VolitionRx Limited (NYSE MKT: VNRX), a life sciences company focused on developing blood-based diagnostic tests for a broad range of cancer types and other conditions, today announced financial results for the second quarter ended June 30, 2015.
Second Quarter 2015 and Recent Company Highlights:
- Made strong progress in pursuing ongoing clinical trials in a range of cancers; in working towards regulatory approval; and in implementing large-scale laboratory automation
- Engaged the specialty clinical research organization, Global Specimen Solutions ("GSS"), to support U.S. market entry through targeted CLIA labs and medical universities
- Partnered with DecideumCogentia to support market access of NuQ® Colorectal Cancer Test in the UK
- Partnered with MedPass International to support commercialization of NuQ® Colorectal Cancer Test in multiple European countries
- Expanded and strengthened the Scientific Advisory Board with the addition of four prominent physicians and industry experts.
"In the last several months, we have continued advancing trials in a range of cancers including our large independent colorectal cancer trials. We remain on track to announce the next big tranche of data in the coming months. We also aim to receive our first CE mark by the end of the year. Concurrently, we have made progress toward developing a commercial organization capable of bringing our NuQ® blood tests to market in the U.S. and Europe," said Cameron Reynolds, President and Chief Executive Officer of VolitionRx.
"We are pleased to be working with two prominent market access consulting agencies, DecideumCogentia and MedPass International, to optimize the launch of our NuQ® cancer tests across Europe once we gain CE Mark approval. We expect to have a CE Mark on our first NuQ® colorectal assay by the end of this year, gain CE Mark approval on the full panel by the middle of 2016 and achieve the first meaningful volumes of sales beginning in 2017. Our recently announced engagement of GSS is expected to accelerate our entry into the U.S. market through relationships with select CLIA regulated labs and medical universities. We continue working toward FDA approval of the NuQ® colorectal cancer diagnostic. In addition, we recently expanded and strengthened our Scientific Advisory Board with the addition of four leading physicians and industry specialists. These individuals bring a wealth of clinical and commercial expertise to our team, which we believe will be valuable as we advance from clinical development to commercialization in Europe and the U.S."
Reynolds added, "We now have our new Tecan automated laboratory robots operational, and expect to reach full capacity next month. This will enable us to process as many as 60,000 patient samples per month, compared to 2,000 samples per month via the manual processing methods we used previously. The throughput improvements we gain with these machines will be key as we continue advancing our NuQ® trials. We continue to explore the potential to develop our Nucleosomics® biomarker panels for other types of cancer. In addition, we aim to secure larger trials in lung, prostate and pancreatic cancer and hope to announce progress this year, supported by the promising results we have reported in our pilot studies in these cancers. At the end of the quarter, VolitionRx had cash of $9.3 million, having raised approximately $9.7 million in net proceeds from a public offering at the time of our NYSE MKT listing in February 2015. We expect another very productive second half of the year for VolitionRx with several key milestones within reach."
Second Quarter 2015 Financial Results
For the three months ended June 30, 2015, VolitionRx reported a net loss of $1.9 million, or $0.10 per share. This compares to net income of $0.8 million, or $0.06 per share in the second quarter of 2014.
Cash and cash equivalents as of June 30, 2015 totaled $9.3 million, compared with $2.1 million as of December 31, 2014.
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