Chordate makes progress in Italy, China and Saudi Arabia
Chordate Medical’s year-end report for 2022 does not show very large sales for either the full year nor the fourth quarter. However, the company’s latest press releases presents progress on several markets. In Italy, 11 clinics are up and running with the K.O.S treatment and the goal is to reach more clinics in 2023. In China, the joint venture company Changyong Medical Technology has submitted an application for product registration for the rhinitis treatment. In addition, Chordate Medical is now able to resume customer orders in Saudi Arabia. BioStock contacted CEO Anders Weilandt to get to know more.
Medtech company Chordate Medical has developed a drug-free treatment technology for chronic migraine and chronic nasal congestion (rhinitis). The treatment is called Kinetic Oscillation Stimulation (K.O.S) and generates vibrations in the nasal cavity that provide a neuromodulating effect.
Starts the year with strengthened financial position
In the year-end report for 2022, Chordate Medical reports net sales of 108 517 SEK for the full year and a negative operating result of 27.9 MSEK. During the fourth quarter, sales amounted to 20 347 SEK and at the end of the year the cash position amounted to just over 3.6 MSEK.
To strengthen the cash position, Chordate Medical carried out a rights issue that generated SEK 37.3 million before issue costs. Thus, the company has the financial resources to continue the ongoing market introductions and to build the company’s value for a future exit.
11 clinics are up and running in Italy
Chordate Medical’s products are currently being introduced in Finland, the UK, Germany, Italy, Israel and Saudi Arabia mainly through market consultants, but also through distributors. In Italy, the rhinitis treatment is offered at 11 clinics around the country, from Tradate and Verona in the north to Bari in the south. The goal is to further increase the number of clinics in 2023.
In addition, the company’s Italian distributor Vedise Hospital is introducing K.O.S. as a treatment for chronic migraine. The introduction is expected to be benefitted from the subgroup results from the migraine study PM007 presented last year. The results showed that K.O.S has a statistically significant effect.
»The positive results from the migraine study have given further momentum to this project. Italy is an important market for us, partly because it’s one of Europe’s largest medtech markets and partly because we expect that K.O.S will soon be offered both for chronic rhinitis and chronic migraine in the country. That makes Italy a strong example of proof-of-concept for us.« – Anders Weilandt, CEO Chordate Medical
China and Saudi Arabia
Recently, Chordate Medical also announced that an application for product registration has been submitted in China for the rhinitis treatment. The registration process is handled by Chordate Medical’s and Nanos Medical’s joint venture Changyong Medical Technology. Now, they are awaiting a response from the Chinese authority in order to decide the next step in the project.
Chordate Medical is also making progress in Saudi Arabia where the Saudi Food and Drug Authority has approved the application for registration of Janin Medical Company as the company’s authorised representative. The approval implies that Chordate Medical can deliver products for both the migraine and the rhinitis indication in Saudi Arabia. According to the company, they have several orders from customers who have been waiting for the approval.
Anders Weilandt sets goals for 2023
In 2023, Chordate Medical will continue to focus on sales and marketing on selected markets. The company will also continue to work on the projects for marketing authorisation in the USA and China. In addition, they are conducting two additional migraine studies – PM009, which is an open pilot study in patients not responding to CGRP inhibitors, and PM010, which is a post-market surveillance study to follow the long-term performance of the treatment.
BioStock contacted CEO Anders Weilandt to learn more about the activities in 2023, as well as the recently published report.
In the year-end report, you reported relatively low sales for Q4 2022. What do you need to do to get the sales going?
– Sales in 2022 and the fourth quarter had not yet recovered from the downtime caused by Covid-19. As in Sweden, the healthcare systems in our focus markets are struggling to catch up with care interventions and activities delayed by the pandemic. Of course, the change of distributor in Saudi Arabia had an impact as activity slowed down when the agreement with the former distributor was terminated.
– Now all that is behind us and we look forward to a change in the results, not least since we added marketing consultants in additional countries during the autumn.
Reading your latest press releases, you seem to focus a lot on rhinitis right now in for example Italy and China. Is not migraine your primary focus?
– We have a very clear focus on migraines. The market approval project in China has been going on for a long time and only applies to rhinitis until further notice.
You have not yet presented final results from the migraine study PM007. Can we expect results before the summer?
– It is likely that we can get approval on the publication of the scientific article within six months, and then we can publish the full results.
In the report, you also mention Chordate Medical’s focus areas for 2023. What milestones in these areas are you looking forward to achieving?
– Our ambition is to reach measurable sales levels in some of our selected market. However, the levels will be relatively low at first.
– We will conduct the PM00 and PM010 studies, but we will probably not be able to deliver the first results before the summer. But possibly not too long after the summer.
The content of BioStock’s news and analyses is independent but the work of BioStock is to a certain degree financed by life science companies. The above article concerns a company from which BioStock has received financing.
