Exagen Inc.

Greetings. Welcome to the ExaGen Inc. second quarter 2023 earnings call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. A question and answer session will follow the formal presentation. If anyone should require operator assistance during the call, please press star zero on your telephone keypad. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. At this time, I would like to hand the call over to Ryan Douglas of Investor Relations. Thank you. You may begin.

Good morning, and thank you for joining us. Earlier today, Exogen, Inc. released financial results for the quarter ended June 30th, 2023. The release is currently available on the company's website at www.exogen.com. Chana Bali, President and Chief Executive Officer, Kamala Dowie, Chief Financial Officer, will host this morning's call. Before we get started, I'd like to remind everyone that management will be making statements during this call that include forward-looking statements within the meaning of federal security laws, which are made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation and Reform Act of 1995. Any statements contained in this call that are not statements of historical facts should be deemed to be forward-looking statements. All forward-looking statements, including and without limitation, statements regarding our business strategy and future financial and operating performance, including guidance for the quarter, potential profitability, Our current and future product offerings and reimbursement and coverage are based upon current estimates and various assumptions. These statements involve material risk and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those anticipated or implied by these forward-looking statements. Accordingly, you should not place undue reliance on these statements. For a list and description of risk and uncertainties associated with our business, please see our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission including our Form 10-K for the year ended December 31st, 2022, and any subsequent filings. The information provided in this conference call speaks only to the live broadcast today, August 7th, 2023. Exogen disclaims any intention or obligation, except as required by law, to update or revise any information, financial projections, or other forward-looking statements, whether because of new information, future events, or otherwise. I'll now turn the call over to John Abali, President and CEO of Exygen. Thanks, Ryan, and thank you to everyone joining the call.

Today I'll discuss our second quarter results and provide updates on our revenue cycle initiatives, including our path to profitability. I'll then turn over the call to Kamal, our CFO, for details on our financial performance. Our strategy to prioritize and focus on advised CTD has resulted in another strong quarter with over 37,000 advised CTD tests delivered and total revenues of $14.1 million. As a reminder, we've made substantial changes to the structure and size of our sales team, and we believe that our Q2 performance is testament to the fact that we've continued to serve the rheumatology community in a highly effective manner. I'm encouraged to see consecutive quarterly growth in volume as we make operational improvements to our business, but this also reinforces the strategic decisions we made at the end of last year. Exygen has significant opportunity ahead, and we're really starting to get on track as a team. It's exciting to see our progress reflected in the performance of the company this quarter. Our revenue for the second quarter was reflective of the strong testing demand and volume delivered in Q2, but also a result of improved cash collections from testing performed in prior quarters. We continue to focus heavily on our revenue cycle operations and have made major strides in Q2 to improve our processes, which I'll detail shortly. We expect to see incremental improvement in ASP as we move into early 2024, but we believe these early improvements in cash collections are a positive sign. Overall, we're seeing positive momentum in our operations and our efforts to achieve profitability continue to progress. One of the key metrics where we saw improvement quarter over quarter was our trailing 12-month ASP, which increased to $320 from $279. The increase in Q2 was aided by timing of cash collections on claims from prior periods, which we don't necessarily expect to recur each quarter. However, this was nonetheless a positive development reflected in the improvement in ASP. In general, we're beginning to trend in the right direction, but expect the bulk of our efforts to materialize into 2024. As we conveyed in Q1, we held claims to give ourselves time to optimize our appeal process, including an effort to increase the overall volume, quality, and persistence of appeals. To give some color on the extent of our efforts to date, we've brought in new leadership to this area of our business. We've worked with a technical writer to revise all appeal letters sent to payers on denied claims. We've restructured the appeals process with our internal team, redefining roles and responsibilities for every person involved in the process. We've worked with our clients to improve the clinical notes they draft on each patient to better communicate the rationale for ordering and utilizing advice. We've worked to improve the process for exchanging these progress notes with our team, to lessen the burden on our customer staff. We've brought in other personnel to increase the outbound calls to insurance companies, allowing us to keep better track of our appeal status. We've strengthened the documentation around test ordering, and the list continues. These efforts have been a substantial adjustment compared to what we were doing even six months ago, and we're still making progress to execute efficiently with these changes. All this requires communication and resetting of expectations with our customers, in a manner which minimizes disruption and reinforces the value they've seen with advised testing for the last 12 years. We continue to focus on achieving a profitable business. We refinanced our loan this quarter, which included a principal payment of $10 million. Our changes to revenue cycle management increased our accounts receivable by $6.9 million. Excluding these two items, our cash decreased $3.8 million in the second quarter. We are making progress in all areas of the company to operate as a leaner, more effective organization, and the team at Exogen is striving to deliver the best service in the industry with a markedly improved cost structure. Additionally, we continue to expect our annual R&D expenses to approach six million, and therefore our Q2 performance was aided by the timing of some of these expected expenses. As an ancillary item, We recently reached an agreement in principle with the Department of Justice to settle an investigation that was initiated in February of 2022. This investigation was related to conduct that occurred in 2014 and 2015. We agreed in principle to make a settlement payment with associated fees of approximately $700,000 and admitted to certain facts, although we did not concede liability. The DOJ will not require an outside compliance monitor to oversee our operations going forward. The definitive settlement agreement is subject to further negotiations, but ultimately, we look forward to putting this issue behind us so we can continue to focus on operating the business. In closing, it's rewarding to see another quarter where our organizational performance is turning in the right direction. This is testament to the hard work of the Exogen team and the value advised testing provides to the rheumatology community. I'm very encouraged by our recent performance, knowing that we continue to improve in many areas and have yet to see the results from several ongoing efforts. Before I hand the call over to Kamal, I'd like to note that at our annual meeting this past quarter, Jim Tolis retired as a member of the Exogen Board of Directors. Jim had been a director on the board for nine years and a vital member of the team. I want to thank Jim for his guidance and support to me personally. Jim has been a strong supporter of Exogen throughout much of the company's history, and we wish him well. Additionally, I'd like to extend a warm welcome to Paul Kim, the newest member of our board. Paul joins us with vast business and leadership experience and currently serves as the CFO of Full Gent Genetics, where he played a pivotal role in growing the company into successful and profitable business. I'll now turn the call over to Kamal.

Thank you, John, and good morning, everyone. For Q2 2023, total revenues were $14.1 million compared with $11.2 million in Q1 of 2023 and $7.6 million in the second quarter of 2022. As a reminder, for year-over-year comparisons, in 2022, payments from Medicare were delayed from Q2 to Q3. Sequential quarter growth in revenue was driven primarily by an increase in ASP. The increase in ASP was a result of improved collections from prior quarters dating back to Q1 2022, mostly due to greater-than-expected cash collections. Testing volumes for revised CTD were record $37,749. Other testing revenue was $1.6 million in the second quarter of 2023, compared with $1.4 million in the first quarter of 2023 and $1.7 million in the second quarter of 2022. Cost of revenue were $5.8 million in Q2, resulting in a total gross margin of 58.7%. compared to 47.2% in Q1 of 2023 and 20.1% in the second quarter of 2022. The increase in gross margin percentage from the first quarter was primarily due to increased accrual rates from improved collections in prior periods. Operating expenses were $19.1 million in the second quarter of 2023 compared with $21.7 million in the second quarter of 2022 primarily driven by a decrease in employer-related expenses due to the reduction in force in early December 2022. For the second quarter of 2023, our net loss was $5 million, compared with a net loss of $7.7 million for the first quarter of 2023 and $14.7 million for the second quarter of 2022. As a reminder, we refinanced our debt on April 28th which included a principal prepayment of $10 million. The refinance was through our existing lender and the current balance of the loan is $18.1 million. The terms of the agreement include a floating interest rate, which is a greater of 10% or prime plus 2%, resetting the interest-only period to three years, the implementation of a new management plan, and improved covenants. Cash and cash equivalents as of June 30th, 2023 were approximately $31.5 million. As John mentioned, with our revenue cycle management strategy, the claims held in Q1 and Q2 contributed to the AR balance increasing to $16.2 million, which is offset by a lower cash balance. Overall, the company is performing better operationally than we were even a few quarters ago, and we're seeing the results in our key metrics. As you heard from John, excluding the loan principal prepayment and changes in AR, this resulted in a decrease in our cash balance of $3.8 million in the second quarter. I'm very proud of the team and the changes we have implemented as we're off to a great start in our path to profitability. Our costs of revenue are lower, our operations are much more efficient, and all departments have goals that align across the organization and continue to drive improved operations. Not to get lost in all the numbers, but just as important is the culture of the organization. I originally joined the company almost 10 years ago, and the culture is stronger than I've ever seen, which is reinforced by a decrease in our trailing 12-month voluntary turnover rate. The rate has decreased 36% from the end of 2022 to June 30th. Turning to guidance, some of the changes in revenue cycle management that John mentioned will have an impact on future quarters. We're modeling the softening and volume in Q3 due to changes in revenue cycle optimization, but are anticipating the lower volume to begin to be offset by higher ASPs in 2024. For Q3, we are providing revenue guidance in the range of 10 to 10.5 million. We will now open the call for questions.

Thank you. We will now be conducting a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star 1 on your telephone keypad. A confirmation tone will indicate your line is in the question queue. You may press star 2 to remove yourself from the queue. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the star key. One moment, please, while we poll for your questions. Our first questions come from the line of Dan Brennan with TD Cowan. Please proceed with your questions.

Great. Thanks for taking the questions. Congrats on the quarter. Maybe just a couple. Maybe just in terms of the benefit this quarter that you had from past collections, can you just quantify kind of what that was? And then are you expecting any more benefit in the back half of the year?

Hi, Dan. Thanks for the question. Yes. the prior period collections that were received in Q2 of 23, but mainly took place in prior year, it was just under $2 million. This is a very positive impact, but I view it as one time. It's very tough to quantify if this is going to occur again. So this comes from mainly 2022, and sometimes there are payments that take up to a year to be received, but I wouldn't anticipate it to be as large as what we just saw for 2022 and future quarters.

Great. And then on the burn in the quarter, so the way I understand it is I guess when you net out, you know, some of the changes that you had there, it sounds like you're basically saying your underlying cash burn was $3.8 million. If that's correct, then what level of burden, which is a nice step down, obviously, from what you guys have been having, what level of burden should we be expecting in the back half of the year? And with the impact on the accounts receivables that you highlighted, is that going to stop? So should we see that kind of normalized going forward?

Great. Good morning, Dan. This is John. So here's kind of the way we think about the cash burden in general. if I can open up the question a little bit more broadly. So we burned almost 40 million of cash or an average of just over 9 million of cash per quarter in 2022. So far here in 2023, looking at the change in cash, as you mentioned, accounting for the AR as well as our debt principal payment, we burned approximately 11 million operating the company these past two quarters. And that was driven largely by some of the improvements we made. Just to recap, We've had the reduction in force of 42 individuals at the end of Q4. That was a substantial cost savings. We've completed the evaluation of our R&D pipeline. We've set up criteria to pursue what we consider real business opportunities. These also strive to ensure financial success of the projects we're working to develop. We've worked to reduce the cost of our internal operations, and we've seen a reduction in our COGS as well. You see that with the Similar overall COG expense, yet an increase in volume year over year. We've created an awareness and accountability at the company level from a budgeting standpoint. That's been one of the key things I've worked to implement is transparency into the expenses that we're incurring as a business all the way throughout the organization, especially at the department head level. And then everyone has generally bought into our efforts to reduce costs. Kamal spoke to it a little bit about the culture. It's certainly a team effort, but it's embraced that way. So we intentionally held claims the first part of the year because we have the cash to do so and because we are working to improve our revenue cycle operations. I gave details in prior quarters, but this was a huge undertaking and a significant opportunity for us. We began releasing these claims at the end of the quarter, and this will obviously slow the pace of cash firms going forward is how we look at it. I'll let Kamal maybe speak a little bit more on some of the specifics, but I wanted to our view here. We're ahead of schedule with the strategy we've put in place. Very positive from our standpoint. The success we're having in reducing the cash use for operations has come down pretty substantially. Dramatic changes relative to where we were really even six months ago. Our AR balance has increased, as we said, about $10 million here in 2023. It gives a sense of the cash we expect to collect over the next several months. That should be weighed in as well when considering our cash balance. But ultimately, we're always looking for ways to improve the organization. So I'll let Kamal maybe speak a little bit to the cash burn for future quarters and how we're thinking about that too.

Yeah, thanks, John. So as John mentioned, AIR was one of the items that we have to exclude to get the number 3.8. And part of the reason why it increased from quarter in Q1. And so in regards to cash burn going forward, we're providing guidance on a quarterly basis. Because sometimes there's quarters like we just had in Q2 where we had very positive impact from that just under $2 million of additional collections received from prior periods into Q2. And it's tough to see the timing of some of these items. That had a very positive impact on our gross margins. We saw those increase to 58.7%. But again, very tough to project the timing to that. On the previous call, what I had mentioned on the Q1 earnings was we were at a $7 million cash flow in Q1. And we would see it gradually come down quarter after quarter. Now again, Q2 was very pleasant surprise with the additional collections. But that wasn't projected. did say that we would expect to see it come down slightly each quarter. That has not changed. That is still what we believe. We just had a really good Q2, but we believe that we're going to see those year-over-year improvements. But again, starting at $7 million in Q1 and coming down from there.

Great. Thank you. And maybe just one last one. The 3Q volume guidance, obviously, you guys are on a journey here over the next couple of years. So not to get lost. incremental, but why would the volumes go lower in 3Q given all the positive changes you guys are putting in place? I know you've talked about on the last call maybe some in the near term could have some disruptions from the Salesforce realignment and then eventually you begin to see the positive benefit, but is that the reason why you're guiding sequentially lower volumes?

Certainly. So to give a little extra color there, Dan, in Q1, Q2, we expected some impact from the reduction to the Salesforce. I think we've detailed it. That extensively, of the 42 individuals that were caught up in the reduction at the end of December, a third of that was sales-based. So we expected some impact of volume from reducing our U.S.-based footprint by about 30% or so. That was factored into our Q1 and Q2 guidance. It didn't happen, to be totally frank. And we've seen now multiple quarters that even with a more streamlined and condensed Salesforce were able to deliver actually record growth here. So that's been very pleasant. What we're factoring in in Q3 are some changes to our revenue cycle operations, which are being translated to the customer. So just to give you a sense, one example, we've implemented a new billing policy this past quarter toward the end of this past quarter, which increases the cost sharing proportion for patients on our testing. The price of the advised test really hasn't changed in about a decade. And so we're making those changes as we've, you know, telegraphed pretty clearly, you know, as we pursue profitable, more profitable business. And so these changes will improve the profitability of our portfolio, we anticipate, but could have some near-term impact to volume. And so, again, the magnitude and timing are always challenging to know ahead of time, but that's really what we factored into in our Q3 guide.

Great. Thank you very much. I'll go back in the queue.

Thank you. Our next question has come from the line of Mark Massara with VTIG. Please proceed with your questions.

Hey, guys. Thanks so much. Congrats on the strong revenue growth and reduction in cash burn. I guess one for you, John. You know, you've outlined a lot of changes to revenue cycle management, and certainly I appreciate a lot of the color that you provided. I think it would be interesting to get your sense for, like, what inning do you think we're in with the changes to revenue cycle management. I'm just trying to determine how much continued improvement do you think we could see as we think about the business into 2024 and beyond?

Great. Good morning, Mark. Thanks for joining the call. Thanks for the question. What inning we're in, I love it. I love the baseball analogy, especially given the season. So from my standpoint, I think we're early innings. And the reason I say that is because we've put a lot of work in terms of prepping. That's what I've considered much of the first half of 2023 to be, a lot of game planning there. And we're starting to put some of those efforts into play, really. So the whole point of holding claims, just to give context to those comments, the whole point of holding claims was that we didn't trigger timely filing deadlines for our appeals process. And the core... kind of a core tenet to our improvement in revenue cycle operations is improving the way we do appeals. I think that's really where the rubber meets the road in terms of impact for us longer term. And so I wanted to postpone as long as possible, really, the timely filing deadlines that would be associated with claim denials. And so as we started to release those, I expect for the claims that we are going to be denied on, I expect to start seeing those come in sometime around September-ish, into October. And then that will be our first round of appeals. I've tried to detail this in the past, but just to refresh everyone, I think that we're going to have the opportunity to appeal somewhere around three times. That third level appeal is oftentimes associated with an external review by a specialist, and that's where we think really the value of the clinical data we've assembled and the value proposition will resonate most with that reviewer. So from our standpoint, It's always been tough to nail down exact timing, but what we've tried to maintain consistency in communicating is sometime towards the end of this year and really into 2024, our growth will be a combination of both volume and ASP growth, revenue growth that is, but it'll be largely driven by ASP growth. And I think that that's really the opportunity for the organization. Again, I think that's the most sensitive lever we have to employ in growing this organization. We've shown we can continue to grow that volume with the current sales footprint, and we just need to pursue, I think, more profitable business from our standpoint. I've also detailed the list price of Advise CTD is $1,650, and our Medicare rate for Advise CTD is $1,067. You see our quarterly ASP was in the $330 range this quarter. Our trailing 12 months is about $320. we're moving along in the right direction. I think they'll have some quarter-to-quarter gyrations, but generally so far, I like the trajectory we're moving in, and I think we need to get to that $500, $600 range on an ASP level to really have some, them transform the organization. So hopefully that gives you some context to timing and how we're thinking about it.

Okay, great. And maybe one for Kamal. Kamal, if I strip out the nearly $2 million of one-time payments. You know, you would have done around $12 million in Q2. You know, you're guiding to $10.25 at the midpoint in Q3. How much of that sequential decrease would you think is related to the reduction in or the softening volumes in Q3 versus some of the collections from prior payments and or other ASP dynamics?

Yeah, thanks for the question, Mark. So our ASP, when you back out that approximately 2 million from prior period collections, is still increasing. We did see that improved collections from prior periods does have an impact on current quarter ASP. So we did have to adjust our accrual rate up for our test performed in Q2. That's going to continue forward into Q3. So I do anticipate our ASP to continue that improvement. So it's going to be higher than what we saw in Q1. So to answer your question, it's primarily going to be driven from a softening in volume and not being driven by the ASP since that has improved.

Yeah, and just to confirm, I know Dan asked you in the prior question, sometimes, obviously, there's summer seasonality in Q3. I know in prior years, there have been some quarters where volumes stepped down sequentially. But can you just maybe walk me through, you know, maybe how much of it is seasonality versus the reduction in forests versus other factors?

Certainly, Mark, I'll chime in here. In terms of seasonality, we had July 4th on a Tuesday, really ate away a good portion of the first week of July, and we're basically one month in to Q3, right? So where we're sitting at today is the quarter started off soft. It's a mix between the holiday impact that we believe, but we're also actually seeing that our customer base, a decent number of vacations. I know I've seen this with some of the airline reporting as well, surveyed some of our customers. From our standpoint, I have a lot of confidence that our team has executed the initial transition from a Salesforce restructuring standpoint very well. And I think we are a leaner organization, but we're delivering a very high level of service I don't believe much. I believe the impact here is a mix of seasonality along with some of our transition on the billing policy side in pursuit of more profitable business. As I mentioned, you increase some of the patient cost sharing. You change some of the prices of your tests. And while we don't believe it will impact the bulk of our business, it will impact a small amount. So that's kind of how we think about it.

Okay, that's it for me. Thanks for the question.

Thanks. Thank you. Our next questions come from the line of Andrew Brackman with William Blair. Please proceed with your questions.

Hey, guys. This is Dustin online for Andrew. Maybe a little bit more about the sales or productivity, which I know you've touched on in past questions, but maybe more so how – Should we expect that going forward? Is there really any impact that you still think might linger in the third and fourth quarters from the reduction in territory and people? And how exactly are you tracking those people, maybe besides volume per rep?

Hey, Dustin. Good morning. Thanks for joining the call. Thanks for the question. I can speak to this from a qualitative standpoint, really cue you in on some of the things that we look at. In terms of performance as an organization, we take a look at orders per position. We take a look at our position base. In Q2, we had a growth in our position base. We've had a growth in our higher ordering positions. I think we have the overall outsized performance really across the board for all of our key metrics. From that standpoint, when we I think throughout the rep transition, we've done a phenomenal job. The team's done a phenomenal job in executing well. I think that we're very strong in that regard. Our reputation, our brand within the rheumatology community is extremely strong, and the transition has had much less of an impact than we originally anticipated, to be completely frank. From that standpoint, I think we are right on track. Really, as we get into Q3, as I've tried to detail, it's a slightly different scenario. You're changing expectations with our customer base. when it comes to pricing and especially when it comes to physician behavior. Our team is adept at this. The company has a history of launching and expanding the product portfolio. In terms of educating the physician base, I think we're very good at it. We've prepared extremely well. We've generated quite a bit of new collateral that's gone out really to aid in explaining the change and the why to the physician. We've developed quite a bit of patient support material as well. And then we have a very compassionate team internally that's them to patients as well as clinicians. So I think we've done what we can to prepare, and I've seen it firsthand. I was in the field actually in Houston and St. Louis over the last couple of weeks, specifically for this reason, working to have conversations with some of our key clinicians, understand what the challenges of these changes mean for them in their practice. And the majority that I visited, I visited over... I think it was 17 or 18 different clinicians over a couple-week period, and it was well-received. I mean, once you explain the why, I think it was very positive. There are some use cases that will likely fall off that are more price-sensitive, and so that's being taken into account into our guide. But from a sales rep standpoint and from a preparation standpoint as an organization, I think we're right where we want to be, I think.

In the past, you've also talked about opportunities with large academic institutions. Just wondering how you guys are tracking there in terms of ordering dates and trends.

Great question. So we don't pull this out as an individual metric to report on, but I can give you a few highlights. We continue to do well with large academic institutions. kind of different pressures, if you will. They're trying to operate a more effective business on their own, and they're seeing upwards of 20 patients per day, so time is of the essence in that context. In the academic setting, or maybe even in the large institution setting, there's typically a combination of research demands along with clinical demands, and so there may be some more time Once you get referred into some of the academic institutions, your disease has likely progressed. You've likely filtered through some of the community-based practices as well. Over the first half of this year, we've had some significant wins. We've had a major system in San Diego actually take on our product. We signed a contract with them. That was a multi-year effort to get that partnership established, and we're launching within that system here in Q3. I think we continue to do well. I think we serve the client bill, if you will, customer very well. We have a very strong value proposition. We save the system money, and so for those systems We continue to do well on both fronts. We have a team that's focused on this area, a team of individuals that their sole responsibility is to take a look at some of these large practices. There's quite a bit of bureaucracy, so you have to have the skill set, you have to have the experience to work through these institutions. We have a strong team that continues to do so, and we've seen some of those improvements. We just don't telegraph all of them. fill this part out, mostly because I think when it comes down to it, what really matters is the performance of the organization as a whole and within the numbers. And so we've cued people into the trailing 12-month ASP. We've taken a look at overall revenue and then the cost per revenue. And so we think that all of our efforts will culminate in improvements there and subsequently help us achieve a profitable organization.

Got it. Good to see progress going on there. And just the last small one for us. Any update on the advised lupus LTD to mid last July? Thank you.

Sure. So from just a level set everyone as well on the call, you know, we obtained a proprietary PLA code for the advised lupus testing and it was granted in April of 2022. We went through the pricing. procedure over the past 12 months or so. And pricing for advised lupus was finalized in January of this year. And then we've maintained coverage as well as payment for 2022 and 2023 claims throughout that process. As part of this, Medicare had asked us to submit for and apply for an LCD. We did so in September of last year. And we got acknowledgement at the time that for the next Contractors Advisory Committee meeting, a CAC meeting, to understand when a draft LCD will be published. At that point in time, it will be approximately about a year before any coverage document would be finalized and publicly on our local MAC, that's Meridian, to hold this meeting and to push the ball forward. So for now, no additional updates. We have a great working relationship with the Meridian team, and to date they've given us no indication as to when that meeting will occur. So we remain in the queue and exactly where we were almost a year ago at this time.

Great. Thank you, John.

Thank you. Our next question has come from the line of Kyle Mixon with Canaccord. Please proceed with your questions.

Hey, guys. Thanks for taking the questions. Congrats on the great quarter. I'm going to take a stab at something here. So, ACR convergence is coming up in early, mid-November, so the fourth quarter. Aside from these RCM changes, does this, like we saw through EQ guidance, reflect any kind of air pocket, I guess, among docs leading up to ACR. I mean, in the past, ACR actually impacted the fourth quarter, but I just want to kind of ask a question around, you know, seasonality factor, if we should be considering the second half of the year.

Certainly. Thanks, Kyle, for joining the call. Maybe I can share a little bit regarding guidance, how we're thinking about it. Was ACR direct So you lose, you know, 12th or 13th of the patient flow productivity through any given quarter. And it's occurring, I believe, in September-ish of this year. It's in San Diego, actually local to us. So we're excited for that meeting. It's a productive meeting where we certainly get to engage with our customers. But in terms of guidance, that wasn't necessarily one specific driving factor in the guidance. You know, overall, we're seeing very strong progress here to date in executing this, our strategy. We've been consistently hand with the information we have.

Yeah, okay. That was great. Thanks for that, John. And then, Kamal, on the gross margins, almost 60% getting flashbacks to the Janice and the Cleveland days with 100% margin. How should we think about the gross margins going forward? I mean, obviously, like, tied to revenue and if that's dipping in the third quarter and, I guess, fourth quarter, you know, clearly margins should decline from here. But, I mean, what's a good way to think about this? I mean, I love, like, the high 50s is good, but should we expect, like, low 50s or something like that going forward?

So I'm very pleased.

Okay, thanks, Kamal. And then I know John kind of earlier did talk about, you know, the 24 strategic priorities. But as you evaluate this past profitability, are you guys hoping to increase the sales force and the territory footprint maybe like early next year? I guess could you just kind of walk through your thoughts on the expansion in the next 12 months to kind of drive that market penetration and the top line growth and everything?

of the sales force in December of this past year, our logic or rationale at the time was to take a look at each of our territories and on a per territory basis, see which of them covered at least the cost of the sales rep. Were we breaking even for having a field-based presence And for 23 territories, the answer was no. Actually, a little bit more than that. What we've done now is from a footprint standpoint, but then at the rep. The idea here is it gives us an empirical approach to expansion where we can really see if it's the right territory, if it's the right individual for that area, and it lets us change some of those variables. in a more measured, meaningful way. But ultimately, it also lets us have great visibility on the cash required, the expense required to expand. So right now, it's about a million dollars a year that we're supplementing the territory on a flip over into a profitable state, then we'll add a new growth territory. And that way it'll kind of be self-fulfilling and cyclical in that manner. So that's our approach. Whether that occurs in Q1, I hope so, to be honest with you. But we have some variables really to figure out there. Again, is it the appropriate territory? What's the potential territory? individual. We have quite a few things to evaluate and are constantly working with. As of right now, we feel very comfortable with the 40 that we have. We'll see when we have some sustained performance in some of those growth territories that flips them over to a profitable state, and then at that point we'll add. We'll also be very clear in that communication.

Perfect. That was great, John. I'll leave it there. Thanks, guys. Appreciate the time.

Thank you. Our next questions come from the line of Ross Osborne with Cantor Fitzgerald. Please proceed with your questions.

Good morning. Just one for us. We'd be curious to hear if there's any update on the pipeline with regards to nephritis and if you provide any more color on where you are in terms of time to market. Thank you.

Sure. Good morning, Ross. I got the first question. The second question was timing to market for those, just to be clear.

Yeah, that's correct. Thank you.

Okay, great. Thanks for the clarification. So in terms of our R&D pipeline, in terms of what's occurred over the last six months, you know, the key cornerstones when I joined the company were the radar program, which was therapeutic selection in the context of rheumatoid arthritis, along with the fibromyalgia diagnostic assay and then some therapeutic response assays in the I'm a big fan of setting up the criteria for success before conducting the evaluation, and so we put this criteria in place, and we thought that if we could identify technologies that were, one, proprietary in nature, two, had an ability to demonstrate clinical utility that we thought was realistic, three, had the ability to achieve value-based pricing. We believe that you have to have some certainty in your reimbursement Also, we want to develop products that meet customer needs, existing customer needs. So that was another component. And then lastly, really having fleshed out the guideline strategy. I think having inclusion in guidelines or at least a pathway to getting there is incredibly important when you're weighing whether or not to move forward with a given opportunity. And so we have a program ongoing now to take a look at both diagnostic as well as therapeutic monitoring or disease activity in lupus nephritis. So this is the indication where you have inflammatory flare in the context of lupus but related to the kidney. It's potentially life-threatening, very significant consequences. has progressed quite a bit in the context of that inflammatory state. There's also therapeutic options on the market that are available. You have a couple from some pharma companies that are mid on the market for a little bit of time here. So we believe that's a pretty exciting opportunity we're pursuing. We're also looking at lupus in general. And then there's a few other projects that we're working on. What I've really committed to externally is talking about some of our pipeline products as we have meaningful developments, not so much selling the future on the come. We're very excited about the potential for AdvisePTD and the ASP improvements that we believe we'll develop here over the next year. several quarters and well into 2024, into 2025. So that's where a lot of our focus is. And as opportunistically, you know, we have some meaningful data, some scientific breakthroughs, if you will. We'll disclose those. Right now, I've said, you know, I think I'll make more comments available externally once we have a clear path to commercial success. and de-risk in some of the, either whether it be technical performance of the assay or in the reimbursement side before commenting on them. So that's kind of the conservatism we've taken in detailing our R&D pipeline. Hopefully that helps us.

Thanks for the update. Congrats again on the quarter.

Thanks. Thank you. There are no further questions at this time. I would now like to turn the floor back over to John Avali for closing comments.

Great. Q2 was another strong quarter where we continued to execute on our objectives and in pursuit of a profitable organization. We're making great progress, and I'm especially proud of the Exigen team for navigating these changes effectively through this point. Thank you for your interest in Exigen, and we look forward to continuing to provide updates on our progress as we work to improve our organization. Thank you.

Thank you. This does conclude today's teleconference. We appreciate your participation. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Enjoy the rest of your day.