OptiBiotix Health PLC – Final Results

OptiBiotix Health plc (AIM: OPTI), a life sciences business developing compounds to tackle obesity, high cholesterol and diabetes, announces its audited results for the year ended 30 November 2018. 

The Company has made strong progress during this period as it continues its transition from a development company into a commercial business.  This period has seen the Company sign a number of commercial deals of increasing value across its product range as it builds multiple revenue streams from manufacturing, application and distribution partners across the world. 

Highlights

• A 543% increase in income from H1 to H2 and a 169% increase on 2017 income of £191k
• Completion of five successful human taste studies on SweetBiotix^® demonstrating high sweetness and low off flavours
• A five year agreement with Akums Drugs and Pharmaceuticals Ltd to exclusively manufacture and supply supplements and biotherapeutic drug products containing LP_LDL^® in India
• A non-exclusive license with one of the world’s largest providers of dairy products to explore the potential for using OptiBiotix’s SweetBiotix^® technology to reduce the sugar content in a range of its dairy food products
• Exclusive agreement with a US company for the development of LP_LDL^® as a drug product with a six figure milestone payments at signing and at two subsequent conditional milestones, amounts totalling a seven-figure sum
• Award for SlimBiome^® for Weight Management Ingredient of the Year at Vitafoods 2018 and ‘Best Functional Ingredient for Health and Wellbeing’ at Food Matters
  – Award for best scientific abstract at ProBiota 2018 co-authored with DSM for the identification and development
  of a prebiotic which selectively enhances the growth of Lactobacillus rhamnosus GG (“LGG^®“) in the gut
  – Independent human studies by Oxford Brookes University demonstrating that volunteers who took SlimBiome^®
  compared to a placebo feel fuller and are less hungry, have less food cravings, and eat less sweet and fatty foods
• The granting of medical device status and a CE mark for SlimBiome^® extending its application as a food ingredient into high value medical products within consumer healthcare and pharmaceutical markets
• The investment in OptiBiotix of £450k by new non-executive board members Neil Davidson and Sean Christie

Post period end highlights

• Manufacturing, supply and profit sharing agreement for SlimBiome® in India
• Appointment of Frédéric Narbel as Managing Director of OptiBiotix’s prebiotic division
• LP_LDL® determined GRAS by an Expert Panel in the United States
• Licence from the Food Standards and Safety Authority India for SlimBiome® to be manufactured in India
• OptiBiotix’s wholly owned subsidiary ProBiotix Health Ltd raise of £1.025 million through the issue of convertible loan notes to fund a potential initial public offering

Stephen O’Hara, CEO of OptiBiotix, commented: “OptiBiotix has made significant progress in the last 12 months signing 18 commercial agreements making a total of 28 agreements since launching products in May 2017.  OptiBiotix’s products are now being commercialised as food ingredients, medical devices, drug biotherapeutics and supplements in around thirty countries across the world. Importantly, these agreements are starting to generate income with revenue growth in the second half of the year significantly higher than at the start of the year. As existing deals contribute to full year revenues, partners continue to grow sales with new product launches in 2019, and as new agreements continue to be signed we anticipate further revenue growth in 2019. On behalf of the Board I would like to thank our shareholders for their continued support and we look forward to an exciting future commercialising our products in a market forecast to become one of the world’s fastest growth areas.”