Shashi Murthy is a self-admitted “serial entrepreneur in cell & gene therapy.” So it isn’t concerning to me that he lists his current endeavor, Nanite, Inc., which he co-founded, on the top of his Linked In page.
His entire $2M payout from the Flaskworks’ acquisition was paid in stock in NWBO, which only vests when the 4 milestones are accomplished. Does anyone really think he would leave before he makes sure that these milestones are achieved? I don’t.
Advent will be conducting the comparability studies and compiling the data for the regulatory submissions, but Dr. Murthy is likely only consulting and overseeing that the Flaskworks’s team gets the Eden System engineered and capable of producing a commercial product that is essentially equivalent to the established manual process and product.
While I believe the second milestone has been achieved, the only milestone that was confirmed was the first one, to find a new supplier to produce a prototype of the EDEN cartridge within 90 days of the Flaskworks’ acquisition. As a reminder, these are the other 3:
(ii)Twenty-five percent (25%) of the Rights shall vest upon the demonstration to the Company’s reasonable satisfaction that the EDEN system can replicate the Company’s current DCVax-L manufacturing process as verified by yield, phenotype and functional assay data.
(iii)Twenty-five percent (25%) of the Rights shall vest upon the completion to the Company’s reasonable satisfaction of comparability studies that demonstrate equivalence between EDEN and the Company’s current process for DCVax-L, and equivalence of the DCVax-L products manufactured through EDEN and those manufactured through the Company’s current process. For purposes of this Agreement, “Completion” shall mean that all applicable data is available and prepared in a consolidated format sufficient for submission to regulatory agencies in the UK, US, Canada and EU.
(iv)Twenty-five percent (25%) of the Rights shall vest upon approval by the regulator in the US or EU of the comparability of the EDEN process and the Company’s current processes, and the comparability of DCVax-L products manufactured through EDEN and those manufactured through the Company’s current processes, for commercial use.
