Rhythm Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ:RYTM) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

Corinne Jenkins: Okay. And then maybe on Xinvento acquisition. Should we expect that asset to be developed in a distinct mechanism of action or are you looking to develop more of like a best in class drug against what are some of the known targets in that disease?

David Meeker: Yes, I think like I said, we have said in our press release that I commented, we’ll provide an in-depth — greater in-depth presentation of where that program is and what we’re going after. So we’re not going to reveal the target today. But I will say if you will here. The biology was incredibly compelling. And why was this a good opportunity for us and as well as things you start with — is there an unmet medical need and is the biology and approach to the problem, does it make sense and is the progress that they’ve made sufficient to give you confidence that you could have a reasonable probability of success here. So Xinvento checked all three of those boxes, we know it’s a competitive area and I think that speaks to the unmet medical need and we’ve been entering into this blindly, we entered in it with a full recognition of what else is out there and how this approach might compete and we feel really good about that.

So I apologize for leaving it there for the moment.

Corinne Jenkins: Okay. Thank you.

Operator: Please standby for our next question. Our next question comes from Dae Gon Ha with Stifel. Your line is now open.

Dae Gon Ha: Great. Good morning. Thanks for taking my questions and congrats on the progress. One question on the DBS launch, just going back to the sequential announcement, I believe, in the first six weeks, you have 50 prescriptions — prescriptions followed by 120 in third quarter and then 200 in fourth quarter. So can you maybe walk us back to that initial six weeks? That 50 within six weeks seems to be fairly robust there. What happened there and is there any chance that we could see another kind of picture like that emerge in 2023 at some point or should we expect kind of going back to Phil’s point, another 70 to 80 per quarter? And then a question on Xinvento. I realize a lot of details are under wraps at this point, but just looking at the board composition, it does seem fairly like it might be more ASO oriented. Am I on the right tractor or is it more small molecule or even injectable biologic? Any kind of insights that would be helpful? Thanks so much.

David Meeker: Yes. Got it. Jen, do you want to take €“

Jennifer Chien: Sure. So you were asking about the number of scripts in the first couple of weeks. So I think that’s defiantly because of some anticipated demand. So we’re waiting to get off the therapy. Also a reminder just in terms of we had patients already ready that were part of our clinical study that we were converting into commercial scripts. So that’s part of the explanation in terms of the number of scripts that we received quite early on. But moving forward, I think it’s always a bit difficult to project, but I will outline that we still have quite an opportunity just in terms of — as we move forward, the script that we’ve received that we are still working through the reimbursement process, getting those patients on to therapy is an area of focus.

We’re continuing to educate the physicians that do have the BBS patients, that’s around the need to treat the hyperphagia and the early onset with the targeted therapy. And the third pillar definitely is to find additional patients, which I have in the past outlined, but we have very targeted mechanisms at this point in time. This is how are we going about our efforts there.