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spk07: Good day and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Verisight first quarter 2023 financial results webcast. At this time, all participants are in listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star 1 1 on your telephone. You will then hear an automated message advising your hand is raised. To withdraw your question, please press star 1 1 again. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Shayla Gorman, Director of Investor Relations.
spk06: Please go ahead.
spk20: Good afternoon, everyone, and thanks for joining us today for a discussion of our first quarter 2023 financial results. With me today are Mark Stapley, Verisight's Chief Executive Officer, and Rebecca Chambers, our Chief Financial Officer. Verisight issued a press release earlier this afternoon detailing our first quarter 2023 financial results. This release, along with a business and financial presentation, is available in the investor relations section of our website at Verisight.com. Before we begin, I'd like to remind you that various statements that we may make during this call will include forward-looking statements as defined under applicable securities laws. Forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties, and the company can give no assurance they will prove to be correct. Further, we are not under any obligation to provide further updates on our business trends or our performance during the quarter. To better understand the risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ, we refer you to the documents that Verisight files with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including Verisight's most recent forms 10-Q and 10-K. In addition, this call will include certain non-GAAP financial measures. Reconciliation of these measures to the most directly comparable GAAP financial measures are included in today's earnings release, accessible from the IR section of Verisight's website. I will now turn the call over to Mark Stapley, Verisight's CEO.
spk13: Thanks, Shayla, and thanks, everyone, for joining us today. I'm very excited to share our first quarter results, which were even better than we anticipated almost across the board. We delivered revenue of $82.4 million, 22% growth over the prior year, driven primarily by our performance of Affirma and Decipher. Further, with our continued focus on financial discipline, we ended the first quarter with cash, cash equivalents, and short-term investments meaningfully ahead of our projections at $178 million, roughly flat for the prior quarter, even with the seasonal use of cash that we anticipated. Behind this balanced approach to growth and capital preservation is our proven framework identifying a specific clinical unmet need, developing the test to address that need, and securing the clinical evidence, reimbursement, and guideline inclusion required to drive sustained market penetration. This approach is the force behind the performance of our affirmer and decipher test and enables us to invest in our long-term growth drivers. This quarter, we delivered close to 12,500 of the firmer tests for patients being evaluated for thyroid cancer, more than we anticipated given that we had expected a greater impact due to seasonality, which is typical in the first quarter. We saw positive growth trends across both our ordering base and orders per existing provider. On the reimbursement front, we secured four new payer contracts, making the test an in-network benefit for over 4 million additional health plan members. In addition to the outstanding work of our commercial and reimbursement team, I'm excited to share that as part of our initiative to enhance our best-in-class Afirma test, we recently launched the addition of TERT promoter mutation testing to the Afirma report. There have been several studies published recently that correlate the presence of a TERT promoter mutation to a high risk of malignancy, as well as highlighting that such mutations co-occurring with the BRAF B600E variant are associated with a poor prognosis. Given the value of these insights for informing patient care, such as whether more aggressive surgery or treatment is warranted, our team worked hard to develop a high-quality DNA assay that allows us to reliably determine the promoter gene mutation status for patients with suspected or diagnosed thyroid cancer to further empower physicians to optimize clinical decision-making. We believe that product enhancements such as this Along with the work we've done to improve the customer experience and to streamline ordering, we'll continue to benefit Affirma's performance in the coming quarters. Given this, as well as our strong first quarter results, we now expect a bolstered growth rate for Affirma in the high single digits for the fall year. Turning to urology, we continue to expand on the body of evidence surrounding the deciphered prostate test, further helping to establish the test as a new standard of care. At the American Neurological Association annual meeting earlier this week, multiple abstracts were presented focusing on our Decipher test. Particularly exciting was data from two large real-world data sets encompassing more than 100,000 men with prostate cancer, which reinforced the clinical utility of our test. In the first study, researchers paired data from the National Cancer Institute's SEER database with patients who had undergone Decipher prostate testing, and found that use of our test was independently associated with a two-fold increase in conservative management among those with favorable risk disease. In the second study, over 90,000 Decipher prostate test results were linked to electronic health and claims data to demonstrate that the Decipher score at initial diagnosis was independently predictive of risk of metastasis, and after radical prostatectomy, was predictive of both biochemical recurrence and metastasis. In addition to the data presented at AUA, we published a number of studies last month that further advanced the clinical utility evidence for the Decipher prostate test. The first study, published in European Neurology and Oncology, found in a cohort of over 4,000 patients that Decipher prostate could help better identify those patients with early micrometastatic disease who may benefit from upfront treatment intensification. This study adds to growing evidence around the use of Decipher prostate to help inform treatment decision-making and initial diagnosis. Additionally, new data from an analysis of an NCI-sponsored Phase III study published in the International Journal of Radiation Oncology Physics, known as the Red Journal, shows that the deciphered prostate test can help physicians more accurately categorize personal risk and select appropriate treatments for men with intermediate-risk prostate cancer. This is important because prostate cancer deemed intermediate risk by NCCN guidelines is the most heterogeneous of all risk groups in the disease, and a wide variety of treatments is available. Of note, this randomized study in which patients were followed for nearly 13 years is the first to validate any gene expression biomarker in the intermediate risk patient population. The attainment of level one evidence for validation of our test in the most recent NCCN guidelines along with the stellar execution by our team and our differentiated Decipher grid report, led to Q1 Decipher prostate volume of more than 12,500 tests. Like Affirma, this growth was also driven both by strong adoption from new ordering physicians, as well as higher volumes from existing accounts. Building on the framework we've established with Affirma and Decipher, we are making good progress on our long-term growth drivers. Site and patient enrollment for Nightingale the clinical utility study for our perceptor nasal swab continues to progress well, demonstrating the potential for our novel non-invasive test to help guide physicians' next steps for patients with potentially malignant lung nodules. We look forward to presenting expanded preliminary data on the familiarity phase of the trial, which enabled investigators to learn how to incorporate the test into patient management in advance of the clinical utility trial, at the American Thoracic Society, or ATS, international conference later this month. The global launch of our test menu to patients outside the United States is another key long-term growth driver for VeriSight. Our current IVD product offering, ProSigna for breast cancer patients, had a record quarter, delivering close to 3,000 tests, demonstrating traction and adoption supported by clinical evidence. With the submission of our Invisio genomic classifier to European regulators in December 2022, we are now responding to feedback from the notified body. In the meantime, we continue to build clinical evidence for Invisio and are looking forward to the presentation of abstracts at ATS, demonstrating the test's impact on patient management and its ability to predict disease progression in patients with artificial lung disease. We believe our focus on evidence generation will help drive adoption of Invisio globally, bolstering the LDT in the U.S. while gaining important KOL support in Europe in preparation for the international launch of the IBD. We are also making good progress building out our broader menu of diagnostic IBDs for the OES market, with the cipher prostate expected for submission in 2024 and our nasal swab expected for submission in 2025. While our biopharma business is facing significant headwinds over the course of this year, given the impact of a sizable customer pulling back on planned spending and the current macro environment, we continue to advance our unique multi-omic offerings. We were pleased to share three abstracts and host a spotlight theater at the AACR annual meeting, highlighting our distinctive set of assets to help biopharma partners at all points along the drug development process. We are continuing to build out our pipeline of new customers to fuel the long-term growth prospects of this business. As I laid out on our call last quarter, one of the strategic focus areas for 2023 is to identify new opportunities to expand our testing menu beyond our currently available products and the pipeline I outlined. As part of these efforts, we held our first annual discovery day in April, bringing together our R&D, medical, clinical, and commercial teams from across the globe to imagine the future for oncology diagnostics, and Verisight's important role as a leader in shaping that future. I am extremely pleased with the work our teams are doing on this front, and our investments drive the next phase of growth for the company. Before I close, I'd like to highlight the publication of our inaugural Environmental, Social, and Governance Report earlier this week. This ESG report highlights how our mission and values are deeply embedded in our business, and demonstrates not only our dedication to transforming patient outcomes all over the world, but also our commitment to our shareholders, employees, business partners, and other stakeholders. I am pleased to provide transparency into our ESG efforts, and I'm excited to build on the foundation we've laid to further advance our program. So in summary, Q1 was a fantastic quarter marked by solid execution across the team. We're excited about our progress today and our clear focus for the future. With that, I will now turn to Rebecca to review our financial results for the quarter and update the expectations for 2023.
spk25: Thanks, Mark. As Mark said, we had another excellent quarter with $82.4 million in revenue, an increase of 22% over the prior year. We grew total volume to approximately 28,800 tests, a 24% increase over the same period of 2022. Quarterly testing revenue was $72.4 million, an increase of 29% year-over-year, driven by higher-than-expected Decipher prostate and Afirma volume, as well as strong cash collections in the quarter. Total testing volume was just under 26,000 tests. Testing ASP was $2,800 per test, benefiting from approximately $2 million of out-of-period collections. Adjusting for this impact, testing ASP would have been slightly greater than $2,700. First quarter product volume was approximately 2,900 tests, and product revenue was $3.9 million, up 31% year over year. Biopharmaceutical and other revenue totaled $6.1 million, down 30% year over year, primarily due to lower IVD contract manufacturing and overall spending constraints across the industry, as previously discussed. Moving to gross margin and operating expenses, I will highlight non-GAAP results, which exclude the amortization of acquired intangible assets as other acquisition-related expenses and restructuring costs, but does include routine stock-based compensation. Non-GAAP gross margin was 68%, up approximately 300 basis points compared to the prior year, Testing growth margin was 73%, up 400 basis points compared to the prior year, benefiting from higher lab volume, mix, and long data collection. Product growth margin was 44%. Biopharmaceutical and other growth margin was 29%, down year-over-year given lower fixed cost absorption. While we are forecasting a sequential step down in consolidated growth margin as we invest to support our better-than-expected volume outlook, We are reiterating our full year expectations of non-GAAP growth margins in the mid-60s. Non-GAAP operating expenses excluding cost of revenue grew up 18% year over year at $58.1 million, driven by rampant clinical trial and IBD development expenses, as well as higher personnel costs. Research and development expenses increased by $4.2 million to $12.7 million Sales and marketing expenses increased by $2.7 million to $25.2 million, and G&A expenses were up $2.1 million to $20.1 million. We recorded a gap net loss of $8.1 million, which included $8.1 million of stock-based compensation expense and $6.7 million of depreciation and amortization. Overall, we ended the quarter with $177.9 million of cash cash equivalents, and short-term investments well ahead of our expectations. Turning now to our 2023 guidance, we have updated our projections to $330 million to $340 million, higher than our previous revenue guidance of $325 million to $335 million. This increase is a result of our strong performance in the first quarter and updating testing revenue expectations of mid to high teens. offset by a greater than previously expected decline in biopharma and other revenue. For the remainder of the year, we are forecasting sequential revenue to increase into Q2 and then decline going into Q3 given typical seasonality in the summer holidays before finishing 2023 with quarter-over-quarter growth in the fourth quarter. Moving to our expectations for cash, cash equivalents, and short-term investments, as always, our comments are barring potential M&A. In 2023, we now anticipate maintaining our 2022 year-end cash balance of approximately $180 million, even with the impact of prior acquisition-related contingent consideration. I am proud of how we've started 2023 and look forward to continuing to deliver on our plans and financial projections. We'll now go into the Q&A portion of the call. Operator, please open the lines.
spk07: Thank you. At this time, we will conduct the question and answer session. As a reminder, to ask a question, you will need to press star 1 1 on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, please press star 1 1 again. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster.
spk06: Our first question comes from the line of
spk07: Sauda of SBB Securities. Your line is now open.
spk09: Great, thanks. So Mark, Rebecca, thanks for taking the question. So first one, Affirma, and I have to say congrats on the really solid beat here and the guide race. So if you could talk a little bit about that product, what's driving the strength there? Is it the Salesforce, you know, optimization? Is it data? Is it just, you know, more conversations around that product? Maybe just talk to us what's driving the strength in the pharma and, you know, you're modeling high single digit for the year. What could, you know, can you talk a little bit about what could push that a little bit higher or maybe a little bit lower as you go through the year?
spk13: Yeah, thanks, Puneet. Thanks for recognizing the strong performance of the Affirma product and the Affirma team. I think it's pretty much all of the above that you mentioned, but mostly I'd say it's driven by, you know, really strong commercial execution, continued enhancements in the product, and kind of the process of ordering and engaging with physicians. A good example of an enhancement in the product is the launch of TERT, that we recently launched in the quarter that enables further clinical utility of the test. There's always publications, including around TERT and more data and evidence as well. And I think I really do have to give a lot of credit to our sales team who are visiting physicians, visiting customers, talking about the benefits of a firmer with them. You know, there are some competitive dynamics out there, too, and it feels like, you know, we've got some real tailwinds there as well, at least, you know, anecdotally it feels that way. So very excited about how Affirma has been, you know, going so far. In terms of, you know, kind of potential for that growth rate to be any different, I think one of those drivers could always be competitive dynamics, but, you know, We're continuing to add new physicians. We're continuing to broaden the adoption within current physician and provider bases. And so to the extent we're able to take incremental share, that would be helpful to drive that up. Again, there's always competitive dynamics that can go the other way, too. That's why we keep investing in the product and ourselves. Anything you want to add?
spk24: No, you covered it well.
spk09: Got it. That's great. And then just a quick one on the TERT mutation. Does this change the LCD pricing or what you can obtain from commercial pairs here in the near-term or long-term?
spk25: Yeah, thanks, Muneeb. I'll take that one. The answer, for all intents and purposes, is not necessarily. So TERT will be ordered for a subsection of patients. And at this point in time, while there is a code, there isn't necessarily pricing associated with that code. And so We are doing this primarily for the benefits of patients and to ensure continued enhancement of the product We'll obviously work over time on getting that price, but given the list price being in the $300 range, we wouldn't expect that to materially impact ASP one way or the other, even once we're successful getting this contracted and covered. Again, it's a very small percentage of patients for which TERT will be ordered, which is why we don't think even once we are successful in getting covered lives for TERT, we'll have a meaningful impact to ASP, but it's important for those patients critically.
spk13: Yeah, and just to add to that, I mean, you know, only 1% to 2% of thyroid nodules that undergo molecular testing are expected to have TERT promoter mutations, right? The test will be potentially ordered for more than that. That would be the outcome. But, yeah, as Rebecca said, it's a small subset of cases, but important to have.
spk08: Makes sense.
spk09: And then just last one for me on biotech funding. Obviously, the macro situation in biotech funding continues to be a challenge and somewhat reflected in the biopharma revenue this quarter as well. So maybe just talk to us about what is the level of moderation through the year? What should we be imagining for a step down for the full year within the context of the guide for biopharma? Thank you.
spk13: Yes. I mean, remember, Puneet, this is something I think we called out several quarters ago as a potential headwind, and I think we were fairly early in seeing that. But then again, A, we have a pretty concentrated position with a small number of customers accounting for a large portion of our biopharma revenue. So that's one factor. And B, we're very much involved in the early clinical research work, which is, I think, the area across all of biopharma that is most impacted versus existing ongoing clinical trials and on-market products. So we're feeling the brunt of it. One of our goals has been to diversify our customer portfolio there, and I think we are making good progress at doing that, but we still remain fairly concentrated It's a very small percentage of our revenue. Biopharma and other is roughly 10%. Biopharma is around, you know, just slightly more than half of that. And so, you know, a little movement here and there obviously translates to a fairly big percentage change.
spk25: And, Puneet, just to help with the math a little bit, we've given updated affirma guidance of high single digits, as you cited earlier. We've given updated testing revenue growth for the year of mid to high teens. We, you know, we continue to expect the product business to do around mid-teens, and so obviously your back solve is that biopharma and other lines. So, you should get pretty close to it with that map.
spk05: Got it. That works. Okay. Thanks, guys.
spk21: Thank you.
spk07: Thank you. One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from the line of Mason Perico of Stevens Inc. Your line is now open.
spk17: Hey, guys. Congrats on the quarter. Really strong performance. Maybe just a quick question here. I know it's probably not this simple, but how promotionally responsive is the thyroid market? Is there somewhat of a linear relationship to repetitions and growth? could adding a few reps potentially bump up that growth rate? Or how are you thinking about, you know, adding reps going forward within your thyroid franchise?
spk13: Yeah, and we've been at this for a lot of years in the thyroid business, so we've got a lot of experience there. And, you know, there's always an optimal point that you get to with commercial teams. And, of course, when you start adding reps, it's not as simple as adding a rep. You have to redesign territories and reallocate territories and that creates some disruption and when you have you know very good relationships between existing reps and their accounts and so you know we always ask ourselves that we have continued to grow that team but we don't have to grow it significantly in order to achieve the kind of results we're getting I think what it's you know what really matters is you know sales rep effectiveness and the sales reps you know having Lots to talk about with their customers and a good reason to go and visit another customer and have a conversation. So a good example, again, is TERT. Again, while it wouldn't be ordered in every patient case, it's another reason to go out and talk to the physician about the addition of TERT and what it means and when they should order it and so on. So just that routine cadence of good, strong communication between our existing sales reps and their customers. And then, obviously, being out on the street finding new customers and converting new customers over to a firmer is a big part of it as we talked about before this product a total you know thyroid testing molecular diagnostic testing is about just over 50% penetrated there's a lot of customers out there a lot of physicians who aren't ordering this test and should be when you actually look at the yield in terms of the number of surgeries that have been avoided thanks to a firmer and it should be a fairly easy conversation, but it takes some investment from the sales team in going out and visiting those accounts.
spk25: And the only thing I would add to that, Mason, is while we are adding headcount here, we're not nearly adding at the same growth rate as revenue is growing, right? So we're seeing immense leverage over the sales and marketing line and expect to continue to do so, which is one of the benefits of the specialty oncology channel. These markets can be served with call it 50, 55 sales heads. And you don't need to build sales forces that are hundreds to just serve different types of physicians. So we obviously really like this model and really are benefiting from a differentiated cash position and cash generation as a result of the leverage we're getting through the sales and marketing line.
spk17: Got it. Thank you. That's helpful. And maybe on Decide for Prostate, I think last I checked, you're at like 195 million covered lives, something like that. Still seems like there's a lot of room to run there. You guys have been publishing a lot of studies. So could I just get your updated thoughts on potential coverage wins or how you're thinking about that going forward?
spk13: Yeah. Yeah, as you quite rightly pointed out, there is a lot of room there. There are some key coverages that we need to get. And, you know, if you think about it, you've got a test here that is very well, you know, reasonably well penetrated, at least so far. It is NCCN Level 1 Guidelines, more than 70 peer-reviewed publications. There is so much evidence out there supporting the use of the test that, you know, it's still a little surprising that it can take, you know, this long. It's not for lack of trying. There are a lot of – we have a market access team that this is what they do. and they're working with payers in order to drive the coverage decisions. So more to come on that in the future. That's one of the opportunities that we have for future tailwinds here, and we've just got to keep driving it. We're still getting, as you heard today, a firm has been on the market, what now, 11, 12 years, and we're still driving commercial coverage in some cases. So it's a core part of what we have to do in diagnostics, as you know.
spk25: And, Mason, as we shared, I think, on the last earnings call, we're expecting the vast majority of the Decipher growth to come from volume, as it already has quite a favorable ASP. And this quarter was no different. Affirma volume grew in the mid-40s. Pricing did add a little bit, but I'm sorry, I said Affirma, I meant Decipher. Decipher, I mean, I would be very happy with Affirma volume growth in the mid-40s as well, but Decipher grew in the mid-40s. And price there was not necessarily, you know, it added a little bit to it, but the vast majority of the growth came from volume. Thanks for bearing with me for stating that.
spk17: All good. Thanks, guys. Appreciate you taking the questions. Pleasure. Thank you.
spk07: Thank you. One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Matt Sykes of Goldman Sachs. Your line is open.
spk02: Hi, good afternoon. Thanks for taking my questions, and congrats on the performance this quarter. Maybe, Rebecca, I just wanted to start out on the OPEC side. I know there was a bit of an increase. Obviously, the revenues were up as well. You had mentioned IBD development, ramping clinical trials, but just what should we expect from an OPEC standpoint this quarter? You gave kind of the gross margin guide, but just sort of below that. Can you kind of give us a sense for OPEX trends over the course of this year?
spk25: Yeah, happy to. And obviously, if you look at our year-over-year growth, a good chunk of that came from increased R&D, as we cited in the prepared remarks. And we're investing heavily not only in IVD development, but also in the Nightingale study for the benefit of nasal swab. We expect that trend of sequential growth for R&D to continue throughout the course of the year. R&D growth will be the largest contributor to optics growth over the course of 2023. As I mentioned earlier, sales and marketing is not expected to grow that materially throughout the year, if anything. And so, you know, again, that's a great source of leverage for us. And on the G&A line, as we invest in really ensuring the systems and facilities and infrastructure to scale over the course of the coming years, especially with the incremental volume growth we're seeing, we will expect G&A to grow slightly, albeit at much less of a growth rate than R&D.
spk02: Got it. And then just maybe to follow up on some of the comments or questions that have been asked on Decipher, and thank you for that volume number. I'm just wondering, I think in your March presentation, you saw the penetration rate around 25%. So I assume that's probably pretty consistent with where we are today. But just maybe any update on sort of the competitive landscape that you're seeing there and where you're seeing sort of the most traction with that product, just given the volume growth?
spk13: Yeah. And remember, I think a couple of factors at play here. One is, as we talked about last time, the incidence of prostate cancer is growing. You can see that it was around 7% growth, and so that's partially driving the whole market to be larger. In terms of the 25% penetration, that was our rough map at the end of last year. So it's tough to update that when not everybody gives you numbers, and it's hard to tell. But I would say clearly we're continuing to take share when, as Rebecca just mentioned, you know, this business grew in the mid-40s quarter over quarter, it certainly feels like that represents some share gains as well as, you know, taking share and, you know, growing the overall market.
spk02: Got it. And if I can just ask one last just clarification question, because I think you talked about in your prepared remarks, but just remind me on the ramp in Europe for the IBDs, you obviously have Persigna. Is it Invisia, Decipher Prostate, then Percepta? in sort of like 24, 25 time period, or could you just maybe help me outline that a little bit better?
spk13: Yeah, so, yeah, thanks for the question. In Vizia, so starting with Prasigna, which is on market today and actually had a good quarter, and we talked about, you know, the growth there and how well that tested so far with close to 3,000 in the quarter, which is actually a record quarter for that product, which is great news. And then in Vizia, we submitted in December last year, a little ahead of schedule, And as I mentioned in the beginning of the call, we're dealing with comments from the notified body, which is a normal part of the process, what we expected, and there's a back and forth there, and I still can't give a sense of time and when that will be approved, as the IBDR process is so untried and tested still at this point. We're going to submit, you've got your timing right there, we're going to submit deciphered prostate in 2024, and we're going to submit nasal swab in 2025, and then they'll go through a very similar review and response process.
spk02: Great. Thanks for clearing that up. Appreciate it, Mark, and congrats again.
spk07: All right. Thank you. One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from the line of Andrew Brockman of William Blair. Your line is open.
spk18: Hey, good afternoon, and thanks for taking the questions. A lot's been asked already, but maybe if I could just do a housekeeping question here. Can you sort of reiterate or remind us around timelines for the Nightingale study? Is it still on track to finish enrollment later this year, and how should we be thinking about a potential readout? Thanks.
spk13: Yeah, thanks for the question there. And Nightingale, yeah, actually the progress has been really good in terms of signing up new sites. And our clinical team has done an excellent job of contracting and getting those going. And with patients starting to enroll in those sites, we're starting to see some nice uptake here. Still expecting around the end of the year to pull through the last patient in the trial. In terms of the readout, that's where there's a lot of variability because, as I think I talked about before, we're going to take a few bites of the apple here in terms of looking at some short-term analysis. And clearly how well you know that we how much we can use that to drive the appropriate clinical utility Conversations for reimbursement will depend on the results of that analysis So, you know, there's a couple of pathways there that we're pursuing in order to move as quickly as possible to reimbursement but ultimately as we've said before we've got to get the clinical utility data and you know, published, which is, you know, takes time, and then, you know, then that drives the reimbursement conversation, which also takes time.
spk25: Yeah, and just one thing to add there is the guidelines point to a two-year follow-up, and we hope that we'll be able to effectively do a shorter follow-up than that, but the longest follow-up that would be required before we go through the publication or early readout would be up to two years.
spk18: Okay, thanks. And then, Rebecca, I've got a boring modeling question for you. I think you mentioned a sequential step down in gross margin. Can you just maybe give a little bit more color around what's driving it? Thanks.
spk25: Absolutely. I'd be happy to. So, obviously, we were very pleased with our gross margin this quarter, and especially the testing gross margin line. But overall, you know, we really did benefit from fixed cost absorption, both on the labor and overhead side this quarter. the benefit of mix as well as the benefit of the $2 million of prior period collections flowing down at 100%. If you look forward with the sequential impact you cited, we will not necessarily have that benefit of the prior period collections, and so that will be a headwind sequentially. And we have been running incredibly lean in the lab. A couple hundred basis points with the majority of that coming from labor absorption is not a sustainable business model. And so we will be, to ensure the ability to continue to grow at increased volume levels, we're seeing we are going to have to staff up with the lab, which will also impact gross margins on a sequential basis. In addition to that, we are expanding our laboratory here in San Diego to take into account the growth of the Decipher franchise. We will be buying instruments. We'll be taking on incremental space. All that also will impact margin. So it's a good news story in the end because we're growing a little bit faster than we had expected. But, you know, obviously we need to invest in that growth. And, you know, even a mid-60s margin is a pretty solid one. And so even though it's a slight sequential step down, I'll take it all day long for the growth we're seeing. Okay.
spk18: Great to hear. Thanks.
spk07: Thank you. One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Mike Matson of Needham & Company. Your line is open.
spk16: Hi, guys. This is Joseph on for Mike. Maybe another question on Affirma. You know, now that teratessin has been added, maybe looking back to when, I guess, Expression Atlas was introduced for the test, I guess I'm assuming that, you know, Expression Atlas is probably ordered or will be ordered a lot more. But in terms of your sales force and productivity, maybe when that add-on was introduced, did you see, you know, a large uptick in interest from new physicians or what have you? And maybe are you kind of expecting a similar thing going forward with the care testing? Thank you.
spk13: Yeah, the way I would look at it is, as I said earlier, the TERT testing, it's really important for some of our physicians because it's important for some of our patients that we're able to provide a readout on TERT. But it gives the sales team a really good reason to go and have the conversation with the physician about the enhancement to the product. And XA would have done the same thing. And now we're making this kind of more of a a blended product cell. The salesperson is speaking to the physician about a firmer as a group of products which includes a firmer, and it includes the genomic people who pass fire. It includes, you know, XA as well as TERT if you check that box. And so it's actually just, you know, a very more straightforward conversation at this point. I wouldn't look necessarily to drive, as Rebecca said earlier, in terms of, you know, the ordering patterns for the significant incremental sales on its own. But I just think it helps to continuously enhance the product and make sure that we're providing physicians what they need to be able to deliver the insights to patients.
spk16: Okay. Thanks for the color on that. Maybe a question on encounter. Just looking at the installed base, maybe without getting into the numbers, in Europe, just looking where these machines are installed, whether hospital labs or clinical labs, maybe that versus academic institutions or pharma. You know, if you have an idea on the split there, and maybe the same question for the U.S. installed base.
spk13: I don't really think about it in terms of the nature of the installed base. If you think about Europe, once we get the regulatory approval for a new test to add to the encounter menu, which is obviously the strategy here, even if we get the regulatory approval, we have to go country by country to drive reimbursement. And then, you know, once you've got that reimbursement decision in the country, you go lab by lab to drive placements. Now, the placements could be in academic labs. They could be in, you know, smaller clinical labs. You know, it's really going to be driven by the menu and the, you know, flow through of patients in those facilities. And so, you know, and it's not really about the current installed base because we're also going to have to place new instruments in order to drive that. And to do that, we need to have the menu on the platform, hence the strategy. So, yeah, I think about it more in terms of going country by country, and that's the important way to focus on it, including, you know, in the U.S. as well.
spk25: Yeah, the only thing I would add is... We obviously are selling Prosigna in the U.S. I would say the vast majority of revenue is actually outside the U.S. I think that is where we put the majority of our investment to develop those OUS markets, so just something to keep in mind.
spk16: Yeah, okay, that makes sense. And then maybe just one last one. In terms of the biopharma revenue, you had mentioned in your prepared remarks that not only from IBD development that you're seeing some pullback, but as well as some of the, I guess, earlier stage services or clinical trial services that you guys do. Has there, you know, been any effect in terms of maybe licensing revenue from the Decipher Grid database or your guys' other databases? Maybe how is that trended here in 2022 and the start of 2023?
spk13: Yeah, just maybe a reminder, the majority of our biopharma revenue is coming from our immuno-oncology business, which itself stems from the Halo DX acquisition, and a lot of it is outside of the U.S. There is a little bit of U.S.-related revenue that is associated with kind of the former Verisight and Decipher businesses. But the majority of the impact we're seeing in the decline is on that immuno-oncology side. And so that's where we're seeing the effect. And that's the bit that's involved in the very early, you know, biomarker development work where you're more likely to see that impact. So, no, I'd say there's no read-through there in terms of the decisive grid-related activity. There's a lot of interest in that. But, yeah, I wouldn't say that's the biggest driver.
spk16: Okay, great. Makes sense. Thank you very much for taking our questions.
spk07: Thank you. One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from the line of Taya Savant of Morgan Stanley. Your line is now open.
spk14: Hey, guys. Good evening. So maybe I'll start with a real simple one for you, Rebecca. Is it fair to assume that in terms of those out-of-period collections that you called out, you know, $2 million impact here in the first quarter, you're essentially zeroing it out in the guide for the rest of the year?
spk01: Yeah, that's fair.
spk14: Okay, perfect. And then, Mark, a big picture one for you on Biopharma, I know you called out sort of, you know, the sizable customers are pulling back on spend, et cetera, but As you look to the next sort of three years or so, are there any key missing pieces in your offering that will make it sort of really step up here in terms of the traction and help Verisight sort of participate more substantively in that opportunity?
spk13: Yeah, it's a great question. I don't think that there are, and to the extent there are, we're working on developing those, but the biggest of which is our biopharma atlas. because we believe that there's a really interesting market demand for that. And so that's what we're working on, because that's one of the things we think is going to drive revenue growth in this business. But I think we have most of what we need today. I mean, we have custom assays, whether they be in immunohistochemistry for proteins, or we have RNA expression-based assays, multiple versions of that. We have DNA that we can do out of our lab in Marseille and also here. So We've got the capabilities, plus, of course, AI capabilities on top of that, which is a lot of what's behind the Atlas work. So we've got the capabilities, we've got the assays, we've got the lab, we've got the people. We just need to drive more success on the selling side and bring more of those biopharma customers in. In the current macro environment, that's a more difficult conversation. I don't expect that current macro environment to last for the next three years. I would certainly hope not. We're starting to get traction, and we'll see how that pans out. In our guide, we're being a little bit more bearish on this side of the business right now, given some of the trends that we've seen.
spk14: Got it. Makes sense. And then on the on the encounter menu, Mark, I think you've pointed to, you know, decipher prostate in 2024 is a particularly important submission. Is there anything you can do that's within your control to pull it forward? I mean, obviously, you know, the approval timelines and then the reimbursement timelines by country are, you know, sort of largely out of your control. But in terms of the submission itself to the Europeans, anything you can do to accelerate it?
spk13: No, it already has been. I mean, relative to the original timeline that we looked at for all of these products on the platform, we pulled it forward substantially. It's not happening in series. I think that's an important point to make. We don't work on Invisia, then start work on Decipher, then start work on NasalSwap. All three have been happening in parallel. But they were just at different stages of development. So the work to bridge over the Decipher asset to the Encounter platform has been progressing very well and we've made good progress there and we're moving to the next stage of that. So it's going to go as fast as it can go with our current plan and roadmap and there's not really much we can do. The most important thing we can do to speed things up is on the notified body review and making sure that what we submit is a very thorough and detailed dossier. The work that we're doing on Invisio, and we always thought it would be this way, it's kind of like a pilot for us. It's giving us some of that sense of what the new notified body under the new IBDR process is looking for that might be different from what it used to be. Our team's got 15 years of experience in doing this, but the The regulatory process is new, as you know, and so there's a lot of learning for the notified body and anyone who's submitting. So that should help hopefully speed Decipher along and make it a little bit smoother. The other thing is we can point to the extensive evidence that we have for the Decipher test in the U.S. and outside the U.S., and hopefully that drives the notified bodies accordingly because there are patients at the end of this that need this test in Europe. So more to come on that, but yeah, we're going to go as fast as we can.
spk14: Got it. That's helpful. And then one final one for me on M&A. I mean, Mark, in the past, you've talked about sort of staying away from the cash guzzlers in this space, so to speak, either in cancer screening or perhaps even in the metastatic setting via MRD, etc., Is that sort of a red line for you as you think about, you know, the M&A opportunities in the pipeline? I mean, obviously, and I'm assuming seller willingness here has gotten a little bit better following the regional banking crises. So could we at some point sort of see you dabble in that space, or is that just sort of off limits in terms of how you think about it philosophically?
spk13: I would certainly think no change in our philosophy around M&A, right? So I've said it before, we We'll obviously not be blind to opportunities. We'll keep our eyes open for things that make sense, but the bar is very, very high for us. In terms of the care continuum itself, yeah, we're not necessarily looking to enter that healthy screening area because there's a lot of people doing that, and it's a significantly heavy investment. But as far as dealing with cancer patients or patients who are suspected of having cancer, that's right in our sweet spot. all the way across the care continuum once you've been identified as a patient. And that's where you're going to see us always continue to focus.
spk15: Fair enough. Thank you, guys. Appreciate the time.
spk07: Thank you. One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Songji Nam of Scotiabank. Your line is open.
spk23: Hi, thanks for taking the question. One more question on your encounter IVD strategy. Mark, do you think there will be market opportunities for laboratories wanting to just adopt one test on the platform, or do you think for this model to work that you would have to see, you know, multiple tests being adopted? How do you see that playing out? I don't know if it's too early to tell, but.
spk13: No, but it's actually the right question, because we've said all along, you know, you need an extensive menu to drive adoption, and that's what we're building. I mean, an extensive, you know, I mean, if you think about it this way, having a breast test, which we do have, Invisia is more of a rare disease, so I don't think that necessarily, you know, steps up the adoption on its own. Prostate, significant indications, significant disease, pent-up demand. that starts to really move the needle. And then if you think about adding nasal swab on top of that, where the population, the potential use cases are much more significant, then you really get into that. That is the point where you get to a very extensive menu, and that makes it much easier to have those placement conversations than just having ProSigna today. Having said that, we are seeing some traction, albeit small, with just the breast cancer test today. But it's gonna take the menu to drive it.
spk23: Got it. And the one for Rebecca, thank you for the cash flow guidance for the year. Sorry I missed it. Sorry if I missed it, but was wondering if there might be any kind of upcoming pipeline, you know, development initiatives or, you know, any activities associated with any of the commercial launches next year that could potentially drive accelerated cash use next year?
spk25: Fair enough question, Sanjeev. We haven't gotten into our budgeting exercise for next year, so it's premature to discuss. That being said, I know Mark and I share the same philosophy, and that is one where we're going to do our best at any point in time to balance investment with cash generation. And so while in any given quarter or any given year, you know, the scale may tip slightly one way or the other, overall, You know, we're absolutely focusing on balancing those two sides, if you will. So, not committing to anything, given we haven't budgeted yet, but, you know, I think that's the overall philosophy that we abide by day in, day out.
spk13: Yeah, another thing I'd add to that, you know, something that I think is evident to everybody that really fuels and drives our business, whether we're talking about Affirma and Decipher or the adoption of Invisia or, you know, the IBD strategy outside the U.S. is evidence generation and evidence development. And so this year we're investing heavily in Nightingale for nasal swab. We always invest somewhat in driving more evidence for Decipher, and we're going to be investing in evidence development for our IBD business outside the U.S., And so to the extent, you know, we feel that there's the affordability to be able to do that within the parameters that we've set, we will continue to do that and fund studies and make sure the evidence development is really helping drive our business.
spk23: Great. Thank you so much.
spk22: Thanks, Sanjeev.
spk07: Thank you. One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from the line of Andrew Cooper of Raymond James. Your line is now open.
spk19: Hey, everybody. Thanks for the question. A lot's been asked. So maybe just one more on sort of the margin side of things, the cost side of things. In terms of one of the costs you made, you talked about personnel costs. Can you just give us a sense, you know, as you look to add maybe some heads in R&D, some heads in sales and marketing, maybe a little bit more measured of a way, how much of that is incremental heads versus a wage inflation is really starting to kind of hit you. Just a sense for kind of the hiring environment out there and what you're seeing on the wage and labor side would be helpful.
spk25: Yeah, happy to do so. I would say it's a little bit of both. On the wage side, you know, given the inflationary environment, when we set our merit budget for this year, we did take that into account. And so I would say it was slightly elevated, though not materially so, versus prior years. And I would, so that would be one point. The other point is we, you know, we are adding heads and doing so in areas where we think both, you know, from a laboratory perspective as well as across the operating lines, we'll get a meaningful return from. And, you know, I think that's relatively evident. I would say the third thing in the first quarter, you always have your benefit resets. and your expense and tax reset, which obviously does impact the first quarter more so than others. And you obviously see that in our OpEx figures this quarter as well. So I would kind of think about those three things as being the primary drivers. And I think going forward, while we're adding some heads, You know, we're very comfortable with the budget we've set and we're very comfortable with, you know, even being vastly ahead on the cash side than where we had expected to be at this point in the year. So, you know, I think our investment levels are quite prudent. And, you know, I think from a cash and ending cash forecast of 2023, we're really happy with where we are, where we are ending forecasting to end at this point in time.
spk13: And from a hiring environment standpoint, I would say it's certainly a lot better than it was before. And we're really, at most levels, having very little trouble finding great people to join our company. And we've placed and brought on some really good talent recently. So it's nice to be able to be hiring right now.
spk19: Great. And then just one more from me. Can you give us a little bit more detail on some of the The efforts and the progress being made on the manufacturing front in terms of continuing down that transition from NanoString to yourself internally, what are some of the guideposts we should be thinking about through the year? And has there been any surprises or anything that has changed from the last update on that front?
spk13: No, nothing new. It's continuing well. And the activity to transition that over to our team in France is progressing as we had planned. And the idea is to have that done at the end of this year. And so we're on track to be able to do that.
spk25: And I wouldn't expect, I mean, this is a day in, day out type of thing at this point in time. You probably won't get meaningful updates until it's done. So, you know, no news is good news, if you will.
spk05: Yep.
spk19: Okay, great. Well, nice quarter, and I will stop there. I appreciate it. Okay.
spk07: All right. Thank you so much. This concludes the Q&A portion. I would now like to turn it back to Mark Stapley for closing remarks.
spk13: Thanks, Stephen. I appreciate it. So just to wrap up, obviously I'm very pleased with the performance of our core testing business in the first quarter with both Affirma and Decipher exceeding our expectations. And it's good to see our efforts on market access and adoption in Europe drive a strong quarter for our product business. Our focus on evidence development, product enhancements, and commercial excellence is really fueling the growth of our business, which will be further supplemented in the long term by the new products that we're developing for global markets, such as our nasal swab for lung cancer and our IVD menu. I'm really proud of the great work the entire VeriSight team is doing for patients all over the world. So with that, I'd like to say thank you.
spk07: Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes our call today. Thank you for joining us. You may now disconnect.
spk12: Thank you. you you Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
spk07: Good day and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Verisight first quarter 2023 financial results webcast. At this time, all participants are in listen only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star 1 1 on your telephone. You will then hear an automated message advising your hand is raised. To withdraw your question, please press star 1 1 again. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Shayla Gorman, Director of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.
spk20: Good afternoon, everyone, and thanks for joining us today for a discussion of our first quarter 2023 financial results. With me today are Mark Stapley, Verisight's Chief Executive Officer, and Rebecca Chambers, our Chief Financial Officer. Verisight issued a press release earlier this afternoon detailing our first quarter 2023 financial results. This release, along with a business and financial presentation, is available in the investor relations section of our website at Verisight.com. Before we begin, I'd like to remind you that various statements that we may make during this call will include forward-looking statements as defined under applicable securities laws. Forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties, and the company can give no assurance they will prove to be correct. Further, we are not under any obligation to provide further updates on our business trends or our performance during the quarter. To better understand the risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ, we refer you to the documents that Verisight files with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including Verisight's most recent forms 10-Q and 10-K. In addition, this call will include certain non-GAAP financial measures. Reconciliation of these measures to the most directly comparable GAAP financial measures are included in today's earnings release, accessible from the IR section of Verisight's website. I will now turn the call over to Mark Stapley, Verisight's CEO.
spk13: Thanks, Shayla, and thanks, everyone, for joining us today. I'm very excited to share our first quarter results, which were even better than we anticipated almost across the board. We delivered revenue of $82.4 million, 22% growth over the prior year, driven primarily by our performance of Affirma and Decipher. Further, with our continued focus on financial discipline, we ended the first quarter with cash, cash equivalents, and short-term investments meaningfully ahead of our projections at $178 million, roughly flat for the prior quarter, even with the seasonal use of cash that we anticipated. Behind this balanced approach to growth and capital preservation is our proven framework of identifying a specific clinical unmet need, developing the test to address that need, and securing the clinical evidence, reimbursement, and guideline inclusion required to drive sustained market penetration. This approach is the force behind the performance of our Affirma and Decipher tests and enables us to invest in our long-term growth drivers. This quarter, we delivered close to 12,500 deferment tests for patients being evaluated for thyroid cancer, more than we anticipated given that we had expected a greater impact due to seasonality, which is typical in the first quarter. We saw positive growth trends across both our ordering base and orders per existing provider. On the reimbursement front, we secured four new payer contracts, making the test an in-network benefit for over 4 million additional health plan members. In addition to the outstanding work of our commercial and reimbursement team, I'm excited to share that as part of our initiative to enhance our best-in-class Afirma test, we recently launched the addition of TERT promoter mutation testing to the Afirma report. There have been several studies published recently that correlate the presence of a TERT promoter mutation to a high risk of malignancy, as well as highlighting that such mutations co-occurring with the BRAF B600E variant are associated with a poor prognosis. Given the value of these insights for informing patient care, such as whether more aggressive surgery or treatment is warranted, our team worked hard to develop a high-quality DNA assay that allows us to reliably determine the promoter gene mutation status for patients with suspected or diagnosed thyroid cancer to further empower physicians to optimize clinical decision-making. We believe that product enhancements such as this Along with the work we've done to improve the customer experience and to streamline ordering, we'll continue to benefit Affirma's performance in the coming quarters. Given this, as well as our strong first quarter results, we now expect a bolstered growth rate for Affirma in the high single digits for the fall year. Turning to urology, we continue to expand on the body of evidence surrounding the Decipher prostate test, further helping to establish the test as a new standard of care. At the American Neurological Association annual meeting earlier this week, multiple abstracts were presented focusing on our Decipher test. Particularly exciting was data from two large real-world data sets encompassing more than 100,000 men with prostate cancer, which reinforced the clinical utility of our test. In the first study, researchers paired data from the National Cancer Institute's SEER database with patients who had undergone Decipher prostate testing, and found that use of our test was independently associated with a two-fold increase in conservative management among those with favorable risk disease. In the second study, over 90,000 Decipher prostate test results were linked to electronic health and claims data to demonstrate that the Decipher score at initial diagnosis was independently predictive of risk of metastasis, and after radical prostatectomy, was predictive of both biochemical recurrence and metastasis. In addition to the data presented at AUA, we published a number of studies last month that further advanced the clinical utility evidence for the Decipher prostate test. The first study, published in European Neurology and Oncology, found in a cohort of over 4,000 patients that Decipher prostate could help better identify those patients with early micrometastatic disease who may benefit from upfront treatment intensification. This study adds to growing evidence around the use of Decipher prostate to help inform treatment decision-making and initial diagnosis. Additionally, new data from an analysis of an NCI-sponsored Phase III study published in the International Journal of Radiation Oncology Physics, known as the Red Journal, shows that the deciphered prostate test can help physicians more accurately categorize personal risk and select appropriate treatments for men with intermediate-risk prostate cancer. This is important because prostate cancer deemed intermediate risk by NCCN guidelines is the most heterogeneous of all risk groups in the disease, and a wide variety of treatments is available. Of note, this randomized study in which patients were followed for nearly 13 years is the first to validate any gene expression biomarker in the intermediate risk patient population. The attainment of level one evidence for validation of our test in the most recent NCCN guidelines along with the stellar execution by our team and our differentiated Decipher grid report, led to Q1 Decipher prostate volume of more than 12,500 tests. Like Affirma, this growth was also driven both by strong adoption from new ordering physicians, as well as higher volumes from existing accounts. Building on the framework we've established with Affirma and Decipher, we are making good progress on our long-term growth drivers. Site and patient enrollment for Nightingale the clinical utility study for our perceptor nasal swab continues to progress well, demonstrating the potential for our novel non-invasive test to help guide physicians' next steps for patients with potentially malignant lung nodules. We look forward to presenting expanded preliminary data on the familiarity phase of the trial, which enabled investigators to learn how to incorporate the test into patient management in advance of the clinical utility trial. at the American Thoracic Society, or ATS, international conference later this month. The global launch of our test menu to patients outside the United States is another key long-term growth driver for VeriSight. Our current IVD product offering, ProSigna for breast cancer patients, had a record quarter, delivering close to 3,000 tests, demonstrating traction and adoption supported by clinical evidence. With the submission of our Invisio genomic classifier to European regulators in December 2022, we are now responding to feedback from the notified body. In the meantime, we continue to build clinical evidence for Invisio and are looking forward to the presentation of abstracts at ATS, demonstrating the test's impact on patient management and its ability to predict disease progression in patients with artificial lung disease. We believe our focus on evidence generation will help drive adoption of Invisio globally bolstering the LDT in the U.S. while gaining important KOL support in Europe in preparation for the international launch of the IBD. We're also making good progress building out our broader menu of diagnostic IBDs for the OUS market, with the cypher prostate expected for submission in 2024 and our nasal swab expected for submission in 2025. While our biopharma business is facing significant headwinds over the course of this year, given the impact of a sizable customer pulling back on planned spending and the current macro environment, we continue to advance our unique multi-omic offerings. We were pleased to share three abstracts and host a spotlight theater at the AACR annual meeting, highlighting our distinctive set of assets to help biopharma partners at all points along the drug development process. We are continuing to build out our pipeline of new customers to fuel the long-term growth prospects of this business. As I laid out on our call last quarter, one of the strategic focus areas for 2023 is to identify new opportunities to expand our testing menu beyond our currently available products and the pipeline I outlined. As part of these efforts, we held our first annual discovery day in April, bringing together our R&D, medical, clinical, and commercial teams from across the globe to imagine the future for oncology diagnostics, and Verisight's important role as a leader in shaping that future. I am extremely pleased with the work our teams are doing on this front and our investments to drive the next phase of growth for the company. Before I close, I'd like to highlight the publication of our inaugural Environmental, Social, and Governance Report earlier this week. This ESG report highlights how our mission and values are deeply embedded in our business and demonstrates not only our dedication to transforming patient outcomes all over the world, but also our commitment to our shareholders, employees, business partners, and other stakeholders. I am pleased to provide transparency into our ESG efforts, and I'm excited to build on the foundation we've laid to further advance our program. So in summary, Q1 was a fantastic quarter marked by solid execution across the team. We're excited about our progress today and our clear focus for the future. With that, I will now turn to Rebecca to review our financial results for the quarter and update the expectations for 2023.
spk25: Thanks, Mark. As Mark said, we had another excellent quarter with $82.4 million in revenue, an increase of 22% over the prior year. We grew total volume to approximately 28,800 tests, a 24% increase over the same period of 2022. Quarterly testing revenue was $72.4 million, an increase of 29% year-over-year, driven by higher-than-expected Decipher prostate and Afirma volume, as well as strong cash collections in the quarter. Total testing volume was just under 26,000 tests. Testing ASP was $2,800 per test, benefiting from approximately $2 million of out-of-period collections. Adjusting for this impact, testing AFT would have been slightly greater than $2,700. First quarter product volume was approximately 2,900 tests, and product revenue was $3.9 million, up 31% year over year. Biopharmaceutical and other revenue totaled $6.1 million, down 30% year over year, primarily due to lower IVD contract manufacturing and overall spending constraints across the industry, as previously discussed. Moving to gross margin and operating expenses, I will highlight non-GAAP results, which exclude the amortization of acquired intangible assets as other acquisition-related expenses and restructuring costs, but does include routine stock-based compensation. Non-GAAP gross margin was 68%, up approximately 300 basis points compared to the prior year. Testing growth margin was 73%, up 400 basis points compared to the prior year, benefiting from higher lab volume, mix, and long data collection. Product growth margin was 44%. Biopharmaceutical and other growth margin was 29%, down year over year given lower fixed cost absorption. While we are forecasting a sequential step down in consolidated growth margin as we invest to support our better than expected volume outlook, We are reiterating our full year expectations of non-GAAP growth margins in the mid-60s. Non-GAAP operating expenses excluding cost of revenue grew up 18% year-over-year at $58.1 million, driven by rampant clinical trial and IBD development expenses, as well as higher personnel costs. Research and development expenses increased by $4.2 million to $12.7 million Sales and marketing expenses increased by $2.7 million to $25.2 million, and G&A expenses were up $2.1 million to $20.1 million. We recorded a gap net loss of $8.1 million, which included $8.1 million of stock-based compensation expense and $6.7 million of depreciation and amortization. Overall, we ended the quarter with $177.9 million of cash, cash equivalents, and short-term investments well ahead of our expectations. Turning now to our 2023 guidance, we have updated our projections to $330 million to $340 million, higher than our previous revenue guidance of $325 million to $335 million. This increase is a result of our strong performance in the first quarter and updating testing revenue expectations of mid to high teens. offset by a greater than previously expected decline in biopharma and other revenue. For the remainder of the year, we are forecasting sequential revenue to increase into Q2 and then decline going into Q3 given typical seasonality in the summer holidays before finishing 2023 with quarter-over-quarter growth in the fourth quarter. Moving to our expectations for cash, cash equivalents, and short-term investments, as always, our comments are barring potential M&A. In 2023, we now anticipate maintaining our 2022 year-end cash balance of approximately $180 million, even with the impact of prior acquisition-related contingent consideration. I am proud of how we've started 2023 and look forward to continuing to deliver on our plans and financial projections. We'll now go into the Q&A portion of the call. Operator, please open the lines.
spk07: Thank you. At this time, we will conduct the question and answer session. As a reminder, to ask a question, you will need to press star 1 1 on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, please press star 1 1 again. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster.
spk06: Our first question comes from the line of
spk07: Souda of SBB Securities. Your line is now open.
spk09: Great, thanks. So, Mark, Rebecca, thanks for taking the question. So, first one, Affirma, and I have to say congrats on the really solid beat here and the guide race. So, if you could talk a little bit about that product, what's driving this trend there? Is it the Salesforce, you know, optimization? Is it data? Is it just, you know, more conversations around that product? Maybe just talk to us what's driving the strength in the pharma and, you know, you're modeling high single digit for the year. What could, you know, can you talk a little bit about what could push that a little bit higher or maybe a little bit lower as you go through the year?
spk13: Yeah, thanks, Puneen. Thanks for recognizing the strong performance of the Affirma product and the Affirma team. I think it's pretty much all of the above that you mentioned, but mostly I'd say it's driven by, you know, really strong commercial execution, continued enhancements in the product, and kind of the process of ordering and engaging with physicians. A good example of an enhancement in the product is the launch of TERT, that we recently launched in the quarter that enables further clinical utility of the test. There's always publications, including around TERT and more data and evidence as well. And I think I really do have to give a lot of credit to our sales team who are visiting physicians, visiting customers, talking about the benefits of a firmer with them. You know, there are some competitive dynamics out there, too, and it feels like, you know, we've got some real tailwinds there as well, at least, you know, anecdotally it feels that way. So very excited about how Affirma has been, you know, going so far. In terms of, you know, kind of potential for that growth rate to be any different, I think one of those drivers could always be competitive dynamics, but, you know, We're continuing to add new physicians. We're continuing to broaden the adoption within current physician and provider bases. And so to the extent we're able to take incremental share, that would be helpful to drive that up. Again, there's always competitive dynamics that can go the other way, too. That's why we keep investing in the product and ourselves. Anything you want to add?
spk24: No, you covered it well.
spk09: Got it. That's great. And then just a quick one on the TERT mutation. Does this change the LCD pricing or what you can obtain from commercial pairs here in the near-term or long-term?
spk25: Yeah, thanks, Muneeb. I'll take that one. The answer, for all intents and purposes, is not necessarily. So TERT will be ordered for a subsection of patients. And at this point in time, while there is a code, there isn't necessarily pricing associated with that code. And so We are doing this primarily for the benefits of patients and to ensure continued enhancement of the product We'll obviously work over time on getting that price, but given the list price being in the $300 range, we wouldn't expect that to materially impact ASP one way or the other, even once we're successful getting this contracted and covered. Again, it's a very small percentage of patients for which TERT will be ordered, which is why we don't think even once we are successful in getting covered lives for TERT, we'll have a meaningful impact to ASP, but it's important for those patients critically.
spk13: Yeah, and just to add to that, I mean, you know, only 1% to 2% of thyroid nodules that undergo molecular testing are expected to have TERT promoter mutations, right? The test will be potentially ordered for more than that. That would be the outcome. But, yeah, as Rebecca said, it's a small subset of cases, but important to have.
spk08: Makes sense.
spk09: And then just last one for me on biotech funding. Obviously, the macro situation in biotech funding continues to be a challenge and somewhat reflected in the biopharma revenue this quarter as well. So maybe just, you know, talk to us about sort of what is the level of moderation through the year? What should we be imagining for a step down for the full year within the context of the guide for biopharma? Thank you.
spk13: Yes. I mean, remember, Puneet, this is something I think we called out several quarters ago as a potential headwind, and I think we were fairly early in seeing that. But then again, A, we have a pretty concentrated position with a small number of customers accounting for a large portion of our biopharma revenue. So that's one factor. And B, we're very much involved in the early clinical research work, which is, I think, the area across all of biopharma that is most impacted versus existing ongoing clinical trials and on-market products. So we're feeling the brunt of it. One of our goals has been to diversify our customer portfolio there, and I think we are making good progress at doing that, but we still remain fairly concentrated It's a very small percentage of our revenue. Biopharma and others, roughly 10%. Biopharma is around, you know, just slightly more than half of that. And so, you know, a little movement here and there obviously translates to a fairly big percentage change.
spk25: And, Puneet, just to help with the math a little bit, we've given updated affirma guidance of high single digits, as you cited earlier. We've given updated testing revenue growth for the year of mid to high teens We, you know, we continue to expect the product business to do around mid-teens, and so obviously your back solve is that biopharma and other lines. So, you should get pretty close to it with that map.
spk05: Got it. That works. Okay. Thanks, guys.
spk21: Thank you.
spk07: Thank you.
spk00: One moment for our next question.
spk07: Our next question comes from the line of Mason Carrico of Stevens Inc. Your line is now open.
spk17: Hey, guys. Congrats on the quarter. Really strong performance. Maybe just a quick question here. I know it's probably not this simple, but how promotionally responsive is the thyroid market? Is there somewhat of a linear relationship to repetitions and growth? could adding a few reps potentially bump up that growth rate? Or how are you thinking about, you know, adding reps going forward within your thyroid franchise?
spk13: Yeah, and we've been at this for a lot of years in the thyroid business, so we've got a lot of experience there. And, you know, there's always an optimal point that you get to with commercial teams. And, of course, when you start adding reps, it's not as simple as adding a rep. You have to redesign territories and reallocate territories and that creates some disruption and when you have you know very good relationships between existing reps and their accounts and so you know we always ask ourselves that we have continued to grow that team but we don't have to grow it significantly in order to achieve the kind of results we're getting I think what it's you know what really matters is you know sales rep effectiveness and the sales reps you know having you know, lots to talk about with their customers and a good reason to go and visit another customer and, you know, have a conversation. So a good example, again, is TERT. Again, while it wouldn't be ordered in every patient case, it's another reason to go out and talk to the physician about the addition of TERT and what it means and when they should order it and so on. So just that routine cadence of good, strong communication between our existing sales reps and their customers and then, you know, obviously, being out on the street finding new customers and converting new customers over to a firmer is a big part of it as we've talked about before this product a total you know thyroid testing molecular diagnostic testing is about just over 50% penetrated there's a lot of customers out there a lot of physicians who aren't ordering this test and should be when you actually look at the yield in terms of the number of surgeries that have been avoided thanks to a firmer and it should be a fairly easy conversation, but it takes some investment from the sales team in going out and visiting those accounts.
spk25: And the only thing I would add to that, Mason, is while we are adding headcount here, we're not nearly adding at the same growth rate as revenue is growing, right? So we're seeing immense leverage over the sales and marketing line and expect to continue to do so, which is one of the benefits of the specialty oncology channel. These markets can be served with call it 50, 55 sales heads. And you don't need to build sales forces that are hundreds to just serve different types of physicians. So we obviously really like this model and really are benefiting from a differentiated cash position and cash generation as a result of the leverage we're getting through the sales and marketing line.
spk17: Got it. Thank you. That's helpful. And maybe on Decide for Prostate, I think last I checked, you're at like 195 million covered lives, something like that. Still seems like there's a lot of room to run there. You guys have been publishing a lot of studies. So could I just get your updated thoughts on potential coverage wins or how you're thinking about that going forward?
spk13: Yeah. Yeah, as you quite rightly pointed out, there is a lot of room there. There are some key coverages that we need to get. And, you know, if you think about it, you've got a test here that is very well, you know, reasonably well penetrated, at least so far. It is NCCN Level 1 Guidelines, more than 70 peer-reviewed publications. There is so much evidence out there supporting the use of the test that, you know, it's still a little surprising that it can take, you know, this long. It's not for lack of trying. There are a lot of – we have a market access team that this is what they do. and they're working with payers in order to drive the coverage decisions. So more to come on that in the future. That's one of the opportunities that we have for future tailwinds here, and we've just got to keep driving it. We're still getting, as you heard today, a firm that's been on the market, what now, 11, 12 years, and we're still driving commercial coverage in some cases. So it's a core part of what we have to do in diagnostics, as you know.
spk25: And, Mason, as we shared, I think, on the last earnings call, we're expecting the vast majority of the Decipher growth to come from volume, as it already has quite a favorable ASP. And this quarter was no different. Affirma volume grew in the mid-40s. Pricing did add a little bit, but I'm sorry, I said Affirma, I meant Decipher. Decipher, I mean, I would be very happy with Affirma volume growth in the mid-40s as well, but Decipher grew in the mid-40s. And price there was not necessarily, you know, it added a little bit to it, but the vast majority of the growth came from volume. Thanks for bearing with me for stating the wrong thing.
spk17: All good. Thanks, guys. Appreciate you taking the questions. Pleasure. Thank you.
spk07: Thank you. One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Matt Sykes of Goldman Sachs. Your line is open.
spk02: Hi, good afternoon. Thanks for taking my questions, and congrats on the performance this quarter. Maybe, Rebecca, I just wanted to start out on the OPEC side. I know there was a bit of an increase. Obviously, the revenues were up as well. You had mentioned IVD development, ramping clinical trials, but just what should we expect from an OPEC standpoint this quarter? You gave kind of the gross margin guide, but just sort of below that, can you kind of give us a sense for OPEX trends over the course of this year?
spk25: Yeah, happy to. And obviously, if you look at our year-over-year growth, a good chunk of that came from increased R&D, as we cited in the prepared remarks. And we're investing heavily not only in IVD development, but also in the Nightingale study for the benefit of nasal swab. We expect that trend of sequential growth for R&D to continue throughout the course of the year. R&D growth will be the largest contributor to optics growth over the course of 2023. As I mentioned earlier, sales and marketing is not expected to grow that materially throughout the year, if anything. And so, you know, again, that's a great source of leverage for us. And on the G&A line, as we invest in really ensuring the systems and facilities and infrastructure to scale over the course of the coming years, especially with the incremental volume growth we're seeing, we will expect G&A to grow slightly, albeit at much less of a growth rate than R&D.
spk02: Got it. And then just maybe to follow up on some of the comments or questions that have been asked on Decipher, and thank you for that volume number. I'm just wondering, I think in your March presentation, you saw the penetration rate around 25%. So I assume that's probably pretty consistent with where we are today. But just maybe any update on sort of the competitive landscape that you're seeing there and where you're seeing sort of the most traction with that product, just given the volume growth.
spk13: Yeah. And remember, I think a couple of factors at play here. One is, as we talked about last time, the incidence of prostate cancer is growing. You can see that it was around 7% growth, and so that's partially driving the whole market to be larger. In terms of the 25% penetration, that was our rough map at the end of last year. So it's tough to update that when not everybody gives you numbers, and it's hard to tell. But I would say clearly we're continuing to take share when, as Rebecca just mentioned, you know, this business grew in the mid-40s quarter over quarter, it certainly feels like that represents some share gains as well as, you know, taking share and, you know, growing the overall market.
spk02: Got it. And if I can just ask one last just clarification question, because I think you talked about in your prepared remarks, but just remind me on the ramp in Europe for the IBDs, you obviously have Persigna. Is it Invisia, Decipher Prostate, then Percepta? in sort of like 24, 25 time period, or could you just maybe help me outline that a little bit better?
spk13: Yeah, so, yeah, thanks for the question. In Vizia, so starting with Prasigna, which is on market today and actually had a good quarter, and we talked about, you know, the growth there and how well that tested so far with close to 3,000 in the quarter, which is actually a record quarter for that product, which is great news. And then in Vizia, we submitted in December last year, a little ahead of schedule, And as I mentioned in the beginning of the call, we're dealing with comments from the notified body, which is a normal part of the process, what we expected, and there's a back and forth there, and I still can't give a sense of time and when that will be approved, as the IVDR process is so untried and tested still at this point. We're gonna submit, you've got your timing right there, we're gonna submit Decipher Prostate in 2024, and we're gonna submit Nasal Swab in 2025, and then they'll go through a very similar review and response process.
spk02: Great. Thanks for clearing that up. Appreciate it, Mark, and congrats again.
spk07: All right. Thank you. One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from the line of Andrew Brockman of William Blair. Your line is open.
spk18: Hey, good afternoon, and thanks for taking the questions. A lot's been asked already, but maybe if I could just do a housekeeping question here. Can you just sort of reiterate or remind us around timelines for the Nightingale study? Is it still on track to finish enrollment later this year, and how should we be thinking about a potential readout? Thanks.
spk13: Yeah, thanks for the question there. And Nightingale, yeah, actually the progress has been really good in terms of signing up new sites. And our clinical team has done an excellent job at contracting and getting those going. And with patients starting to enroll in those sites, we're starting to see some nice uptake here. Still expecting around the end of the year to pull through the last patient in the trial. In terms of the readout, that's where there's a lot of variability because, as I think I talked about before, we're going to take a few bites of the apple here in terms of looking at some short-term analysis. and clearly how much we can use that to drive the appropriate clinical utility conversations for reimbursement will depend on the results of that analysis. So there's a couple of pathways there that we're pursuing in order to move as quickly as possible to reimbursement. But ultimately, as we've said before, we've got to get the clinical utility data you know, published, which is, you know, takes time, and then, you know, then that drives the reimbursement conversation, which also takes time.
spk25: Yeah, and just one thing to add there is the guidelines point to a two-year follow-up, and we hope that we'll be able to effectively do a shorter follow-up than that, but the longest follow-up that would be required before we go through the publication or early readout would be up to two years.
spk18: Okay, thanks. And then, Rebecca, I've got a boring modeling question for you. I think you mentioned a sequential step down in gross margin. Can you just maybe give a little bit more color around what's driving that? Thanks.
spk25: Absolutely. I'd be happy to. So, obviously, we were very pleased with our gross margin this quarter, and especially the testing gross margin line. But overall, you know, we really did benefit from fixed cost absorption, both on the labor and overhead side this quarter. the benefit of mix, as well as the benefit of the $2 million of prior period collections flowing down at 100%. If you look forward with the sequential impact you cited, we will not necessarily have that benefit of the prior period collections, and so that will be a headwind sequentially. And we have been running incredibly lean in the lab. A couple hundred basis points with the majority of that coming from labor absorption is not a sustainable business model. And so we will be to ensure the ability to continue to grow at increased volume levels, we're seeing we are going to have to staff up in the lab, which will also impact gross margins on a sequential basis. In addition to that, we are expanding our laboratory here in San Diego to take into account the growth of the Decipher franchise. We will be buying instruments. We'll be taking on incremental space. All that also will impact margin. So it's a good news story in the end because we're growing a little bit faster than we had expected. But, you know, obviously we need to invest in that growth. And, you know, even a mid-60s margin is a pretty solid one. And so even though it's a slight sequential step down, I'll take it all day long for the growth we're seeing. Okay.
spk18: Great to hear. Thanks.
spk07: Thank you. One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Mike Mattson of Needham and Company. Your line is open.
spk16: Hi, guys. This is Joseph on for Mike. Maybe another question on Affirma. You know, now that TERT testing has been added, maybe looking back to when, I guess, Expression Atlas was introduced for the test, I guess I'm assuming that, you know, Expression Atlas is probably ordered or will be ordered a lot more. But in terms of your sales force and productivity, maybe when that add-on was introduced, did you see, you know, a large uptick in interest from new physicians or what have you? And maybe are you kind of expecting a similar thing going forward with the TERT testing? Thank you.
spk13: Yeah, the way I would look at it is, as I said earlier, the TERT testing, it's really important for some of our physicians because it's important for some of our patients that we're able to provide a readout on TERT. But it gives the sales team a really good reason to go and have the conversation with the physician about the enhancement to the product. And XA would have done the same thing. And now we're making this kind of more of a A blended product cell, the salesperson is speaking to the physician about Affirma as a group of products which includes Affirma and it includes, the genomic people who pass by it includes, you know, XA as well as CURT if you check that box. And so it's actually just, you know, a very more straightforward conversation at this point. I wouldn't look necessarily to drive, as Rebecca said earlier, in terms of, you know, the ordering patterns for the significant incremental sales on its own. But I just think it helps to continuously enhance the product and make sure that we're providing physicians what they need to be able to deliver the insights to patients.
spk16: Okay. Thanks for the color on that. Maybe a question on encounter. Just looking at the installed base, maybe without getting into the numbers, in Europe, just looking where these machines are installed, whether hospital labs or clinical labs, maybe that versus academic institutions or pharma. You know, if you have an idea on the split there, and maybe the same question for the U.S. installed base.
spk13: I don't really think about it in terms of the nature of the installed base. If you think about Europe, once we get the regulatory approval for a new test to add to the encounter menu, which is obviously the strategy here, even if we get the regulatory approval, we have to go country by country to drive reimbursement. And then once you've got that reimbursement decision in the country, you go lab by lab to drive placements. Now, the placements could be in academic labs. It could be in smaller clinical labs. It's really going to be driven by the menu and the flow through of patients in those facilities. And so, you know, and it's not really about the current installed base because we're also going to have to place new instruments in order to drive that. And to do that, we need to have the menu on the platform, hence the strategy. So, yeah, I think about it more in terms of going country by country, and that's the important way to focus on it, including, you know, in the U.S. as well.
spk25: Yeah, the only thing I would add is... We obviously are selling Prosigna in the U.S. I would say the vast majority of revenue is actually outside the U.S. I think that is where we put the majority of our investment to develop those OUS markets, so just something to keep in mind.
spk16: Yeah, okay, that makes sense. And then maybe just one last one. In terms of the biopharma revenue, you had mentioned in your prepared remarks that not only from IBD development that you're seeing some pullback, but as well as some of the, I guess, earlier stage services or clinical trial services that you guys do. Has there, you know, been any effect in terms of maybe licensing revenue from the Decipher Grid database or your guys' other databases? Maybe how is that trended here in 2022 and the start of 2023?
spk13: Yeah, just maybe a reminder, the majority of our biopharma revenue is coming from our immuno-oncology business, which itself stems from the Halo DX acquisition, and a lot of it is outside of the US. There is a little bit of US-related revenue that is associated with kind of the former Verisight and Decipher businesses. But the majority of the impact we're seeing in the decline is on that immuno-oncology side. And so that's where we're seeing the effect. And that's the bit that's involved in the very early, you know, biomarker development, you know, work where you're more likely to see that impact. So, no, I'd say there's no read-through there in terms of the decisive grid-related activity. There's a lot of interest in that. But, yeah, I wouldn't say that's the biggest driver.
spk16: Okay, great. Makes sense. Thank you very much for taking our questions.
spk07: Thank you. One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from the line of Taya Savant of Morgan Stanley. Your line is now open.
spk14: Hey, guys. Good evening. So maybe I'll start with a real simple one for you, Rebecca. Is it fair to assume that in terms of those out-of-period collections that you called out, you know, $2 million impact here in the first quarter, you're essentially zeroing it out in the guide for the rest of the year?
spk01: Yeah, that's fair.
spk14: Okay, perfect. And then, Mark, a big picture one for you on Biopharma, I know you called out sort of, you know, the sizable customers are pulling back on spend, et cetera, but As you look to the next sort of three years or so, are there any key missing pieces in your offering that will make it sort of really step up here in terms of the traction and help Verisight sort of participate more substantively in that opportunity?
spk13: Yeah, it's a great question. I don't think that there are, and to the extent there are, we're working on developing those, but the biggest of which is our biopharma atlas. because we believe that there's a really interesting market demand for that. And so that's what we're working on, because that's one of the things we think is going to drive revenue growth in this business. But I think we have most of what we need today. I mean, we have custom assays, whether they be in immunohistochemistry for proteins, or we have RNA expression-based assays, multiple versions of that. We have DNA that we can do out of our lab in Marseille and also here. We've got the capabilities, plus, of course, AI capabilities on top of that, which is a lot of what's behind the Atlas work. So we've got the capabilities, we've got the assays, we've got the lab, we've got the people. We just need to drive more success on the selling side and bring more of those biopharma customers in. In the current macro environment, that's a more difficult conversation. I don't expect that current macro environment to last for the next three years. I would certainly hope not. We're starting to get traction, and we'll see how that pans out. In our guide, we're being a little bit more bearish on this side of the business right now, given some of the trends that we've seen.
spk14: Got it. Makes sense. And then on the Encounter menu, Mark, I think you've pointed to the Cypher Prostate in 2024 as a particularly important submission. Is there anything you can do that's within your control to pull it forward? Obviously, the approval timelines and then the reimbursement timelines by country are largely out of your control, but in terms of the submission itself to the Europeans, anything you can do to accelerate it?
spk13: No, it already has been. Relative to the original timeline that we looked at for all of these products on the platform, we pulled it forward substantially. It's not happening in series. I think that's an important point to make. We don't work on Invisia, then start work on Decipher, then start work on NasalSwap. All three have been happening in parallel. But they were just at different stages of development. So the work to bridge over the Decipher assets to the Encounter platform has been progressing very well and we've made good progress there and we're moving to the next stage of that. So it's going to go as fast as it can go with our current plan and roadmap and there's not really much we can do. The most important thing we can do to speed things up is on the notified body review and making sure that what we submit is a very thorough and detailed dossier. The work that we're doing on Invisio, and we always thought it would be this way, it's kind of like a pilot for us. It's giving us some of that sense of what the new notified body under the new IVDR process is looking for that might be different from what it used to be. Our team's got 15 years of experience in doing this, but the The regulatory process is new, as you know, and so there's a lot of learning for the notified body and anyone who's submitting. So that should help hopefully speed Decipher along and make it a little bit smoother. The other thing is we can point to the extensive evidence that we have for the Decipher test in the US and outside the US, and hopefully that drives the notified bodies accordingly because there are patients at the end of this that need this test in Europe. So a lot more to come on that, but yeah, we're going to go as fast as we can.
spk14: Got it. That's helpful. And then one final one for me on M&A. I mean, Mark, in the past, you've talked about sort of staying away from the cash guzzlers in this space, so to speak, either in cancer screening or perhaps even in the metastatic setting via MRD, etc., Is that sort of a red line for you as you think about, you know, the M&A opportunities in the pipeline? I mean, obviously, and I'm assuming seller willingness here has gotten a little bit better following the regional banking crises. So could we at some point sort of see you dabble in that space, or is that just sort of off limits in terms of how you think about it philosophically?
spk13: I'd start by saying no change in our philosophy around M&A, right? So I've said it before, we We'll obviously not be blind to opportunities. We'll keep our eyes open for things that make sense, but the bar is very, very high for us. In terms of the care continuum itself, yeah, we're not necessarily looking to enter that healthy screening area because there's a lot of people doing that, and it's a significantly heavy investment. But as far as dealing with cancer patients or patients who are suspected of having cancer, that's right in our sweet spot. all the way across the care continuum once you've been identified as a patient. And that's where you're going to see us always continue to focus.
spk15: Fair enough. Thank you, guys. Appreciate the time.
spk07: Thank you. One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Songji Nam of Scotiabank. Your line is open.
spk23: Hi, thanks for taking the question. One more question on your encounter IVB strategy. Mark, do you think there will be market opportunities for laboratories wanting to just adopt one test on the platform, or do you think for this model to work that you would have to see, you know, multiple tests being adopted? How do you see that playing out? I don't know if it's too early to tell, but.
spk13: No, but it's actually the right question, because we've said all along, you know, you need an extensive menu to drive adoption, and that's what we're building. I mean, an extensive, you know, I mean, if you think about it this way, having a breast test, which we do have, Invisia is more of a rare disease, so I don't think that necessarily, you know, steps up the adoption on its own. Prostate, significant indications, significant disease, pent-up demand. that starts to really move the needle. And then if you think about adding nasal swab on top of that, where the population, the potential use cases are much more significant, then you really get into, that is the point where you get to a very extensive menu, and that makes it much easier to have those placement conversations than just having ProSigna today. Having said that, we are seeing some traction, albeit small, with just the breast cancer test today. But it's gonna take the menu to drive it.
spk23: Got it. And the one for Rebecca, thank you for the cash flow guidance for the year. Sorry I missed it. Sorry if I missed it, but was wondering if there might be any kind of upcoming pipeline, you know, development initiatives or, you know, any activities associated with any of the commercial launches next year that could potentially drive accelerated cash use next year?
spk25: Fair enough question, Sanjeev. We haven't gotten into our budgeting exercise for next year, so it's premature to discuss. That being said, I know Mark and I share the same philosophy, and that is one where we're going to do our best at any point in time to balance investment with cash generation. And so while in any given quarter or any given year, you know, the scale may tip slightly one way or the other overall, You know, we're absolutely focusing on balancing those two sides, if you will. So not committing to anything, given we haven't budgeted yet, but, you know, I think that's the overall philosophy that we abide by day in, day out.
spk13: Yeah, I think I'd add to that. You know, something that I think is evident to everybody that really fuels and drives our business, whether we're talking about Affirma and Decipher or the adoption of Invisia or, you know, the IBD strategy outside the U.S. is evidence generation and evidence development. This year we're investing heavily in Nightingale for nasal swab. We always invest somewhat in driving more evidence for Decipher, and we're going to be investing in evidence development for our IBD business outside the U.S. And so to the extent, you know, we feel that there's the affordability to be able to do that within the parameters that we've set, we will continue to do that and fund studies and make sure the evidence development is really helping drive our business.
spk23: Great. Thank you so much.
spk22: Thanks, Sanjeev.
spk07: Thank you. One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from the line of Andrew Cooper of Raymond James. Your line is now open.
spk19: Hey, everybody. Thanks for the question. A lot's been asked. So maybe just One more on sort of the margin side of things, the cost side of things. In terms of one of the costs you made, you talked about personnel costs. Can you just give us a sense, you know, as you look to add maybe some heads in R&D, some heads in sales and marketing, maybe a little bit more measured of a way, how much of that is incremental heads versus, hey, wage inflation is really starting to kind of hit you? Just a sense for kind of the hiring environment out there and what you're seeing on the wage and labor side would be helpful.
spk25: Yeah, happy to do so. I would say it's a little bit of both. On the wage side, given the inflationary environment, when we set our merit budget for this year, we did take that into account. And so I would say it was slightly elevated, though not materially so, versus prior years. And so that would be one point. The other point is we are adding heads. and doing so in areas where we think both from a laboratory perspective as well as across the operating lines, we'll get a meaningful return from, and I think that's relatively evident. I would say the third thing in the first quarter, you always have your benefit reset. and your expense and tax reset, which obviously does impact the first quarter more so than others. And you obviously see that in our OpEx figures this quarter as well. So I would kind of think about those three things as being the primary drivers. And I think going forward, while we're adding some heads, we're You know, we're very comfortable with the budget we've set, and we're very comfortable with, you know, even being vastly ahead on the cash side than where we had expected to be at this point in the year. So, you know, I think our investment levels are quite prudent. And, you know, I think from a cash – ending cash forecast of 2023, we're really happy with where we are ending – forecasting to end at this point in time.
spk13: And from a hiring environment standpoint, I would say it's certainly a lot better than it was before. And we're really, at most levels, having very little trouble finding great people to join our company. And we've placed and brought on some really good talent recently. So it's nice to be able to be hiring right now.
spk19: Great. And then just one more from me. Can you give us a little bit more detail on some of the The efforts and the progress being made on the manufacturing front in terms of continuing down that transition from NanoString to yourself internally, what are some of the guideposts we should be thinking about through the year? And has there been any surprises or anything that has changed from the last update on that front?
spk13: No, nothing new. It's continuing well. And the activity to transition that over to our team in France is progressing as we had planned. And the idea is to have that done at the end of this year. And so we're on track to be able to do that.
spk25: And I wouldn't expect, I mean, this is a day-in, day-out type of thing at this point in time. You probably won't get meaningful updates until it's done. So, you know, no news is good news, if you will.
spk05: Yep.
spk19: Okay, great. Well, nice quarter, and I will stop there. I appreciate it. Okay.
spk07: All right. Thank you so much. This concludes the Q&A portion. I would now like to turn it back to Mark Stapley for closing remarks.
spk13: Thanks, Stephen. I appreciate it. So just to wrap up, obviously I'm very pleased with the performance of our core testing business in the first quarter with both Affirma and Decipher exceeding our expectations. And it's good to see our efforts on market access and adoption in Europe drive a strong quarter for our product business. Our focus on the evidence development, product enhancements, and commercial excellence is really fueling the growth of our business, which will be further supplemented in the long term by the new products that we're developing for global markets, such as our nasal swab for lung cancer and our IBD menu. I'm really proud of the great work the entire VeriSight team is doing for patients all over the world. So with that, I'd like to say thank you.
spk07: Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes our call today. Thank you for joining us. You may now disconnect.
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