Biostem Technologies New

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. My name is Abby and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the BioSTEM Technologies first quarter 2026 earnings call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speaker's remarks, there will be a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question during this time, simply press star followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. If you would like to withdraw your question, press star one again. Thank you. And I would now like to turn the conference over to Hannah Jeffrey, Investor Relations. You may begin.

Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining our conference call to discuss BioSTEM's first quarter 2026 financial results and corporate highlights. Leading the call today will be Jason Metazeski, the company's chairman and chief executive officer, Barry Hassett, the company's chief commercial officer, and Brandon Poe, the company's chief financial officer. Before we begin, I'd like to remind everyone that our remarks may contain forward-looking statements based on management's current expectations. These involve inherent risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those indicated. These risks are described in our filings with OTC markets. You are cautioned not to place undue reliance on forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date made. The company undertakes no obligation to update them unless required by law. Finally, this call also includes references to non-GAAP financial measures. A reconciliation to comparable GAAP measures and related information can be found in our earnings press release posted on the investor relations section of BioSTEM's website. With that, I'd now like to turn the call over to Jason.

Thank you, Hannah, and good afternoon, everyone. The first quarter of 2026 marked a transformational period for BioSTEM. With the acquisition we completed in late January, we have repositioned the company from a physician office-focused business to a hospital-focused business. Now, with a scalable technology platform backed by a diversified commercial infrastructure that will drive adoption in the hospital setting across a multitude of surgical specialties. This transaction added a new portfolio of perinatal tissue allografts, an experienced sales organization, and a large base of hospital customers, along with major GPO contracts. Together, these additions have significantly expanded our addressable market and increased our exposure to the commercially insured patient populations. As a result, our strategic focus is now centered on the hospital channel, where we believe we can drive broader adoption and long-term growth. While this represents a shift from our 2025 operating model, we believe the core strengths of our business, including our proprietary technologies, clinical data, clinical champions, and commercialization approach position us well to succeed in this setting. Before I dive deeper into the quarter, I want to briefly highlight progress on our capital market strategy. Following the completion of our 2024 and 2025 audits, we have confidentially submitted our Form 10 to the SEC, an important step toward our goal of uplisting to NASDAQ. We believe this will raise visibility of the company, increase our ability to track top talent, enhance our access to institutional capital, and improve trading liquidity over time. This is a top priority for the company, and we are excited to share further updates in the future. Now, on the business front, our focus is centered on four key initiatives that we believe will maximize long-term value creation. First, integrating the acquired products in Salesforce into our organization while continuing to build out our commercial infrastructure. Second, driving adoption across the hospital channel. Third, advancing our product roadmap with a 510K clearance. And fourth, executing the technology transfer of the Neox and Clarex products. In the first quarter, we are encouraged by the progress we have made across each of these initiatives. Starting with integration, our top priority coming out of the January 21st acquisition was to ensure continuity of the acquired business while expanding an already robust commercial organization to drive future growth. We are pleased to report minimal disruption during the transition, as demonstrated by our ability to maintain stable sales performance for the hospital business. Hospital-based revenue was $5.4 million in the quarter, equivalent to $5.4 million revenue performance of the Neox and Clerics products during the same 70-day period in Q1 of 2025. Given the scale and complexity of this transaction, we view this as an important validation of the underlying business and the execution of our integration plan. The transition service agreement with BioTissue has supported our sales operations and administrative functions seamlessly, and we are making great progress internalizing these functions to be operational in the second half of 2026. The most important driver of this stability has been the retention of the commercial organization. We successfully retained the acquired sales team with limited turnover, preserving critical customer relationships and surgical business expertise. At the same time, we have initiated efforts to expand our sales force. Since the acquisition closed, we have nearly doubled the size of the direct sales team and added independent sales agents in key territories. We remain on track to continue scaling teams through the year, and we believe this expanded footprint positions us to increase utilization across our existing account base, as well as drive new customer acquisition over time. This team will focus on key hospital call points across the country. Given our progress, we expect to reach 40 direct representatives by the year end, along with continued strategic expansion of our network of independent sales agents. The new reps are completing our structured training and education programs, and we are confident this training, coupled with their relevant industry experience, will expedite their ramp to full productivity in 2027. From a supply standpoint, our manufacturing and supply agreement with BioTissue extends for up to 36 months post-close of the acquisition, providing continuity and flexibility as we execute on our integration plan. Importantly, this agreement has ensured uninterrupted product availability with no customer-facing or supply disruptions during that transition period. While the supply agreement provides a long-term supply backstop, our objective is to complete a technology transfer and bring manufacturing of the Neox and Cleric products in-house, targeting approximately 12 months post-close. This transition represents a clear and measurable opportunity for gross margin expansion. By eliminating the cost plus markup under our current manufacturing agreement, we will gain roughly seven and a half points of margin improvement. Beyond that, we expect additional upside from internal efficiencies over time. The combination of these positive factors should more than offset the 7% royalty on Neox and Clerics products to be manufactured internally post the technology transfer. Importantly, we have already demonstrated the ability to manufacture similar products at scale, with Vendahe delivering gross margins of approximately 85%, which provides a strong benchmark for where these products can trend. While we expect an initial step up in margins upon completing the transfer, further improvements will be realized as we optimize yields and scale production. We remain on track to complete the technology transfer in the first half of 2027. At scale, this margin expansion is expected to meaningfully improve our path to profitability and drive operating leverage across the business. With that, I'll turn the call over to Barry to discuss our commercial strategy in more detail.