Larry Heaton51:18
Okay. So, first of all, my apologies for the technical difficulties that we encountered at the first of this webinar. I had to count back to how many we did. I was thinking for a second this must have been our 13th one because we were certainly unlucky today. But in any event, thanks for sticking around. Thanks for rejoining. All right, so let's get to some questions. First one is still no sound. Oh, well, I guess that's a legacy from the last one. We have a question here about the Boehringer Ingelheim collaboration which we announced just a week or so ago. What is the impact and so on and so forth. So I'll talk a little bit about that. So Boehringer Ingelheim is, I think, the second largest animal health company in the world. They're privately owned. They're based in Germany. They have subsidiaries around the world. And here in the United States, Boehringer Ingelheim USA has a program they call PP ID, which basically is a screening. They're promoting the screening of all horses for PPI because while it affects a significant number of horses of a certain age, it also affects younger horses and it affects a lot of donkeys and certain breeds of horses like really small horses, things like that. And so Boehringer Ingelheim has up until recently the only drug that was used to treat this condition. And so it's in their best interest to screen for this condition. And you know since we launched the ACT that's been our goal as well. We've been selling Truforma and EACTH for several years now. We've been gaining traction in the marketplace with equine vets and importantly we've also been gaining traction with the academically oriented equine vets who have studied this particular assay. I think we've told you before that our assay is the only one I should say our set of assays for EAC is the only one that measures not only ACT but also this derivative called clip which may be super important. Time will tell. But we're the only ones that offer that. Up until now you had to send your blood to Cornell and wait and then get the results back and would take days maybe longer to get that. Boehringer Ingelheim based on the academic presentations that were made at AAP based on the fact that we've been working with them over the last year doing combined labs and events with equine vets they satisfied themselves that technologically we had not only equal to Cornell but actually superior when it comes down to being able to measure clip independently. So, their program is every spring and every fall they offer at no charge to have a couple of horses per veterinarian tested and they cover the cost. Up until now, that meant they covered the cost of sending the blood to Cornell and they paid that bill. But now, and it kicks off just in a few days, April 6th, I think is the launch date for BI's program. they're going to offer the vets to be able to do the testing at the point of care with the Truforma device. And so their salespeople have the ability to sign that customer up to their program. That will mean that we place the device as we do anyway at no charge. and that initial set of cartridges which is both EACTH and insulin those cartridges are being paid for by BI. So they do two in the fall and they do two in the spring. We're obviously coming up on the spring one. The beauty of it for us, of course, is that every single equine vet that encounters PPI and treats PPI today uses the BI drug. Now, there's another company that's recently launched a competitive drug. We'll see how that goes in the marketplace, but today all equine vets know BI and they all know when it comes to PPI, BI is the authority because they have the only drug. and so we get that mantle of credibility along with the absolute convenience and all the other advantages that come along with being able to do this testing at the point of care. We are super excited because this allows us to get that initial usage, EAC and insulin and then we can come right behind them with cortisol and progesterone and it's just a great opportunity. Customer acquisition cost for us is essentially nil at that point. And so it's a terrific opportunity and we you can be sure we're going to avail ourselves of it. All right, next one.
Will first quarter earnings surpass 10 million? Well, I suppose that earnings of 10 million will be possible in the first quarter of some year, but that's not anytime in the near term. I think the question really is will first quarter revenues surpass 10 million and the answer is I don't think so. It's not in our plan. As Mike pointed out, first quarter revenue always takes a dip from fourth quarter because that's our strongest capital quarter. And we expect that pattern to continue here in 2026. I noticed you haven't purchased any shares. I think I covered that. Since you stated in the last Q&A that we might break even at the end of 2026, what new or existing revenue will drive the increase in revenues? Cash, I think, would probably be the question. So, we have the products that we're selling now, they will be sufficient for us to achieve the sales objectives that we have set forth. That could get us to cash flow break even certainly by the end of the year. It won't be for the full year of 2026. But certainly by the end of the year there's an opportunity, there's a potential for that to happen. We do firmly believe that we will be both cash flow break even and also GAAP profitable for the full year of 2027. And you'll see progress throughout the year in this area.
Have you noticed a decline in domestic and international sales since the Iran war started and oil prices rising? No, we haven't. And our new VP of international sales and our senior vice president of sales have been in Europe this past week and business is booming there. Our sales are up very nicely in the international market. It's proven to be a very fertile ground for us and that's one of the reasons why we took the step of bringing in a VP of international. And in fact there's a question here: Can I discuss the new VP of international sales? You met him here on the video, super experienced gentleman, 17 years with IDEX, three years with Antech. These are giants in the field. He built their businesses in Europe and other international markets. So we're super happy that he chose to come with us. And we have high expectations of international sales growth as we move forward.
When and which assays are to be launched this year. So we will be launching several assays for the equine market and one assay for the feline market. And I'd actually prefer not to say what those are because in the past we've telegraphed what we were doing and then other companies can come out and try and compete with us before we've even gotten on the market. So let me just say we have three equine assays and one feline assay that will be launched during the course of this year.
Talk about VP of sales or international sales. There are a few questions on here about the development services segment. Can we expect further growth in this segment throughout 2026 and beyond? There's another one here. What constitutes engineering services? I'll take that one now. Let me cover all those questions in one group. Development services is composed of several things. One would be engineering services. This would be assistance that we can provide other companies in the development of specific products that utilize our platform technology. We have an arrangement that's been made public with ROM Services. That is an example of where we can work together to help further develop the technology that they're applying in the human market. Similarly, we could offer that same support for companies that are looking to utilize our Truforma platform. So that's engineering services. Now those things generally have a start to them and they continue until the project is completed, and then engineering services would move to the side. We also do contract manufacturing. So in the case of ROM, for example, we're manufacturing the devices that they're bringing onto the market for the elderly population, the neonatal population, the prison populations. In the case of any company that we work with that would utilize our Truforma platform or our biosensor technology, we would manufacture those products as well. And generally you could expect that engineering services would then lead to contract manufacturing. And so as one part of this segment falls away, then a new part could very well take its place. And then you would have contract manufacturing on an ongoing basis. And then there are other sorts of services that have to do with basically helping a company with inventorying the product, distributing the product, providing technical support. And we have a couple of companies that we have engaged to help with that. One would leverage our Plymouth facility and the biotech capabilities we have there, and the other leveraging the staff we have in the Roswell facility down in Georgia. With respect to what we think is going to happen in the future, we're not going to give any specific guidance on this because this by its very nature can vary. It's not just us that has to do with generating this revenue. There are partners, collaborators, so there are multiple variables. So it wouldn't be prudent for us to try and predict this revenue with any sort of specificity. I will say though that we believe that this has legs. The reason I say that is if you remember back to when we acquired Corvo Biotechnologies, we stated then and we've repeated several times that our strategy was to first build a significant market and a track record with the Truforma platform in the animal health space, and then leverage that technology to enter through partners to monetize that technology with partners in the human health space. We knew when we acquired Orbal Biotechnology that there were several different indications for human health applications for this platform technology. And so to the extent that any single partner we are working with would after initial work decide not to go down that road or for whatever reason not be the appropriate partner for us, there's no shortage of other entities that we would be able to approach and move forward together in some sort of partnership or joint venture. So while I'm not going to give specific guidance, our expectation is that this will be a way for us to generate meaningful revenue as we move forward.
Okay, I hope that satisfies. Let's see. Talked about the assays, talked about VP of sales, talked about development services, talked about Lauringer. Timeline for equine version of VetGuardian. Good question. Trudy asks me that almost every week and I tell her the same thing I'll tell you now, which is that we first wanted to perfect the VetGuardian Plus device. We have that in the marketplace now. We wanted to make sure that we got all of that technology really zeroed in by looking in a small space, a cage, a kennel where there's a dog or a cat or what have you. Now we're at the point where we can apply it to a larger space, which is a stall where the horse is moving around. And so we expect sometime during this year to have some news on that. And Trudy, I'm not going to tell you any more than that. Wish I shared, you can attest to the fact that I shared the same thing I told you. Right. All right. Similar lower cash burn from Q4 and Q1 and throughout 2026.
I think Mike and then I reiterated it. Our cash burn is always higher in the first quarter. It's the highest of the year. This year will be no different. There are expenses that are accrued throughout the year that we need to pay out. But then you see the cash burn going down from there. And this is what we expect. Our operating expenses for 2026 will be less in absolute cash dollar terms than they were in 2025. We are focused on that. You may have seen for those of you who follow our website and our positions, while we did bring on a new VP of international, there are a couple of senior positions that are no longer part of our management team and company. These are all just reflections of the fact that our expenses will go down not just as a percentage of revenue, but actually also in hard dollar terms. Let's see when do we expect to be profitable? 2027.
Will this move the stock you think? So we'll talk a little bit about that. I think later there's another question about stock price and whatnot. So when we think about it in simplest form, more people want to buy the stock than want to sell the stock, stock price goes up. You all know that. So we need more buyers. We appreciate your sticking with the stock, we would encourage you to do that and hold it, but sometimes you just need the cash so we get it. So we need more buyers. And so, how do you get more buyers? Well, why are people not buying today? One reason they might not be buying today is that we're burning cash. And so, what are we doing about that? We're focused like a laser beam on reducing our cash burn and getting to cash flow break even. Somebody else might say, I'm not buying it because even though they're not burning cash, they're not profitable. And so, that's the other major thing that we're doing is we're looking to be profitable. Now, there are other reasons. They might not like the exchange that we're on. Well, we're not on an exchange. They might not like that we're not on an exchange that they recognize. They might not like the share price being where it is. And so, at this point, reducing the number of shares outstanding. We're very well aware that there are multiple ways to do that. One path is not favored by the shareholders and so we're not going down that path. The other path would take longer, but it would be a) get to cash flow break even, b) get to profitability, c) generate some free cash, and then d) start buying shares back. So from an operative sort of plan, these are the kind of things that we look at. And why do we look at it that way? Because we're looking to remove reasons why people are not buying the stock today. And then once we remove those reasons, we have to give them reasons to buy it. So, let's increase revenue, let's keep margins high, let's keep expenses low, let's be profitable, let's show good growth opportunities. This is what we're working on.
Any new indications coming soon for Pulsevet? Are we gaining market share adoption and recently added indications for horses and dogs? So new indications I think the newest indications are treatment of asthma and also there's a new indication for the treatment of sole depth. Apparently the depth of the hoof of a horse, the thickness of it, is a pretty important thing for horses. There's a study that recently was done. The first sharing of that was in December of this past year that says that if you use shockwave on the hoof of a horse, you can enhance the sole depth. So we're early days on that but we're contemplating doing a registry for that as well. Those would be indications that would help. Now the other thing is that by having indications in the small animal companion animal segment, we actually gain the ability to have the product introduced into the mixed animal vet group. So there's about 2400 equine-only vets in the United States. There's another couple thousand mixed practice vets. Up until now, those mixed practice vets basically make their money treating small animals, but they really like to treat horses. They probably own horses themselves. But if they only have a few horse customers and they're not performance and sports horses, then they're sometimes not real eager to make the investment in Pulsevet because it does require an investment and you need to use them to be able to get a return on that investment. But once we introduced it into the small animal market, now we're able to go to those mixed animal vets and say, 'Hey, you can pay for the device by using it in your small animal practice, and now you get to treat the horses that you want to treat.' Because every vet that's treating horses sees lameness, asthma, a number of conditions. There's actually 40 different indications for horses. And now by having it able to treat small animals, that opens it up. We've delighted quite a few of them with that story. And it's actually the fastest growing group of veterinarians, which would be the mixed animal both horses and small animal veterinarians.
Development services, we talked about that. Not seeing any insider buying because it's not possible to buy when your windows closed before it opens. I honestly should have made that connection when I was asked this question last quarter or last month. That's on me. Because at that time we knew when earnings would be released. It just didn't occur to me at the time. Last year we had one day where we could acquire shares and this year we had no days. Talked about cash burns, talked about development services. Any thoughts on trying to be listed back on the NYSE? Let me circle back on that question. I think Mike's got some information that might be helpful. Is Q1 2026 revenue beating Q1 2025 revenue? We've gone 20 quarters in a row of having the revenue for the quarter set a new record for that particular quarter by demonstrating year-over-year growth. We expect 2026 to be the same as it has been in 25, 24, 23, and 22.
Can you talk about rough revenue Cornell market does a PP? I don't know how much of their revenue, I don't know what Cornell's revenue is. They don't disclose it. They're not publicly traded. I would just tell you that the opportunity for us to have Boehringer Ingelheim tell every equine vet that is their customer and every equine vet is a customer of BI that they endorse the Truforma and they will pay for four tests in the spring and four tests in the fall. That's really good for us. Any buyback would not happen till profitability. Can you at least discuss what it would look like if we indeed hit profitability? The stock price extremely undervalued now and a buyback should provide reasonable investor value. Yeah. So I object to the premise. A buyback, a small buyback isn't going to make any difference. We have almost a billion shares outstanding. So until we are cash flow positive and profitable and have plenty of money in the bank, at which point we would consider and lay out a strategy, but that'd be a long strategy frankly.
That's a lot of shares out there. To do one now, I think the chairman of our audit committee uses a phrase: it's a permanent loss of capital for a short-term gain that benefits a few shareholders but it's not for the benefit of all shareholders unless it's a reasonable, prudent, thought-out long-term plan, which we'll get to when we get to that. Let's see. We talked about engineering services. We talked about stock buyback. So for the Boehringer Ingelheim screening program, what milestones should investors watch over the next 6 to 12 months to judge success? For example, number of enrolled veterinarians, device placements. We're not going to disclose any of those metrics. We talk about our segments and we'll continue to report segments. But what I would say is watch out for the diagnostic revenues, watch out for the consumable revenues, and you'll see those grow. We talked about the other two format tests. PIMS integration is on track. We'll have our first of many products integrated with PIMS by June. That's true for, and then the rest of our product line will follow. The timeline is like June to September in that range. By September, all of our products and nearly all of the PIMS integrators. There's a number of them out there. How soon may we expect to go back to being listed on a major exchange? I'm going to defer that to Mike in just a minute.
What caused revenue to be higher in Q4 versus previous quarters? It is our highest capital revenue quarter of the year for a number of reasons. One, equine veterinarians tend to aggregate their purchases at their annual trade show which is always held in December or late November early December of each year. We sell as many Pulsevet units to the equine market in that around that meeting as we sell in each of the previous quarters. And then of course we have the whole quarter leading up to it. The second reason is that the federal tax code allows for investment tax credits. Well, what they do is they allow you to take the cost of the acquisition as an expense in the quarter in which you put it to use and then you have it for the whole year. So if you buy something on January 1, then a year and 3 months later you get the benefit of it. If you buy it on December 31st, you get the benefit of it immediately for the whole previous year. It's just a buying cycle that exists in pretty much all capital sales and it's certainly the case for us here as well. And then there's also a little bit of sales people wanting to make their quotas and bonuses. So all that comes together and makes the fourth quarter. You can look back at 22, 23, 24, 25 and see the same pattern repeat over and over. Am I worried about the stock price? No.
Am I worried about the stock price? No. Am I worried about it? It's a good question. I guess it depends on how you say worried. I think about it a lot. I see my own portfolio just as you all do. I want that stock to appreciate, both for my own personal reasons and my grandchildren, but for each of all of you who have invested your hard-earned money into our shares. Some of you before I got here, but it doesn't matter. I want to see it go up, as you all do. I'm not worried about it because I know that the stock is not the company. The company's not the stock. The underlying foundation of this company is strong and getting stronger. We've made a tremendous amount of progress. We have a lot more to go. We're not sitting here saying, 'Okay, we're all done now.' We got a long way to go. But we're making really good progress and eventually that's going to be rewarded. I think I just knocked on wood.
You said cash flow break even could happen by the end of 26, 27 are the goals. What milestones can we watch for? Just watch for revenue increasing, expenses coming down, margins staying strong, and the cash burn. You'll see the progress being made during the course of the year. If you look back at the last three or four or five years, you'll see the cash burn always highest in the first quarter and so on. And again, I see especially Mr. Anonymous attendee that you are looking for very specific detailed information which we don't disclose. We are in a marketplace where we're surrounded by competitors, many of whom have much higher resources than we do. And so we're not looking to telegraph to them what they might want to do to forestall our progress. And so I hope you would appreciate that.
You said operating expenses should be lower. Yes. Again, these milestones, I know what you're looking for, but I'm not sure that I can help you with these things. If you want milestones to know if we're on track for reducing cash flow, then I would suggest that you look at reducing cash burn. The other metrics are leading or lagging indicators, but the best indicator for cash burn is cash burn. I can see that there are people that want to build models by knowing the installed base and so on. Again, we haven't disclosed it in our history and we don't plan on doing it now. This is competitive intelligence that we don't need to share with the market. I have told you that every equine vet is a customer of BI and there are about 4,400 of them. So we expect to make progress there and you'll see that reflected in our revenues. Do we advertise in big events such as the Kentucky Derby where racing horses are found? We advertise in a lot of events that are equine oriented. As Trudy said, we are the official shockwave of the American Quarter Horse Association, the American Reining Horse Association, the Cutting Horse Association, the Run for the Million, and many others. All of these are associations where Pulsevet is the official shockwave and the vets that take care of those horses know that and utilize our technology. But more to the point, when Trudy says she's in charge of client education, she also reaches out directly to horse owners so that they know to ask their vet for the gold standard in these technologies.
You said your plan is to remove the reasons investors are not buying the stock today by reducing cash, reaching cash flow break even, becoming profitable, keeping margins high and growing revenue. What are the milestones with that you should look for? I think the question answers it. Increasing revenue, strong margins, reducing opex as a percentage of revenue, reducing opex in cash terms. We disclose all those things and I would encourage you to follow along with those. Do I plan on staying with Zomedica for the foreseeable future? Yes, I do. I recruited, with the exception of two people here, and you've met them. You met Evan St. Peter two webinars ago and you met Dr. Ashley Wood last webinar. With the exception of them, I've recruited every single person that's here at Zomedica. I'm here to the point where they can take their stock options and go cash them in and get something nice with them or use them for their children. My children are grown. As I told my wife a while ago, you can retire, but I don't need to. So there's some weeks that I'm a little lonely at home because she's out with the grandkids, but then I head out there on the weekend, so I'm here.
That's a repeat of a question about the milestones. Do you think you'll still see revenue benefit even in the PP off-season for new Truforma placement with Boehringer? Yeah, I think so. The screening season for PPI is in the spring and the fall. The treatment: BI wants to screen so they can get new patients. The drug they are prescribed, they take it all year long. The process is you do the analysis, do the assessment, okay they have PPI, now you put them on the drug. As you titrate that drug to reach the correct level for that particular horse, you do multiple tests. So you're getting tests every month or so for a while, maybe three or four or five months. Then you say, okay, the horse is on a good dose, but every 6 months or a year, depending on the vet, they have to come back and test again to make sure the dose is still correct. Some people need to take a thyroid medication; they have to get their blood drawn periodically to check the dose. So this is a test that continues all year long. Even if it's not PPI season, it could be breeding season where progesterone comes in on the same platform, or foaling season where foals are born and sometimes they need to be tested with cortisol. So it's a good thing that it's going to last the whole year.
I'm going to address that about the NYSE. I'm going to actually let Mike do that. Okay. Now there's some questions about acquisitions. Congratulations to whoever on the team that worked on the BI deal. It sounds stellar. Yeah, for sure. I of course helped, but not really. This was the culmination of our PSV team working with the PSVs at BI, our VP for corporate accounts and strategic collaborations who we hired just about a year ago, and Trudy and all her contacts at BI. So kudos to the team across the board. I got to be the one to sign the agreement, but the real work was done by the folks that have been doing this for a while. All right, so now there's a couple questions about Oxford Science. So first of all, per SEC regulations and just good common sense, anything that is material we disclose and we disclose it timely. If we have a material event, due to Canadian regulations, we have like a day to get the word out in the form of an AK. Actually it's a different kind of filing in Canada, and we have two or three or four days to disclose it via an AK in the United States. If it's material, it will make a difference. Then we also do a press release about it. We aren't stingy with press releases. So if we have not disclosed something, it's because it's not material. If it's not material, why spend your time on it? If we had something material, why wouldn't we tell the whole world? Because it might be part of a bigger strategy that we're not ready to share. So I would ask that you take with a grain of salt anything you might have heard. Wonder about the motivation for that. That's for you to figure out. In our case, we're going to be close to the vest on things that we think should be close to the vest, and we have that latitude if it's not a material event. Any acquisitions looking forward, clearly we're looking to reduce and eliminate cash burn as quickly as we can. So spending a bunch of cash somewhere else is against that concept. Any future potential acquisitions, it would be crazy to talk about those. That wouldn't be smart. So let me leave it at that. Okay. All right. So now let me go to Mike and ask you to comment on what it would take to get to an exchange.