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Latest 10-Q filed 10/31/2025 · Compared against 7/31/2025
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Item 1A. Risk Factors
Our business is subject to risks, uncertainties, and events that, if they occur, could adversely affect our financial condition and results of operations and the trading price of our securities. Except as set forth below, there have been no material changes from the risk factors previously described in Part I, Item 1A. Risk Factors of the Annual Report.
Risks Related to Our Financial Condition and Capital Requirements
There is substantial doubt about our ability to continue as a going concern.
We have incurred recurring operating losses and negative cash flows from operating activities since inception and expect to continue incurring operating losses and negative cash flows in the future. In connection with the preparation of our Quarterly Report, our management concluded that there is substantial doubt as to whether we can continue as a going concern for the twelve months following the issuance of the Quarterly Report. Our ability to continue as a going concern is dependent upon raising capital to maintain current operations and continue research and development efforts. We plan to raise additional capital to fund our operations through public or private equity offerings, debt financings, and/or potential collaborations and license arrangements or other sources. There is no assurance, however, that any additional financing or any revenue-generating collaboration will be available when needed or that we will be able to obtain financing or enter into a collaboration on terms acceptable to us.
These factors raise substantial doubt about our ability to continue as a going concern. Substantial doubt about our ability to continue as a going concern may materially and adversely affect the price per share of our Common Stock, and it may be more difficult for us to obtain financing. If existing or potential collaborators decline to do business with us or potential investors decline to participate in any future financings due to such concerns, our ability to increase our cash position may be limited. The perception that we may not be able to continue as a going concern may cause others to choose not to deal with us due to concerns about our ability to meet our contractual obligations. We have prepared our condensed consolidated financial statements on a going concern basis, which contemplates the realization of assets and the satisfaction of liabilities and commitments in the normal course of business. Our financial statements do not include any adjustments that might be necessary if we are unable to continue as a going concern. During the nine months ended September 30, 2025, we have implemented measures to reduce operating expenses including delaying certain research and development project spend while prioritizing near term pipeline projects, limiting finance, legal and administrative costs, and pursuing options to limit spend on office space. If we are unable to continue as a going concern, we will be forced to further delay, reduce, or discontinue our research and development programs or consider other various strategic alternatives and you could lose all or part of your investment in us.
Risks Related to Manufacturing
Manufacturing cell therapy products is complex and subject to both human and systemic risks. Our third-party manufacturers or we may encounter difficulties in production and sourcing and may be subject to variations and supply constraints of critical components. If we or any of our third-party manufacturers encounter such difficulties, our ability to supply our product candidates for clinical trials or our products for patients, if approved, could be delayed or prevented.
The manufacture of biologic cell therapy product candidates, and products, if approved, is complex and requires significant expertise and capital investment, including developing advanced manufacturing techniques and process controls. Manufacturers of biologic products often encounter difficulties in production and sourcing, particularly in scaling up or out, validating the production process, and assuring high reliability of the manufacturing processes (including the absence of contamination), in light of variations and supply constraints of critical components. These problems include logistics and shipping, difficulties with production costs and yields, quality control, including consistency, stability, purity, and efficacy of the product, product testing, operator error, and availability of qualified personnel, as well as compliance with strictly enforced federal, state, and foreign regulations. For example, timelines for our planned twelve-week Phase 1/2 clinical trial utilizing CYWC628 for treatment of diabetic foot ulcers in Australia have been extended as we work with our CDMO to resolve process issues with the manufacturing training runs and increase the number of test manufacturingaseptic process simulation runs needed to confirm no sterility issueof the manufacturing process before we begin the manufacture of CYWC628 for the clinical trial. Furthermore, if contaminants are discovered in our supply of our product candidates or in the manufacturing facilities, such manufacturing facilities may need to be closed for an extended period of time to investigate and remedy the contamination. We cannot assure you that any stability, purity, and efficacy failures, deficiencies, or other issues relating to manufacturing our product candidates will not occur in the future.
Additionally, our product candidates are derived from cells collected from humans. Such cells may vary in type and quality as the donors may vary in age, medical history, and many other factors. We have strict specifications for donor cell material and our product candidates. The donor cell material variability may exceed our manufacturing process capability or deviate from the specified ranges and result in failure in the production of the cell therapy product, lower quality batches, or even require adjustments to the specifications approved by authorities. The donor cell material may also be variable in factors that we currently may not be able to detect with the analytical methods used or may not know how to measure. We may also discover failures with the material after production. As a result, we may not be able to deliver the quality and consistency of our cell therapy products that we need or may need to re-collect cell material which can increase costs and/or cause delay, result in recalls, adversely impact patient outcomes and otherwise harm our clinical trials, reputation, business, and prospects.
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We may fail to manage the logistics of collecting and shipping patient material to the manufacturing site, shipping the product candidate back to the relevant parties, and experiencing delays or shortages of certain clinical or commercial-grade supplies and components. Logistical and shipment delays
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and problems caused by us, our vendors, or other factors not in our control, including business interruptions, global supply chain issues, and weather, could prevent or delay the delivery of product candidates to patients. Additionally, we have to maintain a complex chain of identity and chain of custody with respect to donor material as it moves to the manufacturing facility, through the manufacturing processes, and ultimately to a patient. Failure to maintain a chain of identity and chain of custody could result in patient death, loss of product, or regulatory action.
Our failure, or the failure of our third-party manufacturers, to comply with applicable regulations could result in sanctions being imposed on us, including clinical holds, fines, injunctions, civil penalties, delays, suspension or withdrawal of approvals, seizures or voluntary recalls of product candidates, operating restrictions, and criminal prosecutions, any of which could significantly affect supplies of our product candidates. The facilities used by our contract manufacturers to manufacture our product candidates must be evaluated by the FDA. We do not control the manufacturing process of, and are completely dependent on, our contract manufacturing partners for compliance with cGMPs. If our contract manufacturers cannot successfully manufacture material that conforms to our specifications and the strict regulatory requirements of the FDA, the EMA, or other comparable regulatory authorities, we may not be able to secure and/or maintain regulatory approval for our product candidates manufactured at these facilities. In addition, we have no control over the ability of our contract manufacturers to maintain adequate quality control, quality assurance and qualified personnel. If the FDA finds deficiencies or a comparable foreign regulatory authority does not approve these facilities for the manufacture of our product candidates or if it withdraws any such approval in the future, we may need to find alternative manufacturing facilities, which would significantly impact our ability to develop, obtain regulatory approval for or market our product candidates, if approved. Contract manufacturers may face manufacturing or quality control problems causing drug substance production and shipment delays or a situation where the contractor may not be able to maintain compliance with the applicable cGMP requirements. Any failure to comply with cGMP requirements or other FDA, EMA and comparable foreign regulatory requirements could adversely affect our clinical research activities and our ability to develop our product candidates and market our products, if approved.
The production of our cell banks and product candidates by a contract development manufacturing organization may fail and result in delays, additional costs, or technical failure.
We have contracted with CDMOs for the production of our master cell banks and working cell banks for our fibroblast cell-based product candidates to enable clinical trials. If the CDMO is unable to produce our master cell banks, working cell banks and our fibroblast cell-based product candidates to enable clinical trials, we may encounter delays, additional costs, or technical failure of one or more of our product candidates. For example, timelines for our planned twelve-week Phase 1/2 clinical trial utilizing CYWC628 for treatment of diabetic foot ulcers in Australia have been extended as we work with our CDMO to resolve process issues with the manufacturing training run and increase the number of test manufacturingaseptic process simulation runs needed to confirm no sterility issueof the manufacturing process before we begin the manufacture of CYWC628 for the clinical trial.
Our reliance on third parties reduces our control over our product candidate development activities but does not relieve us of our responsibility to ensure compliance with all required legal, regulatory and industry standards. For example, the FDA and other regulatory authorities require that our product candidates and any products that we may eventually commercialize be manufactured according to cGMP requirements. Any failure by our third-party manufacturers to comply with cGMP or maintain a compliance status acceptable to the FDA or other regulatory authorities or failure to scale up manufacturing processes, including any failure to deliver sufficient quantities of product candidates in a timely manner, could lead to a delay in, or failure to obtain, regulatory approval of any of our product candidates.
If we were to need an alternate CDMO, we would incur added costs and delays in identifying and qualifying any such replacement. In addition, we expect to order drug product and services on a statement of work or purchase order basis and do not plan to enter into long-term dedicated capacity or minimum supply arrangements with any commercial manufacturer. We may not be able to timely secure needed supply arrangements on satisfactory terms, or at all. Our failure to secure these arrangements as needed could have a material adverse effect on our ability to complete the development of our product candidates or, to commercialize them, if approved. We may be unable to conclude agreements for commercial supply with third-party manufacturers or may be unable to do so on acceptable terms. There may be difficulties in scaling up to commercial quantities and formulation of our product candidates, and the costs of manufacturing could be prohibitive.
Changes in the methods of product candidate manufacturing or formulation may result in additional costs or delay.
As product candidates proceed through preclinical studies to late-stage clinical trials towards potential marketing approval and commercialization, it is common that various aspects of the development program, such as manufacturing methods, formulation, materials, and processes, are altered along the way in an effort to optimize processes and product characteristics. Such alterations can also occur due to changes in manufacturers. Such changes carry the risk that they will not achieve their intended objectives. Any such changes could cause our product candidates to perform differently and affect the results of planned clinical trials or other future clinical trials conducted with product candidates produced using the modified manufacturing methods, materials, and processes. Such changes may also require additional testing, FDA notification or FDA approval. This could delay the completion of clinical trials, require the conduct of bridging clinical trials or the repetition of one or more clinical trials beyond those we currently anticipate, increase clinical trial costs, delay approval of our product candidates and jeopardize our ability to commercialize our product candidates if approved. In addition, we may be required to make significant changes to our upstream and downstream processes across our pipeline, which could delay the development of future product candidates. For example, we encountered process issues with the manufacturing training run of CYWC628 and will need to increase the number of test manufacturingaseptic process simulation runs needed to confirm no sterility issueof the manufacturing process before we begin the manufacture of CYWC628 for the clinical trial. These issues have caused us to extend the timelines for the initiation and completion of our planned twelve-week Phase 1/2 clinical trial utilizing CYWC628 for treatment of diabetic foot ulcers in Australia. If changes are needed to the manufacturing methods for CYWC628 as a result of these issues, the timing for the initiation and completion of our clinical trial in Australia may be further delayed.
We rely on third parties for our manufacturing process and may, in the future, depend on third-party manufacturers for our product candidates, and this increases the risk related to the timely and sufficient production of our product candidates.
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We do not have complete control over all aspects of the manufacturing process of, and are dependent on, our contract manufacturing partners for compliance with cGMP regulations for manufacturing our cell therapy product candidates. Third-party manufacturers may be unable to comply with cGMP regulations or similar regulatory requirements outside the United States. If our contract manufacturers cannot successfully manufacture material that conforms to our specifications and the strict regulatory requirements of the FDA, the EMA, or other regulatory authorities, we will not be able to produce our product candidates. In addition, we do not have control over the ability of our contract manufacturers to maintain adequate quality control, quality assurance and qualified personnel. For example, we are currently working with our CDMO to resolve process issues with the manufacturing training runs of CYWC628 and to complete additional test manufacturingincrease the number of aseptic process simulation runs needed to confirm no sterility issuesof the manufacturing process before we begin the manufacture of CYWC628 for our planned twelve-week Phase 1/2 clinical trial utilizing CYWC628 for treatment of diabetic foot ulcers in Australia. If these issues are not resolved, we will be unable to manufacture CYWC628 for our planned clinical trial in a timely manner. If the FDA, the EMA, or a comparable foreign regulatory authority does not approve these facilities for the manufacture of our product candidates or if it withdraws any such approval in the future, we may need to find alternative manufacturing facilities, which would significantly impact our ability to develop, obtain marketing approval for or market our product candidates, if approved. Our failure, or the failure of our third-party manufacturers, to comply with applicable regulations could result in sanctions being imposed on us, including fines, injunctions, civil penalties, delays, suspension or withdrawal of approvals, license revocation, seizures or recalls of product candidates, operating restrictions and criminal prosecutions, any of which could significantly and adversely affect supplies of our product candidates and harm our business and results of operations. Furthermore, the raw materials for our product candidates may be sourced, in some cases, from a single-source supplier. If we were to experience an unexpected loss of supply of any of our product candidates or any of our future product candidates for any reason, whether as a result of manufacturing, supply, or storage issues or otherwise, we could experience delays, disruptions, suspensions, or terminations of, or be required to restart or repeat, any pending or ongoing clinical trials.
We currently rely on third-party manufacturers to produce our product candidates. In the event that we or any of our third-party manufacturers fail to comply with such requirements or to perform with certain requirements in relation to quality, timing, or otherwise, or if our supply of components or other materials becomes limited or interrupted for other reasons, we may be forced to enter into an agreement with another third party, which we may not be able to do on commercially reasonable terms, if at all. In particular, any replacement of our third-party manufacturers could require significant effort and expertise because there may be a limited number of qualified replacements. In some cases, the technical skills or technology required to manufacture our product candidates may be unique or proprietary to us or the third-party manufacturer. We may have difficulty transferring such skills or technology to another third party, and a feasible alternative may not exist. In addition, certain of our product candidates and our own proprietary methods have never been produced or implemented outside of our company. Therefore, we may experience delays in our development programs if we attempt to establish new third-party manufacturing arrangements for these product candidates or methods. These factors would increase our reliance on such manufacturers or require us to obtain a license from such manufacturers in order to have another third party manufacture our product candidates. If we are required to or voluntarily stop manufacturing our product candidates for any reason, we will be required to verify that the new manufacturer maintains facilities and procedures that comply with quality standards and with all applicable regulations and guidelines and that the product produced is equivalent to that produced in our facility. The delays associated with the verification of a new manufacturer and equivalent product could negatively affect our ability to develop product candidates in a timely manner or within budget.
Our or a third partys failure to execute our manufacturing requirements, do so on commercially reasonable terms and timelines, and comply with cGMP requirements could adversely affect our business in a number of ways, including:
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| inability to meet our product specifications and quality requirements consistently; |
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| inability to initiate or continue clinical trials of our product candidates under development; |
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| delays in submitting regulatory applications or receiving marketing approvals for our product candidates, if at all; |
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| inability to commercialize any product candidates that receive marketing approval on a timely basis; |
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| loss of the cooperation of future collaborators; |
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| subjecting third-party manufacturing facilities or our manufacturing facilities to additional inspections by regulatory authorities; |
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| requirements to cease development or to recall batches of our product candidates; and |
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| in the event of approval to market and commercialize our product candidates, an inability to meet commercial demands for our product candidates or any future product candidates. |
Risks Related to Ownership of Our Common Stock
Failure to maintain compliance with the applicable Nasdaq continued listing requirements could result in our common stock being delisted, which could limit stockholders ability to trade our common stock.
As a listed company on Nasdaq, we are required to meet certain financial, public float, bid price and liquidity standards on an ongoing basis to continue the listing of our common stock. If we fail to meet these continued listing requirements, our common stock may be subject to delisting, which could materially impact the liquidity of our common stock making it more challenging to buy and sell shares of our common stock. On April 1, 2025, the listing of our common stock was moved from the Nasdaq Global Market to the Nasdaq Capital Market. We requested this move to allow us to satisfy less stringent financial, liquidity, and market capitalization requirements to continue the listing of our common stock. For example, the market value requirement of the Nasdaq Capital Market is $35 million versus $50 million for the Nasdaq Global Market and the stockholders equity requirement
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for the Nasdaq Capital Market is $2.5 million versus $10 million for the Nasdaq Global Market. Following the transfer, we remain subject to the $1
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minimum bid price requirement and continued listing requirements for the Nasdaq Capital Market, and no assurance can be given that we will be able to satisfy these requirements. If we fail to meet any of these requirements after the transfer, our securities may be delisted from Nasdaq.
On July 1, 2025, we received a notification letter from the Nasdaq Listing Qualifications Staff notifying us that the closing bid price of our shares of common stock was below the minimum closing bid price of $1.00 per share during the previous 30 consecutive trading days, or the Notice, as required for continued listing on the Nasdaq Capital Market under Nasdaq Listing Rule 5550(a)(2).
In accordance with Nasdaq Listing Rule 5810(c)(3)(A), we have been provided an initial period of 180 calendar days, or until December 29, 2025, to regain compliance with this requirement. To regain compliance, the closing bid price of our common stock must be $1.00 per share or more for a minimum of 10 consecutive business days at any time before December 29, 2025. If we do not regain compliance with Rule 5550(a)(2) by December 29, 2025, we may be eligible for an additional 180 calendar day compliance period. To qualify, we will be required to meet the continued listing requirement for market value of publicly held shares and all other initial listing standards for the Nasdaq Capital Market, except the bid price requirement, and will need to provide written notice to Nasdaq of our intention to cure the deficiency during the second compliance period. If it appears to the Staff that we will not be able to cure the deficiency, or if we are otherwise not eligible, Nasdaq will notify us that our securities will be subject to delisting. In the event of such notification, we may appeal the Staffs determination to delist our securities, but there can be no assurance the Staff will grant our request for continued listing.
Additionally, on August 4, 2025, we received a notification letter from the Staff notifying us that we do not meet the requirement in Nasdaq Listing Rule 5550(b)(2) to maintain a minimum market value of listed securities, or MVLS, of $35.0 million that is required for continued listing on The Nasdaq Capital Market.
In accordance with Nasdaq Listing Rule 5810(c)(3)(C), we have a period of 180 calendar days, or until February 2, 2026, to regain compliance with this requirement. To regain compliance, our MVLS must close at $35.0 million or more for a minimum of 10 consecutive business days at any time before February 2, 2026. If we do not regain compliance with Rule 5550(b)(2) by February 2, 2026, Nasdaq will notify us that our securities are subject to delisting. In the event of such notification, we may appeal the Staffs determination to delist our securities, but there can be no assurance the Staff will grant our request for continued listing.
We continue to actively monitor our performance with respect to the listing standards and will consider available options to resolve any deficiency and maintain compliance with the Nasdaq rules. There can be no assurance that we will be able to maintain compliance or, if we fall out of compliance, regain compliance with any deficiency, or if we implement an option that regains our compliance, maintain compliance thereafter. If we fail to regain compliance with the Nasdaq continued listing standards, our common stock will be subject to delisting from Nasdaq.
Without a Nasdaq market listing, stockholders may have a difficult time getting a quote for the sale or purchase of our common stock, the sale or purchase of our common stock would likely be made more difficult and the trading volume and liquidity of our common stock could decline. Delisting from Nasdaq could also result in negative publicity and could also make it more difficult for us to raise additional capital. The absence of such a listing may adversely affect the acceptance of our common stock as currency or the value accorded by other parties. Further, if we are delisted, we would lose federal pre-emption of state securities laws as it relates to our securities and thus also incur additional costs under state blue sky laws in connection with any sales of our securities. These requirements could severely limit the market liquidity of our common stock and the ability of our stockholders to sell our common stock in the secondary market. If our common stock is delisted by Nasdaq, our common stock may be eligible to trade on an over-the-counter quotation system, such as the OTCQB market, where an investor may find it more difficult to sell our common stock or obtain accurate quotations as to the market value of our common stock. We cannot assure you that our common stock, if delisted from Nasdaq, will be listed on another national securities exchange or quoted on an over-the counter quotation system. If our common stock is delisted, it may come within the definition of penny stock as defined in the Exchange Act and would be covered by Rule 15g-9 of the Exchange Act. Rule 15g-9 imposes additional sales practice requirements on broker-dealers who sell securities to persons other than established customers and accredited investors. For transactions covered by Rule 15g-9, the broker-dealer must make a special suitability determination for the purchaser and receive the purchasers written agreement to the transaction prior to the sale. Consequently, Rule 15g-9, if it were to become applicable, would affect the ability or willingness of broker-dealers to sell our securities, and accordingly would affect the ability of stockholders to sell their securities in the public market. These additional procedures could also limit our ability to raise additional capital in the future.