we have seen a higher government payer patient volume in 2018 than we did in 2017. That increase, you know, essentially is the opposite of what we saw coming from 2016 into 2017. You know, as such, you could think of it as a little tailwind to our volume growth as compared to a headwind last year. That is probably not sustainable for the long term.
It's an impact we expect to see for the remainder of this year, but, you know, we wouldn't expect to see that same, delta next year. Maybe I'll have Mike talk about the pieces of the growth that we think are ongoing and in fact sustainable.
Thanks, Bruce. I'm very encouraged with the early indicators of treatment demand, which is our patient enrollments and our first-time fills, which, as Bruce mentioned, picked up in the second half of 2017 and really began to blossom in terms of real bottle volume in Q1 2018, which was very much a good thing. I would say that on some of the long-term drivers, our general awareness campaign around driving the diagnosis of narcolepsy remains very much a key investment for us. As we said earlier, we are doing that for the full year of 2018 and expect to see that continue to perform well. I would say that our PA approval rates have been very good.
you know, in 2018 we'll have the full complement or the full year complement of our field reimbursement team, which has done well in the second half of 2017, helping both customers and patients get access to drugs. We're very pleased with all those moving in the right direction.
Could you help me just quantify the difference, like if you're talking about a high, you know, given your growth guidance for this year, could you help break out which ones are more sustainable longer term, maybe in percentage form if possible?
Yeah. We haven't provided any further breakdown of the volume growth first quarter over first quarter. You know, we did give you some sense last year for the amount of the impact that we thought was non-recurring, and you know, gave you a sense that our underlying normalized volume growth probably was mid-single digits. We're thrilled with the strong first quarter we had. At this point, we're giving guidance for mid-single digits again for this year, which would represent that more normalized growth rate. You know, let's obviously see how the numbers continue to progress for the rest of the year with some of the efforts and initiatives that Mike detailed. I think that normalized growth rate in the mid-single digits feels about right to us.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Umer Raffat with Evercore ISI. Your line is now open.
Hi. Thanks so much for taking my questions. Perhaps two, if I may, or I may have a third follow-up if we have time. Bruce, there was a press report recently from some of your top shareholders, citing the idea of valuing the company on sum of the parts basis and part of the thesis being potential split. I guess my question to you was, has there ever been strategic interest in the sleep business? Because that seems to be part of the thesis. Secondly, how do you think about this idea in general? Secondly, on VYXEOS, A, I'm curious the quarter-over-quarter trend, what explains that? I know you kept the guidance for the year.
as you think about designing your MDS trial, it's my observation that one of the most important contributors to your survival benefit in phase III AML was more number of patients being able to get to transplant. My question is, what's your expectation for the percentage of MDS patients that will require transplant in your MDS trial? Thank you.
Okay, Umer, that was quite a long question. Artfully asked.
I can ask one more.
Let's take it piece by piece. I'll take the first one and I'll invite Matt to jump in with any additional commentary he'd like, and then maybe Matt could take the VYXEOS trend question, and Allen could take the question, the narrower question about MDS and percentage of patients moving to transplant. You know, the observation that a sum of the parts valuation for the company or a variety of valuation approaches for the company might yield a price that indicates we're currently undervalued is something we think about.
You know, we're happy to see some additional visibility, I think, right now in the sustainable growth of XYREM as a product, increased progress of our low sodium oxybate efforts and sort of helping people think about this franchise longer term. You know, continued evolution of our pipeline and then progress on a new launch with VYXEOS. We think as our success on multiple dimensions becomes more visible, it might cause people to rethink that. You know, thinking about sleep as a strategic part of our business, you know, I would say XYREM is not a standalone product, right? It's a product that's our initial entry into the sleep therapeutic area. In this case, pretty much a U.S. only opportunity for us given the prior partnering of that product ex-U.S.
as we move forward with our low sodium programs, potentially the once nightly program, you know, we think we have the ability to continue to grow that franchise, potentially realize value for that franchise outside the U.S. as well. Then with the pending submission of solriamfetol, we're coming up on launching a product that we think is exciting, which has great overlap with XYREM. you know, a common patient population on the narcolepsy side, with expansion into OSA, utilizing a sales force that would have high overlap with our current target audiences, meaning we're already well-positioned to execute on that. we are, of course, active on the corp dev side as well, looking at things we can add, given our expertise and commitment to the sleep therapeutic area. I...
You know, we do see real value in that business as a continuing piece of Jazz overall, and obviously the cash flow coming from, you know, the strong continued performance and growth in XYREM is part of what makes us confident that we can continue to execute on corporate development opportunities as we have over the past five or six years to continue to broaden our portfolio. Matt, anything you wanna add to this?
No, that's fine.
Okay. Mike, maybe talk about VYXEOS.
Sure, sure.
-pattern.
We were very pleased with the growth in VYXEOS in the academic centers, and now we're seeing, I'd say, even faster adoption in the community to a much smaller scale. It's certainly catching on in the community hospitals for outpatient consolidation. That I think is a good thing for patients and institutions. Our newly dedicated AML sales force, now that we've built the BMT dedicated sales force, will allow us greater reach into the community. We are pleased with the formulary status of VYXEOS. To date, we're at about 72% of the top decile accounts were on formulary there. I think we're again pleased with the uptake. This is.
We received the NCCN guidelines late in Q1 and have yet to really begin any promotional activities with those, and they're about to begin as we speak.
Allen, you wanna take the question about VYXEOS?
Yeah. I think there were two questions there. One was about the data in the 301 study. Were the transplant patients the one that benefited? The answer is yes, but remember the OS was based on all patients, and actually the number of patients who went to transplant, although it was greater in the VYXEOS arm, they did make up a minority of the study population. The OS benefit was proven across the different populations. Clearly, I think what you're referring to was this post-hoc analysis looking at those patients who went to transplant. In that group, we did see a very marked benefit. That's a very interesting thing scientifically, and we're trying to understand that.
that could reflect either two things, either very deep remissions or perhaps better condition of patients as they go into transplant, better sort of performance status. You know, we're doing additional analysis to try to understand that it could be one or the other or combination of both. The next question you asked was around our MDS study. We haven't disclosed the details of our MDS study. I will sort of answer your questions about how we think about MDS, and maybe this will address that. Clearly, VYXEOS has shown a benefit in patients with AML with myelodysplasia-related changes, so it seems like a no-brainer to move into MDS. When you think about MDS, you have to really think about two populations, those that are transplant eligible and therefore eligible for curative therapy, and those that are unfit for transplant.
Now, there's a lot of overlap between transplant eligible and fit for intensive chemotherapy and unfit for transplant and unfit for intensive chemotherapy. Clearly, the low-hanging fruit for us would be moving into this fit for chemotherapy and fit for transplant population where we know the dose of VYXEOS.
We would also want to someday move into those patients with MDS that are unfit. In those patients, we're gonna sort of explore new doses and schedules that will be optimal for those patients.
Thank you so very much. Super helpful.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of David Maris with Wells Fargo. Your line is now open.
Good afternoon. A couple questions. Can you describe a likely scenario that the accelerated review voucher would be used? It would seem that if low-sodium oxybate is something with the safety advantage that it should have, that it would be almost unethical to hold back using an accelerated review voucher if you had one. Would you agree with that? Lastly, if there is a low-sodium on the market and a 10X sodium on the market, does it make any sense? Like, would you remove the other one just for safety concerns? I mean, again, from an ethical standpoint, Bruce, do you think that it makes sense to have both on the market?
Interesting questions, David. On the, you know, is it unethical to delay approval of a product? You know, you could make that argument for any product that's designed to be a better treatment for patients on efficacy, tolerability, or both. Of course, there are some mechanisms already in place, such as we experienced with defibrotide and VYXEOS for priority review, breakthrough therapy for things where I think we and the regulators would agree that speeding that treatment to patients as quickly as possible is mandated.
You know, this gives us an opportunity to take other review processes, which would otherwise be standard review processes and accelerate those for any reason, whether that's because of, you know, the severe patient need, whether that's how it tracks to our internal priorities of how we use resources, how we stagger launches, whether it relates to competitive situations where, you know, it would benefit us to move to market faster, you know, in terms of long-term potential for the product. There are lots of ways to think about that. I would say, as we sit here today, we don't yet know where it will make most sense.
Having that optionality to use it on any of our existing programs or any new program we bring into the company through corporate development, I think is a real advantage for us and, you know, could differentiate us as a buyer of a new asset to be more attractive in terms of realizing value from that asset with this. Lots of ways to think about it. On your other question about you know, removing a higher sodium version from the market, you know, once a lower sodium version is available, you know, I think there are multiple parts to your implied question. One is, you know, how do you continue to support or not support the higher sodium product in terms of your promotional efforts, in terms of manufacturing, distribution. You know, that is essentially within our control.
There are different questions about whether that product remains available from a regulatory standpoint. That's not our decision. You know, what we get to decide is how we use our resources and what product we're helping physicians and patients access that we believe is the best treatment.
Just as a follow-up, from what I hear you saying is, hey, listen, people shouldn't assume that the accelerated review is gonna be used for the low sodium. In fact, it may be used for something that's business development related. Secondly, you may do a hard switch because it's safety related, but you may also just focus your attention on one and make sure that doctors are aware that there is something with the potential better safety. Is that correct?
I'll stick with what I said. You know, on the first one, I think you're correctly pointing out, David, there's optionality, right? It could be used in a number of different ways. You know, part of our job will be figure out how to get optimal use out of that priority review voucher. On the second one, you know, I know what we control, which is how we allocate our resources. You know, we are excited about the potential for JZP-258 and getting that to market as soon as we can.
Great. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from a line of Jason Gerberry with Bank of America . Your line is now open.
Hi, good afternoon. Thanks for taking my question. Bruce, just, you know, in terms of the rumblings out of FDA and the commissioner regarding REMS and delaying generic entry, just kind of curious, you know, that's my understanding that, you know, generally this has to do with restrictions around generics getting drug product bio studies, which has never been an issue with Jazz and the generic developers there. My question to you is, you know, as you talk to your legal team, do you see any risk that your XYREM patent settlements could be prospectively challenged in any way? Or do you feel like sort of the generous term that you allow generics to come in advance of the DDI patents puts you in a pretty safe position?
Well, we certainly view the settlements that we've reached as pro-competitive, in a number of ways. You know, they certainly, like all settlements, can be reviewed, but we feel that they were good settlements. I would agree, Jason, that a lot of the commentary about REMS, b eing used to delay generic entry are really focused on other things. You know, the issue that you brought up in particular, you know, in our case, there are approved generic products, and we've already reached settlements that will bring generic versions to market in the future, you know, well ahead, as you point out, of patents we have covering our product.
Got it. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Gary Nachman with BMO Capital Markets. Your line is now open.
Hi. Good afternoon. A couple on solriamfetol. Could you describe the latest payer conversations you've been having, the receptivity for the product, and if there are any updated thoughts on a pricing range for it? Regarding the planned filing in Europe, remind us of your plans to commercialize there and what sort of effort you would need. Thanks.
Mike, you wanna take the first part of that?
Yeah, I'd be happy to. As part of some of the pre-launch activities, you know, we're doing market research and all the branding, messaging, consumer awareness, and importantly, developing the payer prop and the payer messaging, as you touched on. We have begun a lot of that research. We're learning a lot as it goes along. We think, you know, this drug is very much, it's well differentiated. The clinical efficacy is quite good. I think we can get to a place with the payers to understand what the impact of ES as a neurological condition and that there is an urgency to treat it.
Dan, you wanna talk a little bit about Europe?
Sure. Yeah, on the European side, you know, our European team, which is a specialty-focused team, has, you know, been doing some work and thinking about this. We do see a lot of benefit in the solriamfetol and moving into this additional franchise. You know, the data is very strong. It cuts across various regions. We have KOLs in Europe that stand behind it. The market need is quite strong. We've been doing some work, which is really the question is the value proposition, potential pricing, and how that could lead to a potential return. We do think the initial signs are promising that this could be the beginning of a new franchise for Jazz in Europe.
Okay, one quick follow-up. As you're building out the infrastructure a little bit more for VYXEOS, and you already have a presence with Defitelio in Europe, how much are you gonna be able to leverage that with a product like solriamfetol? Is there, you know, synergies there?
Yeah, there's clearly synergy with the leadership, the pricing reimbursement expertise, the geographic presence of the affiliates. There may be some specialty accounts that we're gonna be covering that would be different. Again, there is some synergy in the organization.
Okay. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Randall Stanicky with RBC Capital Markets. Your line is now open.
Great. Question for Matt. How are you conceptually thinking about larger diversifying transactions versus a continuation of pipeline deals? I guess to follow up on a prior question, I mean, does the voucher provide any read-through to how you're thinking about that? Matt, if just another follow-up for you. If you could talk about spending for the year and cadence, it looked like Q1 is a little lighter than you might have expected. Are you running light? How should we think about the rest of the year from an R&D and SG&A perspective? Thank you.
Yeah. Thanks, Randall. On the first one, we continue to look at a range of potential transactions. Larger and later transactions as well as pipeline building transactions that would be development stage assets. I would not read into anything with respect to the acquisition of the PRV, any particular focus as it relates to that, because it could be used, again, for internal or external programs. That's not really gonna help you determine where we're going on the M&A side. We continue to—I would continue to say that with respect to very large transactions, there are fewer of those opportunities, and they're often more complicated to get done.
As we've many times said, our base case would be transactions of the ilk we've done in the past. We're always, you know, open-minded to thinking about, you know, again, larger transactions, and we'll continue to do so. On the spending side, you know, again, we reiterated guidance with respect to both SG&A and R&D in the ranges that we had previously provided. While I would agree with you, the first quarter's results, we spent a little less than you might have anticipated in that regard and a lower percentage of revenue than in previous years. Though again, I'd mention we did have a strong revenue growth in the quarter.
We continue to be very excited about the investments we're gonna make, including in our, you know, expansion of existing programs, addition of new programs on the R&D side, and some of the launch-related investments we talked about at the start of the year when we set guidance related to preparing for solriamfetol, preparing for VYXEOS in Europe, and continuing to invest around our VYXEOS launch and also the more dedicated AML and PMT sales forces we have. I think we have a lot of investments to make. They're ongoing, and I, we've reiterated our guidance as such.
Okay, great. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Douglas Tsao with Barclays. Your line is now open.
Good afternoon. Thanks for taking the questions. Just, you know, following up on the issue of the priority review, just curious if this was the first time that you pursued one. Obviously, there have been transactions for them, you know, was it just sort of opportunistic or, you know, did you have sort of any kind of thinking, you know, in terms of why doing it, you know, this time versus other times that they were available? Then just in terms of spending, following up on Randall's question in terms of sort of cadence from a spending standpoint, you know, how should we think about the commercial?
Should we see a little bit more spend in the fourth quarter just given the ramp up as you sort of plan for the anticipated launch of Solriamfetol? Thank you.
Sure. I'll start, I guess, Doug, on the PRV, just to say we can't comment on sort of tactically how we might approach the market on these things, as you may imagine. Though I will say we've contemplated what optionality they provide and have thought about economically based on, you know, what you expect, or what you could look at in terms of the area under the curve for sales that you could pull forward for any particular product, you know, what could they be worth in various scenarios. We thought about that many times, but, you know, I can't really comment on when and how we enter the market for stuff like this. As it relates to spending, while there will be some amount of activity later in the year, it is actually ongoing already.
We've started to layer in some of those investments, again, related to some of the dedicated sales forces to some of the start of the investment related to the European infrastructure for VYXEOS, though, again, it'll build as the year goes on. As far as market building and medical education and other expenditures related to Solriamfetol, that's starting as well. While it will increase as the year goes, it's not all loaded in the fourth quarter.
Okay, great. Thank you.
Our working assumption is that any significant expansion of our field sales force would actually occur beginning early next year.
Okay.
Just given the PDUFA date and time for DEA scheduling, again, we've indicated the first quarter of 2019 would be the appropriate time to think about the launch.
Thank you. The next question will come from the line of Jessica Fye with J.P. Morgan. Your line is now open.
Hey there. Thanks for taking my question. I wanted to follow up, not to beat a dead horse here, but I think you've made a couple of comments on the call, about the PRV potentially differentiating Jazz as a buyer of a new asset. Can you elaborate on that point and the degree to which that difference in review timing and the area under the curve would really be differentiating? Thank you.
Yeah, I mean, my comment was just meant to say that the potential value of an asset, if its regulatory approval date could be brought forward, can be higher. Whether that means it's worth more to us or we can provide more value back to a seller or some combination of the two, it does provide, you know, one aspect of value that might be available to us, maybe not to others pursuing the same asset. I don't think there's more to say than that.
Okay, thank you. Can we take Allen's current role and his background as any indication of the potential therapeutic area for the next business development transaction?
No comment.
Thanks, guys.
Thank you. The next question will come from the line of David Risinger with Morgan Stanley. Your line is now open.
Yes, thanks very much. My question relates to JZP-258 timing. Could you provide some more color on when you expect to have the final data in-house, when you expect to be able to issue a press release, etc. ? The reason I ask is that the primary completion date that I last saw was November 2018, and I just wanna make sure that I understand the appropriate timing to expect the results. Thank you.
David, we expect to complete the enrollment as Doug would say this year toward the end of the year, and it'll take us a while to clean the database. We're really expecting data most likely in the earlier part of 2019 and submission in 2019.
Okay, thank you.
Thank you. The next question will come from the line of Ronny Gal with Bernstein. Your line is now open.
Good afternoon, everybody, and thank you for taking my question. Two parts. First, ERWINAZE. Can you tell us a little bit about the efforts to remediate that product and the next generation, product you guys are working with? Second, about VYXEOS, how is EU pricing featuring versus US pricing? Is it like three-quarter, one-half? Where are we in that range of pricing just for our modeling purposes?
Ronny, on the asparaginase business, you know, unfortunately we continue to face supply disruptions. You know, disappointing to us, though, as you know from our prior commentary, you know, we are working with the manufacturer to do everything we can to improve quality, reliability. Capacity and ultimately reliability of supply. That effort is not one that can be finished quickly. It's a lot of work, with a long cycle time of manufacturing; even successful improvements take a while to result in actual increased supply to the market. Hence are probably wider than normal guidance for this year in terms of where we'll end up on revenues.
You know, we are working to bring even better asparaginase treatments to patients in the future through, you know, several development initiatives designed to yield improvements in manufacturability, immunogenicity, frequency of dosing or other attributes that would be a benefit to patients, so that effort continues. Dan, any comment on VYXEOS EU pricing?
Yeah, no, it's a little premature to talk about that there. As Bruce said in the script, significant efforts have been underway in terms of building the pricing reimbursement strategy. Obviously the value proposition that goes across Europe and across the various regions, but then very country-specific and sequencing strategies that are ready for implementation.
Thanks.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Ken Cacciatore with Cowen and Company. Your line is now open.
Thanks. Bruce or Matt, I was wondering if you'd wanna comment on the acquisition purchase price of the Shire Oncology division. It seemed pretty healthy. I wanted to see if that's any reflection of kind of a changing nature in business development in orphan oncology and hematology. Just generally speaking, is it getting a little bit too rich? Kind of general thoughts around it. Thank you.
Yeah, Ken, I think I'll avoid commenting on any one particular transaction, but I think your general question goes to, you know, viability of a strategy to continue to buy diversifying assets, in the fields we're in or in a new therapeutic area. I would say, you know, from time to time, we see transactions that trade at prices that, in our view, at least as we analyze the opportunity, wouldn't provide a sufficient opportunity for return to make it worth committing our shareholders' capital, in that direction. But for the most part, we find that those are, you know, limited circumstances. You know, it's a piece of the market. It's assets at a particular stage of development aimed at a particular target, that get hot as opposed to everything.
With a commercial development focus that spans commercial assets, near market assets, programs in development that spans global deals, European deals, US-only deals, that looks at big deals, that looks at small deals. You know, our view is we will continue to find opportunities to put capital to work in transactions that are both a strategic fit for Jazz, but also offer really good return possibilities. You know, I think our watch word hasn't changed over the past four or five years that we wanna be disciplined and make sure we're investing wisely. But we remain confident we can in fact do that in this environment.
Is there any FTC reasons why you could have or could not have participated in that auction?
Yeah, can't comment on that.
Okay, thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Gregg Gilbert with Deutsche Bank. Your line is now open.
Thanks. Bruce, let me ask you the M&A question a little differently. Several months ago, you indicated that you were not being more aggressive on share buybacks because you saw better uses for the capital relatively soon. Is that still the case? For Mike, on VYXEOS, now that more patients have moved into the consolidation phase, are you seeing more outpatient treatment? Is that something you expect to see gain traction over the course of 2018? Thanks.
Yeah, Gregg, on the first part of your question, I would say yes, it's still the case. Meaning that while we have continued to buy stock back under our stock repurchase program, and we will continue to buy stock back under that program, which I think as Matt indicated in his commentary, still, as in our press release, still has $148 million remaining, as of the end of the first quarter. We also believe it's very important for us to stay ready to execute on attractive corporate development opportunities. You know, our significant cash position, our undrawn revolvers, our strong balance sheet, our good cash flow, all, in our mind, position us very well.
While we think the stock is a great buy at today's price, and you could argue we should buy a lot more of our stock back, we think ultimately a better use of capital is to invest in other opportunities to earn a return that at the same time diversify the company's growth drivers for the future. As long as we continue to feel those opportunities out there and something we can execute on, I think we wanna maintain the flexibility financially to go after those from a strong base . Mike?
Yeah. Yeah, Gregg. Yes, I would say that probably two-thirds of the newer accounts that ordered in Q1 2018 were community-based, which indicates to me that we are getting traction in that. And that is consolidation treatment. But we feel very good about the significant upside that VYXEOS has in the indicated population. I think this outpatient consolidation is a great thing for patients and families, and you certainly avoid the hospitalization costs associated with inpatient treatment.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Irina Koffler with Mizuho. Your line is now open.
Hi. Thanks for taking the question. When I attended AAN a couple weeks ago and sat in on some of these sleep presentations, there was another drug called pitolisant that was supposedly being filed in the U.S. around the same time that JZP-110 is being filed and, or you know, was filed, and is also a wakefulness agent, and I believe the drug is approved in Europe. Could you talk about the competitive positioning of solriamfetol versus that product? Also, will its existence in Europe affect your potential pricing in Europe in any way? Thank you.
Yeah, Irina. Our NDA for solriamfetol was submitted last year, has been accepted for filing. We have a PDUFA date. At least to my knowledge, the drug you're talking about has not yet been submitted, or we don't know it's been submitted. In terms of, you know, relative positioning of the products, what we know is our data, and we know that solriamfetol's data on subjective and objective measures of its efficacy are very strong. They were strong in two different phase II trials, and in a number of phase III trials across multiple indications. They were consistent. Results were maintained over time, appeared quickly, for patients.
You know, we think we have a drug in solriamfetol that I think is, as Mike said in answer to a question earlier, you know, position it as, you know, a real potential benefit to patients who've been dissatisfied with existing therapies for excessive sleepiness in both narcolepsy and obstructive sleep apnea. In Europe, you know, obviously, as we do our pricing, reimbursement, access analytics and thinking about opportunities for sleep-related drugs, we'll look at availability and pricing of all agents, not just that one. That is built into our thinking.
Okay. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of David Buck with B. Riley FBR. Your line is now open.
Yes, thanks for taking the question. On Defitelio, can you talk about what markers we should be looking for from the sales force? You know, how long it might take, you know, what type of markers you're looking at for success in terms of growing that product and better diagnosing VOD? Can you also talk about maybe conceptually for Matt the sustainability of your 93% or so gross margin as you move into VYXEOS in Europe, solriamfetol in Europe potentially in 2019, 2020, and have a little bit of a shifting mix?
Finally, I guess on the pediatric review voucher, you know, was it more opportunistic in a question of the price being more right near term, you know, given that your purchase price was significantly lower than some of the other ones in recent years? Thanks.
Yeah. On Defitelio, you know, what we're seeing in Europe and in the US, so really globally for the product is, we think, you know, better recognition of VOD and better responsiveness to start treatment when physicians see progression, indicating that Defitelio would be an important treatment intervention. You know, we don't, unfortunately, on a day-to-day basis, have a lot of metrics that give us more information. We certainly know vials sold and to whom, but that doesn't necessarily translate in every case to knowing exactly what that usage is on a patient-by-patient basis.
Looking at ordering patterns of accounts, and again, this is in U.S. and in Europe, you know, whether we're looking at repeat orders or whether we're looking at average size of orders, whether we're looking at penetration in pediatric, which has been good, but adult, which has been growing. You know, we remain encouraged that we're seeing the right trends. I think in today's comments, the new news, if there is, probably falls into two categories. One is we've reconfigured our sales force in the U.S. to give a dedicated team toward adult transplant centers. That's a very new effort, so I don't think we have a lot of data from that. We were pleased to see some of our top talent internally want to take those roles and focus on that.
We think that's a good sign, and we think they're doing a great job. The other thing that's still relatively new is the introduction to the market of some new important treatments that have as one of their downsides, a higher incidence of VOD. As those agents are utilized more, we think it increases awareness of and watchfulness for VOD. We hope that will benefit many patients in the future.
Want me to take this?
Yeah.
Yeah. Just on the gross margin question, David, I you know would not worry about any you know near term you know diminution in the gross margin. I think it'll be you know relatively incremental you know for the foreseeable future. You know I'd expect we can maintain very good and attractive gross margins given the cost of sales for our all the products in our portfolio. The lowest of those is Erwinaze, which obviously is not one we're able to grow dramatically right at the moment.
As it relates to PRV dynamics, when you can, you know, enter markets where there are, you know, more sellers than buyers or, you know, if that is an appropriate thing to do or when you're able to buy it at a time when you don't need it immediately, you might be able to attract, you know, get better prices as a buyer. I think we're conscious of those dynamics. You know, again, I wouldn't say you can read much into that in terms of a long-term trend, either way. We're happy to, again, have been able to create the opportunity to use this against either an existing or future development program.
Thank you. The next question will go to Liav Abraham with Citi. Your line is now open.
Good afternoon. A follow-up question on JZP-258, and your lower sodium once-nightly version of XYREM. Just given the prioritization of JZP-507-258, I'd be curious on your thoughts regarding the timelines on a once-nightly low sodium version. Any updates, are there any updates you can provide about where this is in development, and to what extent is this a priority at this time? Thanks.
Yeah, Liav, no current updates on the status of the once nightly low sodium development program. It does continue. It is active. You know, the priority right now is getting the product that is nearer to market to market, which is JZP-258, which while not bioequivalent as XYREM, is very similar in terms of that PK profile, and therefore we have high confidence that what we'll see in terms of efficacy and safety ought to be consistent with our expectations for XYREM. Once nightly represents a change to that PK profile and thus a little more uncertainty in how that'll prove out in clinical trials. You know, let's first get JZP-258 to the market because we believe that satisfies achieving that lower sodium that we think will benefit patients quickly.
If we can also introduce the benefit of once nightly dosing, so much the better.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question goes to William Tanner with Cantor Fitzgerald. Your line is now open.
Thanks for taking the questions. Bruce, just back on the low sodium discussion. I think you said something about it remains to be determined if the higher sodium will be available, will still be available, and I'm wondering if that would suggest that a case could be made to pull the NDA for safety reasons. Then the follow-up would be, can you just remind us how a JZP-258 launch or I guess a JZP-507 launch impacts the settlements or doesn't impact the settlements? Thanks.
Yeah, Bill, you know, on the first one, I think too early to comment. You know, we need to finish our clinical trial. We need to look at the data from our clinical trial. We need to put a submission package together. We need to go through the regulatory process before it makes sense to talk about what you do with both products, since at the moment we only have one. The second part of the question?
Settlements.
On the impact on the settlements, you know, the settlements are very specific to XYREM, the existing product, meaning that, you know, we certainly don't give any rights to our later development programs, such as JZP-507 or JZP-258. By the same token, the market decline provisions that are typical to most of these types of settlements really just track sales of the XYREM product itself. You know, introduction of a new product that caused a decrease in the sales of XYREM could impact those parts of the settlement.
Okay, great. Thank you very much.
Thank you. The next question goes to Corey Davis with Seaport. Your line is now open.
Corey, are you there? Okay, operator, next question.
Next question will come from Dana Flanders with Goldman Sachs. Your line is now open.
Hi, this is Chris for Dana. Thanks for the questions. Can you maybe touch on how you think JZP-258 will be received in the market when the XYREM generics are available? Are you assuming it will be used broadly across all patients, even those without ongoing sodium-sensitive comorbidities? Or will you focus on patients at higher risk for volume overload and other sodium-based complications? Then any changes to OpEx spend given the suspension of JZP-507, excluding obviously the pushed out launch when JZP-258 is coming?
Chris, you know the question about the reception of JZP-258 when generics are available, of course, under our current timelines, our hope is that JZP-258 would be available before generics were available. Then the question, if JZP-258 is on the market is, you know, would patients switch from a product with 10% of the sodium of XYREM back to a product with 100%? Or put another way, a tenfold increase in sodium. Our view is that would be a sizable increase in sodium going to a level that at the 9 gram per night dose would be above the AHA's recommended maximum daily intake of sodium, in a population that's taking the medication chronically.
In the second part of your question, you know, you're specifically getting at does it matter to all patients? You know, certainly there are patients with increased cardiovascular risk where I think this would be particularly important. We know that in part because doctors contacted during earlier market research indicated that there are a fraction of their patients for whom they will not start them on XYREM. These are, you know, narcolepsy patients because of the fear of the high sodium load alone. For that, they would put patients on XYREM. We know there are patients for whom it already would make a difference. Now physicians think about it.
Again, if you're being put on a medication potentially in adolescence, early adulthood, and being told you're gonna take it for the rest of your life, you know, going on 1.6 grams of sodium per day in your medication alone, that's pre-dietary sodium, you know, is a lot to do to someone when there's a safer alternative available. On the spending, no, I wouldn't assume that, you know, suspension of the JZP-507 NDA submission would have a meaningful impact on spending. You know, we're redirecting those resources toward ensuring progress against all of our regulatory submissions, including being as ready for a rapid JZP-258 NDA submission as we can be.
Got it. Maybe just to clarify a bit. Is there any outcomes-based study you feel you need to do in order to guard against payers potentially putting pressure to prescribe the generic over JZP- 258 once it is on the market? Thanks.
I would say there is a lot of evidence already available about the impact of sodium intake on a variety of health outcomes in very large very long-term studies across large numbers of patients. That's not specific to our drug. It's not specific to this indication. I think physicians have a good sense developed through lots of evidence of the impact of excessive sodium intake. I think your question's a great one in terms of what people will look at to determine how important this is. You know, whether those are specifically trials we need to run, I think is a different question.
Great. Thanks for the clarification.
Operator, we'll take this next question, and then we'll take one more after that, okay?
Perfect. The next question will come from the line of John Boris with SunTrust. Your line is now open.
Hey, John, are you there?
John? Okay, operator, we'll move on to the last question.
Thank you. Our last question will come from the line of Annabel Samimy with Stifel. Your line is now open.
Hi. Thanks for taking my question. I get the prize, I guess. With VYXEOS, can you, I know that you just started marketing with NCCN listing, but maybe can you discuss the impact that that ability to market with that listing will help uptake? Do you have any good analogs to help us sort of quantify what that trend could be, going into the second, third and fourth quarter? Finally, on VYXEOS, can you talk about the uptake on- and off-label and give us some timing on the readout of other studies with VYXEOS that are ongoing right now by investigators? Thanks.
Mike, you wanna take
Sure.
-NCCN and on off label?
Sure. As I said, largely our use right now is very much within indication for labeled population. As you may have seen, the NCCN guideline also included reinduction f or patients who received 7+3 in the first induction post-remission for any patient following a previous intensive therapy, and relapse patients that were given VYXEOS in first induction and then progressed 12 months, that would be down the road, but also completing induction treatment. These are populations that are not in our labeled indication and would provide, I think payer support, for reimbursement and coverage of these populations. We're very pleased with this. As we said, we just began promoting this with the NCCN. They announce their guidelines, and then it takes a little while to get the materials.
Okay. Maybe on the additional studies that could be emerging, when could we see some data and when do we see, you know, potential uptake in those other areas?
Dr. Yang?
Well, Annabel, let me just jump in and say, you know, we haven't even published all the data from existing studies, so, you know, I think you'll see additional data coming out there. Most of our effort, having just received approval of the drug in the third quarter last year, has been to get additional studies up and running, and we talked about studies that are ISTs, studies that are cooperative group studies that are, maybe Jazz-sponsored, studies. You know, right now, the effort is aimed at getting a number of those studies up and running. We're still a little ways away from data coming out of any of those. Allen, do you want to-
Yeah. I would just say, you know, Celator was resource constrained, and so they didn't have a lot of studies. You know, there are some ISTs that they had initiated with some cooperative groups, including pediatric data as well. The challenge of course with that is that we don't control those studies, and so we're sort of beholden to when they complete those studies and put those data forward. You know, our strategy has not changed. You know, we intend to make VYXEOS the backbone of AML therapy. Around that, you know, I think some of the key scientific issues that we're gonna address are dosing and schedule in different populations, combination therapies along with targeted agents, of course, and then new populations.
New populations within AML, standard risk AML, unfit AML, and then adjacent malignancies as MDS, as we mentioned earlier. All of these are being addressed by the team. The team has been working very aggressively. I know you wanna hear more about that, but you know, as we just got the label at the end of last year, the team has been moving aggressively, and shortly we're gonna be sort of showcasing a series of Jazz-sponsored studies, cooperative group collaborations, and collaborations with external sort of KOLs to address those data needs.
Great. Thank you.
Thank you. Now I'd like to turn the call back to Miss Kathee Littrell for closing remarks.
Thanks, Sabrina, and thank you again for joining us today and all the questions. We will be participating in the upcoming Bank of America Merrill Lynch, UBS, Bernstein, and Goldman Sachs healthcare conferences this quarter. We will also host and webcast an investor event from SLEEP Meeting in Baltimore in June and hope to see many of you. This now ends our call.
Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for participating in today's conference. This does conclude your program. You may all disconnect. Everyone, have a great day.