Thank you for standing by. This is the conference operator. Welcome to the Zymeworks conference call and webcast to discuss the acquisition of Theravance Biopharma. As a reminder, all participants are in a listen-only mode, and the conference is being recorded. After the presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. I would like to turn the conference over to Shrinal Inamdar, Vice President of Investor Relations. Shrinal, please go ahead.
Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us. Today, we will discuss the closing of the Theravance Biopharma acquisition and what this transaction means for the next phase of Zymeworks. Scott Platshon, our Chief Business Officer, will begin with an overview of the transaction, including YUPELRI and the acquired R&D portfolio and how it advances our strategy at Zymeworks.
Kristin Stafford, our Chief Financial Officer, will then discuss the financing structure, financial outlook, and capital allocation framework. At the end, Ken Galbraith, our CEO and Chair, will open the call for questions. As usual, we will be making forward-looking statements during this call, including statements regarding the Theravance Biopharma acquisition, our financial outlook, the performance and growth of YUPELRI, potential development and commercialization opportunities, future business development, and capital allocation.
These statements are based upon our current expectations and various assumptions and are subject to risks and uncertainties, including those associated with companies in our industry and at our stage of development. For a discussion of these risks and uncertainties, we refer you to our latest SEC filings as found on our website and as filed with the SEC. With that, I will return this call over to Scott.
Thank you, Shrinal, and good morning to everyone joining us. We are thrilled to have closed our acquisition of Theravance. This transaction brings an important new medicine under the Zymeworks umbrella in YUPELRI. This only-in-class, once-daily nebulized LAMA delivers meaningful clinical benefit to COPD patients who struggle to use handheld inhalers and is supported by a world-class commercial partner, Viatris. This acquisition also serves as a strong demonstration of the types of economics we are well-suited to acquire at attractive prices for several reasons. First, Theravance maintains responsibility for hospital promotion, which introduces operational and structural complexities that render this transaction less attractive for traditional royalty buyers. Despite having a strong partner in Viatris who manages most of the complexity associated with commercial promotion, this component is off-strategy for a pure financial buyer.
Second, we were able to provide an offer to acquire 100% of the equity of Theravance, while traditional royalty buyers prefer asset acquisitions for structural reasons. Third, we were able to finance the acquisition via a $350 million non-recourse royalty-backed note with OMERS at an attractive cost of capital. This financing is secured solely by YUPELRI cash flows and demonstrates how our differentiated model allows us to collaborate with large financial institutions, leveraging their lower cost of capital rather than competing with them for assets.
Finally, YUPELRI is not the only source of value in this deal. The transaction also includes additional collaboration and royalty economics, an R&D portfolio, very significant Irish tax attributes, and an experienced commercial organization. Importantly, almost all of these other potential sources of value serve purely as upside and were not valued as contributing to returns.
Since the transaction was announced in late June, our conviction has strengthened that there are more de-risked trapped cash flows and assets that we are uniquely set up to access. The ability for Zymeworks to acquire whole organizations for access to R&D assets or cash flows makes us a differentiated acquirer with multiple avenues for value creation.
Turning to the financial profile of the transaction, our base case underwriting anticipates a mid-teen IRR over the long term, driven primarily by YUPELRI with a small contribution from VIBATIV, an important powerful antibiotic sold by Cumberland. As mentioned, the base case does not assign any value to a number of additional opportunities. These include the potential utilization of approximately $2.5 billion of Irish tax attributes, future value from the acquired R&D portfolio, and certain potential future milestones or other business development opportunities.
The profit share from Viatris adds to our recurring cash flow foundation alongside ZIIHERA, while also providing an opportunity to actively manage upside opportunity. The retained hospital organization is an important part of that opportunity. Hospital sales grew approximately 25% year-over-year in the second quarter of 2026, demonstrating continued momentum in the channel. We are thrilled to be welcoming a lean, skilled, and highly experienced commercial and medical team to Zymeworks.
The retained team has demonstrated strong execution and understands the market, customers, and product. We believe the hospital channel will continue to provide strong momentum to the brand over the coming years. As previously mentioned, Viatris is responsible for promoting in the community and managing most of the complexities associated with commercial promotion and reporting. As we evolve the organization, we are also investing in the experience needed to support a more diversified business.
With this in mind, we are adding new senior leaders from Theravance across technology, data science, and AI, as well as intellectual property. Stuart Knight will become Executive Vice President and Chief Information Officer of Zymeworks, where Stuart will guide the company's future technology strategy, including continued investment in the company's existing AI, data science, and machine learning capabilities. Stuart brings substantial experience in biotech and pharmaceutical companies operating in both the United States and Europe.
Stuart will also be joined by Jesse Fecker as Vice President of Intellectual Property. We plan to hire a seasoned pharmaceutical executive with experience building and leading commercial pharmaceutical organizations to lead the commercial operations of Theravance. We will continue to evaluate the combined organization and provide updates on any future changes. For now, these additions strengthen the infrastructure we need to execute the next phase of our strategy.
Beyond the commercial assets, Theravance Biopharma also adds an R&D portfolio to Zymeworks. This expands our existing pipeline of wholly owned and partnered programs and gives us additional opportunities to create value through development, partnering, and other strategic alternatives. I would like to reiterate, we do not assign any value to these programs in our base case IRR.
We will only allocate capital to programs that have a clear, attractive, risk-adjusted value creation potential. We will also evaluate partnering, licensing, or other alternatives when those opportunities make sense. As a reminder, R&D expenses in 2Q 2026 were 20% lower than in 2Q 2025, which is consistent with our planned reduction in R&D expenses. This approach allows us to preserve the upside associated with R&D while operating from a more diversified financial foundation. With that, I will hand over to Kristin to talk through the financial updates.
Thanks, Scott. As Scott mentioned earlier, another component of the transaction is approximately $2.5 billion of Irish tax attributes that we acquired. We have assigned no value to the utilization of these attributes in our base case IRR and expect to assign no value to the attributes of purchase accounting as well. It is important to note that the tax attributes exist because of the depth and breadth of the R&D in the business, as we have just reviewed.
We will evaluate potential opportunities to utilize these attributes in connection with future Irish revenues, IP structuring, and potential acquisitions or investments involving our Irish legal entities. Our existing Irish R&D operations provide an important foundation for that evaluation. The actual utilization, timing, and value of these attributes will depend on applicable tax laws, regulations, and the facts and circumstances of any future transactions.
Similar to the R&D portfolio, we view the tax attributes as additional optionality rather than an assumption underlying the transaction. On this slide, I wanted to return to the financing structure and remind everyone that a significant portion of the transaction was financed through a non-recourse note with OMERS Life Sciences, secured by the YUPELRI cash flows at a very attractive cost of capital in relation to the mid-teens IRR we expect the transaction to provide. The structure is designed so that the note is serviced by the underlying YUPELRI economics and is non-recourse to the broader Zymeworks business, subject to the terms of the financing arrangements. YUPELRI is currently generating approximately $60 million of annualized cash flows at current run rates, providing the durability and predictability that allows us to structure this financing.
During the note period, OMERS received 75% of the YUPELRI profit share cash flows to service interest and principal, with the residual economics retained by Zymeworks. Once the note is repaid, the remaining cash flows revert to Zymeworks. This financing structure allows us to access a high-quality commercial asset while preserving capital for other opportunities across our business.
The transaction is expected to be accounted for as a business combination, and the purchase price will be allocated to the fair value of the net assets acquired and primarily includes rights related to YUPELRI, with any remaining amount recorded as goodwill. YUPELRI is expected to represent the principal identifiable intangible asset and will be amortized over its estimated useful life, generally through the expected loss of exclusivity period.
We also expect to recognize a tax liability due to an uncertain tax position as part of the accounting for the business combination. Upon expiration of the applicable audit period in October 2026, the liability may be reversed, resulting in the recognition of a non-cash income tax benefit in the fourth quarter of 2026. When looking at the Viatris collaboration agreement, it's important to remember that Theravance does not record product sales.
Viatris records 100% of YUPELRI's net sales, while Theravance reports a single line item in its financials, which is called Viatris collaboration agreement revenue. This number is a net figure that includes Theravance's 35% share of profits and losses and adjustments for shared costs. To model the quarterly cash flow from YUPELRI, you must apply the 35/65 split across three distinct buckets. For net sales, you need to take 35% of the total U.S. net sales.
For Theravance commercial expenses, you need to add back 65% of the commercial costs that Theravance incurred since Viatris owes Theravance for its share of these costs. For Viatris commercial expenses, you need to subtract 35% of the commercial costs Viatris incurred since Theravance owes Viatris for its share. An illustrative example has been provided on the right-hand side of the slide with actual revenue and expense line items for the financial year 2025.
With the completion of the Theravance acquisition and the $250 million milestone payment triggered by the FDA approval of ZIIHERA in GEA on August 25th, 2026, the company has provided updated financial guidance utilizing relevant financial metrics that it believes provide a more suitable framework for evaluating operating performance of the business. The company expects total revenue for 2026 to be between $278 million and $292 million, and 2026 adjusted EBITDA to be between $114 million and $128 million, excluding the impact of any future transactions. At the current time, we won't provide any specific revenue guidance by source, specifically referring to milestone revenue or ZIIHERA royalties from Jazz and BeOne. Recently, Jazz has updated peak sales guidance for ZIIHERA to be between $3 billion and $5 billion.
As an illustrative example, annual royalties due to Zymeworks would be between $485 million and $885 million based on those peak sales estimates, using the 20% royalty rate for sales above the $2 billion threshold, as previously disclosed. Sales of ZIIHERA by BeOne in their Asia Pacific territory would be incremental to these sales estimates from Jazz, as would the resulting royalties to Zymeworks. Adjusted EBITDA is a non-GAAP financial measure, and a reconciliation between GAAP reported and non-GAAP financial information presented for historical periods can be found in the appendix at the end of this presentation. Our guidance today reflects our current expectations for the acquired business and the broader Zymeworks operating profile. As with all forward-looking guidance, actual results may differ based on a number of factors, including commercial performance, collaboration, revenue, operating expenses, and other risks described in our public filings.
Going forward, we believe total revenue and adjusted EBITDA provide a more meaningful framework for evaluating Zymeworks as we transition to a business supported by multiple sources of revenue and operating cash flow. We will provide updates on our 2026 financial guidance as needed with respect to future events and transactions, and expect to provide initial guidance for 2027 in conjunction with the release of our annual financial results for 2026, expected in the first quarter of 2027. One of the most important changes following the Theravance acquisition, as well as ZIIHERA's approval in GEA, is the increased role of cash flow in our capital allocation framework. As we generate cash from the commercial and royalty portfolio, we have multiple avenues for deploying that capital. We can continue to invest in our wholly-owned R&D programs.
We can advance the R&D programs acquired through Theravance internally or through out licenses or spin-outs. We can acquire additional R&D programs, royalty streams, or commercial assets individually or in multi-component acquisitions, and we can repurchase shares when we believe that represents an attractive use of capital, as we have done since August of 2024. We will evaluate these opportunities based on expected risk-adjusted returns, strategic fit, and our broader financial position. The objective is not to prioritize one use of capital permanently, but to allocate capital toward the opportunities we believe can create the greatest long-term value. I'd like to highlight what we believe this means for Zymeworks. Historically, the company was primarily driven by R&D catalysts and individual development events. Following the Theravance acquisition, we are beginning to build a more diversified business. We now have growing royalty revenues, commercial cash flows, and multiple sources of operating revenue.
At the same time, we retain our wholly-owned R&D programs, our partnered pipeline, and the ability to pursue additional acquisitions and partnerships. This creates a different financial foundation for Zymeworks. Recurring cash flows provide greater visibility, commercial growth can provide operating leverage, our R&D portfolio provides additional opportunities for future value creation, and disciplined capital allocation allows us to connect these pieces and continue investing in the opportunities we believe offer the most risk-adjusted returns. We believe the Theravance acquisition is an important first step in demonstrating that model at scale, and importantly, this transaction does not change what Zymeworks was fundamentally built to do. It gives us a stronger financial foundation from which to do it.
The acquisition of Theravance Biopharma is the first tangible validation of the strategy we outlined less than a year ago and we believe it demonstrates something genuinely new in how life sciences capital can be deployed. There are three things we want investors to take away from today. The first is about access. Zymeworks can acquire operating companies where valuable cash flows such as royalty streams, profit participation, and commercial economics are embedded within a broader business structure that traditional royalty investors are not typically structured to acquire. Because we can acquire the whole company, we evaluate those cash flows alongside commercial assets, including R&D pipelines that we have the potential to develop, tax attributes that we may be built to leverage, and other sources of value that would otherwise remain embedded within the operating business, and in some cases, at no incremental cost.
What this means in practice is that Zymeworks creates a new origination channel. Companies with embedded royalties have a path to monetize those assets, and royalty partners have access to high-quality opportunities they may not otherwise be able to source or structure. In acquiring the commercial royalty economics, Zymeworks also gains access to R&D pipelines and platforms that are embedded within these businesses, which we can develop, partner, or spin out. We believe that is a meaningful and durable competitive position. The second is about structure. We have demonstrated that durable contracted cash flows can directly support acquisition financing, including non-recourse structures that align the financing instrument with the underlying asset economics. This allows Zymeworks to pursue acquisitions of meaningful scale while aligning the financing with the cash flows of the acquired business and preserving capital for other uses.
During 2026, we have accessed approximately $600 million of non-dilutive financing through non-recourse notes at an attractive cost of capital, with proceeds supporting both the Theravance acquisition and continued share repurchases. This financing strategy, together with our repurchase program, reflects our focus on minimizing equity dilution for shareholders. Our last public equity offering was in January 2022, and we currently have no plans for another equity issuance. The third is about value creation, but beyond the initial cash flow. In addition to the commercial and royalty streams, Zymeworks retains the ability to generate value through active development, profit-share arrangements, licensing and potential future spin-outs. That distinguishes our model for traditional royalty organizations, where returns are largely defined at the point of acquisition. For us, the acquisition is the starting point.
Recurring cash flows provide a foundation from which we can fund R&D, pursue additional acquisitions and partnerships, or return capital to shareholders based on where we see the best risk-adjusted returns at any given time. We are pleased with how this transaction has come together, and we believe it gives investors a clear picture of what Zymeworks is building and how we intend to keep building it. This is not the end of the story for the year. We have additional catalysts ahead, including the continued U.S. commercial launch for zanidatamab in GEA by our partners. Upcoming data presentations from our partners J&J and Jazz, as well as important updates from our own pipeline, including the phase I optimization data for ZW191 that we expect to present at ESMO in Madrid on October 24th. We look forward to sharing those developments with investors over the coming months.
With that, I will ask Ken to join us as we open the line for questions.
Thank you, Kristin and Scott. Operator, we're ready to open the question and answer period now.
Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. If you have a question or a comment at this time, please press star one one on your telephone. If your question has been answered and you wish to remove yourself from the queue, please press star one one again. We'll pause for a moment while we compile our Q&A roster. Our first question comes from Yigal Nochomovitz with Citigroup. Your line is open.
Hi, this is Joohwan Kim on for Yigal. Thanks for taking our question and congrats on the progress. One quick question from us. With YUPELRI hospital sales growing 25% year-over-year, and as you look towards third quarter, can you help us understand whether acceleration is driven primarily by existing accounts or expansion into new hospitals or improved conversions in the community setting? Thanks.
Okay, thanks for the question. I'll ask Scott to provide a general answer. Obviously, we won't be able to send any specific console. The third quarter is reported by us in November, but I'll see if Scott has any general comments to address your question.
Yeah, thanks for your great question. It is a very attractive part of this franchise. We are really excited to welcome a very lean and skilled team that is responsible for the remarkable performance in the hospital to date. I am going to make just a few high-level comments about the hospital channel broadly. The first point is that the hospital sales cycle is very different than the community.
It is a very skilled and slightly longer return on investment. Getting new hospitals online and getting onto formularies can often take six months to multiple years. There is still a lot of opportunity for additional accounts to come online. There is also opportunity for growth in existing channels. It is a little bit to your question. The answer is both. We are really excited to have a great team to help us drive that channel that remains pretty under-penetrated at this point.
Great. Thanks very much.
Thank you.
One moment before our next question. Our next question comes from Charles Zhu with LifeSci Capital. Your line is open.
Hi, this is Zhu on for Charles. Thanks for taking our questions and congrats on progress. Following up on hospital channels, can you share your plans to maximize hospital channel sales, including how many of Theravance's account managers and medical liaisons you retained, whether you plan to add head count, and what leading indicators you will use to measure progress? Thanks.
Okay, thanks for the question. I will see what else Scott wants to add to that. Some of the detail of the question we will not get into, but I will see if Scott has something to add generally to your question beyond what we answered in the last one.
Yeah. Thanks for the question. I think we are going to shy away from any sort of specifics. At a high level, there is a huge opportunity in the hospital. COPD, 15 million- 16 million patients in the U.S., 2 million + really strong candidates for YUPELRI. There is a really strong rationale for why YUPELRI should play such a great role in the hospital. I can give you just sort of a few of those anecdotes. Patients with COPD exacerbation find themselves hospitalized. A therapy like YUPELRI makes a lot of sense, supports tidal breathing. It is really the right way to deliver a medication. It being the only in-class long-acting has a real pharmacoeconomic benefit. We have respiratory therapists going in three , four, five times a day deliver short-acting nebulizers that are often used inappropriately or take a lot of time. There is an enormous opportunity.
I think we will shy away from giving sort of any specific trends we are looking at. At a high level, I will say about the team, this is an exceptionally talented team, an average 10-year, well above industry norms. We think that there is several years ahead of continued hospital, very meaningful hospital growth for the brand.
Thank you. One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Gregory Renza with Truist Securities. Your line is open.
Great. Thanks. Good morning, Ken, Scott, and Kristin. Congrats on the deal close. Thanks for taking my question. Guys, just with respect to some of the R&D assets that you've discussed about potentially looking externally, namely the pan-RAS ADC portfolio as well as ZW191. Just provide some updates of how that's either going to be accelerated or how you're evolving the framework with which you want to take that forward with externalization. Thanks so much.
Yeah, thanks for the question, Gregor. I'll take that question on directly. I think as we talked about early in the year, we did talk about the fact that we had a really rich and diversified wholly-owned R&D portfolio. Since then, we've made new disclosures around the pan-RAS ADC, which wasn't even public at that time. I think it's obvious that we have a very productive R&D group working in multiple themes in both ADCs and multi-spec antibodies, that we would like to find ways to bring in partnerships, collaborations, external capital, so we can move as much of that forward as possible where it's justified by continuing data, but without relying just on our P&L to be able to do that, because I think we have our own financial metrics in mind.
We're trying to find ways that partners can have resources and dedicated teams where maybe a spin-off entity that's dedicated to a particular portfolio, as we talked about with the pan-RAS ADC portfolio, might again have dedicated resources, dedicated focus, and we can move as much of the portfolio as is justified forward. In the same way, we've been working all through this year to understand what collaborations make sense for us, which parts of the portfolio versus which parts we'd like to keep wholly owned to ourselves and move forward with our own capital. I think as we mentioned, we're not finished this year with potential catalysts in our operating plans for the year. I think as we can complete such transactions, we'll announce them.
I think as we move along with some partnership collaborations and spin-offs, get a better sense of how that shapes the R&D portfolio. We are certainly not running out of substrate of things that are really interesting we would like to pursue. We just have internal limitations on capital, very high standards for things to move forward. I can certainly see how a few key partnerships and collaborations, a spin-off entity would help us exploit the totality of the R&D portfolio.
By retaining royalties and milestone interest, equity interest in the case of spin-off, we can find a way to continue to share in the success of those future portfolio in the same way we will or expect to with zanidatamab and eventually pasritamig. You will just have to wait for those transactions. We are making good progress, and I think we are excited about some of the options that are available to us to move some of those programs forward, but not with just our own P&L.
Thank you. One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Brian Cheng with JP Morgan. Your line is open.
Hi, this is Sarah on for Brian. Thanks for taking our questions. You continue to emphasize that $2.5 billion of Irish tax attributes, but they are still excluded from the base case IRR and purchasing accounting. As we sit here today, what do you view as the most realistic pathway to using them? Is it the existing activities that you have, future acquisitions or some form of IP structuring?
Yeah, good question. I will let Kristin come on and answer that question with whatever guidance you would like to provide, Kristin.
Yep, sure. We see that this $2.5 billion of attributes really depends on the nature of the attributes and the amount and the timing of the future taxable income and tax rules, as we mentioned. So we are working through the appropriate ways to incorporate them into our broader structure, but we do see potential paths to use them, as we mentioned, kind of more broadly over the presentation.
Thank you.
No, thanks for the question. Just to confirm, those are not included in our base case mid-teens IRR. Any ability to utilize those would be upside for us in the investment that we have made in the Theravance acquisition.
One moment before our next question. Our next question comes from Yaron Werber with TD Cowen. Your line is open.
Hi, this is Dana on for Yaron. Congrats on all the progress and thanks for taking our questions. You highlighted a 25% year-over-year growth in YUPELRI hospital sales in Q2 and continued margin expansion. Is this similar to what we should expect for the product's revenue trajectory for the next three to five years? Long-term, how are you thinking about YUPELRI's peak sales opportunity in COPD? Thanks so much.
Thanks for the question. I'll see what Scott wants to add to that question.
Great question. We're not going to be providing any product-level specific guidance today. As previously highlighted, the hospital channel is really important for a couple of reasons. You highlighted the 25% growth year-over-year in the second quarter. We do see opportunity. The hospital channel should continue to drive momentum over the coming years and contribute to the brand. I think I will just take this opportunity to highlight the importance of the hospital channel beyond just the exact figures that are provided year-over-year. YUPELRI is really an amazing medicine for patients in the hospital recovering from an exacerbation, partly because of the value it delivers to them.
But the other really important thing to remember about the hospital sales force that we're really thrilled to welcome to Zymeworks is as patients leave the hospital and transition back into the community, there's a lot of incentive both from the hospitals and payers, and for the benefit of the patient care to keep them on an amazing medicine like YUPELRI. And so it does serve as an important sort of funnel into the outpatient community setting where Viatris is responsible.
I think we'll shy away from any sort of specific guidance around the hospital channel other than to say the hospital channel itself is an area we expect continued growth, and it has continued impact as patients transition back out into the community.
That's helpful. Thanks so much.
One moment for our next question.
Our next question comes from Stephen Willey with Stifel. Your line is open.
Yeah, good morning. Thanks for taking the questions and providing all the color here. I guess it looks like YUPELRI volume growth is flat on the community setting when you back out pricing, and I know that's Viatris' detail, but do you have any estimate, I know Scott just talked about this, of the percentage of community sales that actually originate with a hospital-based script? And I guess how much more runway do you see in the community setting if you're able to grow the hospital-based component and potentially increase the conversion rate? Thanks.
Yeah. Thanks, Steve. Good question. Scott?
Yeah, great question. We see continued opportunity for growth from a volume perspective in both channels. The latest estimates are that about 12%-13% of volume comes from the hospital channel in terms of volume. In terms of origination, that's a very hard data set to nail down with that level of precision. We have a lot of ideas about where that figure stands, and really are excited to welcome the Theravance team on board and see how we can continue to drive that given the robust growth in the hospital that should be continuing to trickle down into the community. But it's a very hard data set to give an exact figure on beyond that sort of 12%, 13% split by current volume in each channel.
All right. Thank you.
Thanks, Steve.
One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Reni Benjamin with Citizens. Your line is open.
Hey, good morning, guys. Thanks for taking the questions and congrats on closing the deal. I guess two from us. What are your peak sales expectations for YUPELRI and what is the potential timing of that? Are there any potential indications which could further expand this TAM? Just one for the R&D portfolio. Could you maybe give us a sense, it's an extensive portfolio, I'm sure you've had a chance to look at it, and I understand the commentary you made during the call, but which assets do you think could drive value over the next 12 - 24 months for you?
Yeah. Thanks, Reni. Let me take your first question, then I'll give the next one to Scott. I think on the peak sales for YUPELRI, I think we haven't given any peak sales guidance on YUPELRI, and Viatris hasn't either. So we would only usually talk about that if our commercial partner was in a position to do that. We've obviously talked about peak sales for zanidatamab being between $3 billion and $5 billion eventually, and that's because that's Jazz's guidance, and we've simply reflected against that guidance to what our share of that would be from a royalty perspective. So that's why we talked about that. But we've not given any peak sales guidance for YUPELRI and would not do so unless our commercial partner, Viatris, decided that that was something they'd like to do. Maybe you want to answer the second question on R&D portfolio stuff.
Yeah, absolutely. Theravance is a historic company in our industry, coming up on 30 years since its founding and really a robust and rich history of successful drug development, and a very broad autoimmune and inflammatory portfolio that we'll take over. We're not in a position today to point you towards any one asset. But one of the advantages of this model of having sort of an asset and royalty aggregation strategy alongside a robust R&D team is we feel we're very uniquely set up to look through that portfolio and maximize value. Whether that's through spin-outs or out-licensing or very targeted capital investments on our own that we'd come back and explain in detail, remains to be seen. But it's something that we feel could provide a very meaningful upside. Again, just to remind and reiterate, we allocated zero value in that mid-teens IRR to that portfolio.
I think now that the closing is behind us, there'll be an opportunity for us to dig through that portfolio in depth and come up with the right plan and hopefully come back in short order to the market with a little bit more information.
And sorry, just to add, Reni, before we finish that. We are hoping to schedule our next R&D Day in Q1 of next year. I think our last one was December 2024, and we like to do one every two years or so. So, once that's scheduled in Q1 2027, by that time, we'll probably be in a position after some evaluation to talk a little bit more about any R&D investment or potential out-licensing efforts around the acquired Theravance R&D portfolio. So maybe Q1 next year is a good timeframe for us to be able to answer that question with some real plans and as a part of our presentation then.
Got it. Thanks very much for the additional color and congrats.
Yeah. Thank you.
One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Mayank Mamtani with B. Riley Securities. Your line is open.
Yes. Good morning, team. Thanks for taking our questions and appreciate the level of detail. I know you're not breaking out guidance components. It doesn't seem there's a whole lot of the ZIIHERA royalties included if we consider the seasonality part in the YUPELRI, 4Q for them, generally being the strongest both from volume and also stocking dynamics. I was just wondering if you could give us any color and also how the hospital investment aspects could change in your hand. Also was wondering if there's any progress to report on the ampreloxetine regulatory and partnering process standpoint. I think you had that on your slide.
Then just lastly, the third part to my question was, how do you think about the $100 million TRELEGY milestone in context of when you talk about special dividends versus buyback, and managing this cash flow building, but also maintaining dry powder for future transactions?
Yeah, thanks for the multiple part one question. You're always good at that. I'll take the first one and then I'll pass the other three to Scott to comment. But I think, we thought very thoughtfully about the type of financial guidance we could start providing and the operating metrics that would be useful. In the end, we settled on total revenues and adjusted EBITDA as things that would be worthwhile to start guiding on. It's the first time we've given this type of financial guidance to replace the normal activity-based guidance or cash runway guidance. We decided to give some guidance for 2026 just because we thought it'd be helpful to start with. We're obviously trying to be a little conservative in making sure that we only guide on metrics that we have some good predictability or transparency around to share publicly and that are meaningful.
And obviously trying to be conservative with providing a range of guidance that targets where the actual performance may end up. So you might think our guidance for Q4 is a little bit conservative, but hopefully over time, as we gain a little bit more confidence and predictability, we'll be able to be maybe a little less conservative in the ranges that we provide. So I think I wouldn't read too much into that other than we're trying to be conservative in the way that we think about it, starting this process of providing meaningful financial guidance on a regular basis to help folks guide their evaluation of the company. That's all I would read into it, and I'll let Scott answer the other three parts of your one question.
Sure. Thanks for your question. I will do my best to hit all three of the different parts. I think your first question was a bit about what changes you might expect to see around the hospital promotion. I think it is important to remember that we feel that Theravance's hospital team has done an exceptionally good job. This product launched in 2018, 2019. Still finding 25% year-over-year driving formulary uptake is really quite impressive. Of course, we always aim to see if we can find ways to improve both the hospital channel itself and in that transition to the community setting as patients leave the hospital. The drug is really under-penetrated if you look broadly.
Again, I mentioned earlier, 15 million - 16 million U.S. COPD patients, 2 million + really well suited for a nebulized therapy like YUPELRI, where patients have, for one reason or another, issues with using a handheld. And we are very much in the single digits penetrated into that. Both the community and the hospital have room to grow, and we will see how we can drive some additional growth there. You asked about the TRELEGY milestone, I believe. That, just to remind folks, would be triggered based upon 2026 sales from TRELEGY, and we believe that is a very high confidence milestone that we will look forward to receiving, assuming the sales track from our partners in Royalty Pharma. In terms of allocation, it will be similar to the framework.
That capital will be allocated to the highest return, and we certainly do not pre-specify if that is going to go towards an R&D, towards additional M&A, or towards returning capital to shareholders. And nothing really to say at this point on the ampreloxetine. We have a 20% share if that ultimately does find a home, but I think we will leave it at that for now.
Thank you so much. You covered it all. Appreciate it, guys.
Thanks for the questions.
Thanks.
One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Jonathan Miller with Evercore ISI. Your line is open.
Hi, guys. Thanks so much for taking the question, and congrats on getting this deal closed and really showing us what you mean when you were talking about transitioning the business model at the end of last year. Really great to see it. Just one multi-part one for me. You've said that YUPELRI is a starting point here, and I want to come back to that. But it seems like your expectations for YUPELRI, you're very excited about it, you're excited about the hospital potential, but it seems like your expectations here are on the high end of what consensus was estimating before the acquisition. I'd love to get a sense for where you think the market has been wrong on the product and about the prospects, especially in hospital. But as excited as you are, what were people not appreciating about this potential ramp here?
Thinking beyond YUPELRI, as you say, it's a starting point. We talked a little bit about no explicit value being given for R&D assets or the Irish tax asset. You talked a little bit about when we could expect that to change for R&D, but what about all the other portions of this deal that you think are potentially valuable but are not getting explicit valuation in your deal math, the Irish tax assets, et cetera, when could we start to see the impact from those things be a little bit more explicit in your go-forward valuation?
Great. Thanks for the multiple questions. I will let Scott answer both of those.
Yeah. Great question, Jon. Good to have you back on asking questions again as well. YUPELRI is really in an interesting and privileged position. COPD being an enormous market, I think there can occasionally be sometimes a bit of dogma around handhelds versus a nebulized therapy like YUPELRI. But it is really an amazingly important medicine for patients that I think has, through its both safety and efficacy, stood the test of time. There is an amazing wave of innovation happening in the COPD space around some novel biologics and great to see Merck recognize the amazing value of a nebulized product in ensifentrine with their own acquisition. I think a little bit versus consensus has been the dogma changing around the importance of nebulized therapy for that reasonably sized population within COPD that struggles with their handheld.
I would also say, elaborating on my privileged position that YUPELRI has in the market is it is really only in class. As we see more interesting biologics come on, this is a foundational therapy that is early in the treatment paradigm. We see additional innovation, additional medicines coming into COPD as only benefiting YUPELRI. The last thing I would say is that the hospital sales cycle in particular can be long. It is a very, very different type of selling than you will see particularly in the community. The IP being cleared well into the 2030s, and having that clarity to invest in some of the channels that maybe take a little bit longer time to turn on gives us confidence in the continued growth for the years ahead. Jon, would you just repeat your second question? Sorry about that.
Just on the stuff that was not explicitly valued as part of the deal, you mentioned a bunch of other pieces of Theravance that you thought were exciting, but you were not giving explicit monetary value. When does that change? When can you start talking about your view on explicit value?
Yeah, give us a bit of time. We have some preliminary ideas, but I think, as Ken mentioned, an R&D Day where we can talk a little bit more about this, sort of in the early part of next year might be a good venue for us to come back and talk a little bit more about that. Again, just to reiterate, no value to those. Those would only be sort of potential upside if we are able to find interesting opportunities for those.
Great. Thanks so much.
Sorry, Jon. Jon, just to add to your comment about what the market was missing about YUPELRI. I think that the Viatris deal was pretty interesting structure that Theravance had with a 35% profit share and the ability to co-promote in the hospital space in the U.S. That was interesting. It was very interesting to us. I think YUPELRI has a lot more growth in it than maybe people realize. I think that is just because it was kind of stuck under a pretty extensive R&D portfolio that unfortunately for Theravance had some clinical setbacks over a number of years, which I think was the incentive to think about maybe a sale of the company. I think it just kind of got lost under those R&D efforts, R&D portfolio.
For us, those are the types of things where maybe we can make a multi-component acquisition without having to pay fair value for every component which is in that. I think justifying the transaction and our purchase price based on mid-teens IRR that is really driven by very modest growth for YUPELRI just gives us some confidence that we paid the right price, we can generate those returns, and there is upside, which could be from optional additional investments for us, or there just might be upside without any additional capital investment for us.
I think those are the types of things that we look for is multi-components in a biotech company that might not be all fairly valued because there is someone who's missing the point on one of those key aspects, and we can acquire at the right price, sort it through, and hopefully drive an IRR that's really well beyond the mid-teens IRR we're using as the base case to justify the transaction.
Awesome. Thanks so much, Ken. Makes sense.
Thank you for your questions. Appreciate it.
Again, ladies and gentlemen, if you have a question or a comment at this time, please press star one one on your telephone. One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Nicole Berritto with Wolfe Research. Your line is open.
Hi, this is Nicole on for Kalpit. Thank you so much for taking our question. Just wanted to ask, now that the transaction's closed, would you be able to give us any color on when the OMERS note may be repaid and Zymeworks' steps from that 25% to 100% of the YUPELRI cash flow? Are you expecting this to happen before maturity in 2030? Can you give us any color on that? Thank you.
Thank you for the question, Nicole. I'll ask Kristin if she can answer that question. If you were able to hear it, Kristin, can you answer that?
I did hear the question, I think. We are not giving specific guidance on when we expect that note to be paid down. I think, Nicole, if you're looking at your own models, you can model the pay down of the interest of principal. I think you can probably reflect that as well. I think you understand that it's 75% paid towards interest and principal, and then it would revert to us. I think what we explained is probably all that we can share as far as expected pay down dates. Thank you.
I am not showing any further questions at this time. I turn the call back over to Ken for any further remarks.
No, that is great. Thank you, operator. Thank you for attending the conference call and the questions. I hope you found the additional detail on the Theravance acquisition, the rationale for it, what we see going forward is helpful. Hopefully the financial guidance that we started providing today on total revenues and adjusted EBITDA for 2026 is useful for you to have as well. As you said at the beginning of the call, we have a number of other catalyst and objectives inside the company for the remainder of 2026. I do not think we are done with the things we would like to accomplish inside Zymeworks. Hopefully I just advise all of you, please stay tuned, and we look forward to reporting additional progress as we move ahead for the remainder of 2026. Thank you very much.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, this does conclude today's presentation. We thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect and have a wonderful day.