IMV Inc. (NASDAQ:IMV) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

Jeremy Graff: Yes. I think, Andrew, you touched a bit on it earlier. The inclusion criteria for the trial come with an expectation of a life expectancy for patients of 90 days or more. It’s hard in this really refractory patient population with patients who are actually passing away during our screening protocols to really anticipate if those patients can make it out that form. So, we have some patients very desperately ill who make it into the trial and then very shortly thereafter progress very quickly. And those are the kinds of patients we are talking about. Now, as we continue to enroll and fulfill enrollment, I think Brandon asked about as well, the evaluable patient population. So, we will probably over-enroll a bit so that we can account for these types of patients as we learn more and more about this particularly refractory patient population.

Andrew Hall: And then to your first question, Brandon, about what the feedback has been from the data? Everyone is very encouraged about the data, but they see that it is €“ it’s an early signal. I think what people are most curious about, these patients are really refractory. The annotation that they have passed through so many therapies and a cancer vaccine, and you know this as well as that often takes a while to get going. You need to sort of educate and instruct an immune response, which can take time. The fact that we are seeing patients who are so refractory respond to a therapeutic modality like this gives us really good confidence. And particularly in a space where in the early disease setting where you would expect to see a greater therapeutic effect, we are starting now to see with Merck, Moderna and others putting really good data into market.

We are seeing this effect in a really refractory patient. And that’s got a bunch of people scratching their heads as to what’s IMV doing that’s a bit different. Jeremy, probably worth you adding a little color to that perspective.

Jeremy Graff: Yes. I think it is an important piece. So, when we think about treating advanced disease, we are of course treating active disease. What you just mentioned in reference where the really exciting data for the RNA vaccines in a prophylactic or a pseudo-prophylactic setting in a patient setting where the patient does not have active disease and you are defeating its recurrence. In our case and in most of the cases for prior cancer vaccine efforts, we have tried to treat advanced cancer patients, and that’s much tougher. Those established cancer lesions are immunosuppressive in and of themselves. In other words, they beat back on any immunotech, you try to inspire. It’s a much higher hurdle to shrink existing disease than it is to prevent recurrence of disease.

And so I think when we reflect on our data, when we continuously see shrinkage of advanced disease, not just in one disease setting, not just diffuse large B-cell lymphoma, but also metastatic bladder, also advanced metastatic ovarian cancer, gives great confidence that the way our drug works, the way it consistently and continuously feeds immune instruction into the immune system. The way it enables priming of anticancer T-cells, wave after wave across time helps us to imagine how it is that we can be successful in shrinking preexisting advanced lesions when others have not been successful in that space.

Andrew Hall: And Brandon, just to sort of get to the center of the question, we are getting very positive feedback on the data from strategics from academics, from people that are close to the field. The challenge is, and everyone recognizes this, us included, it’s early. This is not the full data set and everyone is very anxious about seeing the full data set. We are obviously getting pretty close to that. So, everyone at IMV is excited.

Brandon Folkes: Great. Thank you very much. Appreciate all the color. Yes. And congrats on the progress, I mean it looks good.

Andrew Hall: Thanks Brandon.