Palatin Technologies' CEO Discusses F3Q2012 Results - Earnings Call Transcript

Dr. Carl Spana

Thank you and now for an update of our program, starting with RBC and diabetes, melanocortin-4 receptor program partner with AstraZeneca. This program under the direction of AstraZeneca continues to make substantial progress. In 2011, Astra designated the compound AZD2820 which was developed by Palatin as a candidate for clinical development. AstraZeneca has completed a Phase 1 study with AZD2820 and results from this study indicate that AZD2820 has a safety and pharmacokinetic properties for further development.

For all the year, this quarter AstraZeneca began enrolment in a second clinical trial of AZD2820. This study is a randomized, a single blind, placebo controlled study to investigate safety, tolerability in pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics of repeated and ascending doses of AZD2820 in obese subjects. Study is starting to enroll approximately 72 obese subjects, and additional details can be found on the website clinicaltrials.gov.

Results of this trial should be available later this calendar year, if results of this trial support further development of AZD2820, we expect that AstraZeneca will aggressively move AZD2820 into larger Phase 2b clinical studies. The commercial drug candidate AZD2820 is a melanocortin receptor, partial agonist developed by Palatin, as part of its collaborative research program with AstraZeneca. The decision to move this program into clinical development was in part based on exciting clinical data generated by Palatin as part of our collaboration with AstraZeneca.

Results and proof of principle clinical trials of obese patients with non-commercial compounds that target the melanocortin-4 receptor showed significant reductions in food intake and weight loss. We believe this clinical data along with earlier work on animal models of obesity demonstrate the significant role that the melanocortin pathway played in regulating food intake, weight loss and validates melanocortin-4 receptor as a major target for obesity therapeutics.

We believe that therapeutics that target the melanocortin-4 receptor have the potential to demonstrate the safety and efficacy required for approval and to dramatically impact the treatment of obesity. As you can imagine, this program has huge commercial potential and we believe that our partner, AstraZeneca has the resources and commitment to realize this potential.

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