Three studies are the focus as the company targets chronic illnesses, including cancer, using a pipeline that includes cannabis products and probiotics.
() has increased annual revenues by 25% to $5.5 million while increasing its net tangible assets per security by 518% to 10.5 cents.
The results came on the back of a 25% increase in net loss to $4.6 million.
Medlab reported the net loss increase was due to the accelerated costs of its research projects, with some up to 18 months ahead of schedule, and NanaBis costs related to the Federal Government’s Special Access Scheme (SAS).
Cash receipts were up 47% as the company ended June 30 with a $20.3 million cash balance.
Financial year standouts
Medlab managing director Sean Hall reported the company made a number of achievements in the 2017-18 financial year in its nutraceutical business and its research.
These included receiving a licence to sell or supply a schedule 8 or schedule 9 drugs which was limited to cannabis and its derivatives.
The company also progressed its Phase 1/2a clinical trial of cannabis cannabidiol/tetrahydrocannabinol (CBD/THC) therapy NanaBis in seriously ill cancer patients at Sydney’s Royal North Shore Hospital, with the trial now underway.
The product was licensed for supply, along with fellow cannabis CBD product NanaBidial, through the Australian Government’s access scheme SAS.
Positive “exciting” data began to be returned from doctors prescribing NanaBis.
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Another trial, Phase 2a clinical trial of NRGBiotic probiotic in depression, was also underway, at Queensland University of Technology Brisbane.
Medlab’s nutraceutical business continuing to grow by gaining recognition in professional pharmacy spaces.
The company upped revenues in the complementary business to its therapeutics program by 26% while keeping a lid on operating expenses.
Medlab chairman Michael Hall reported a third trial was being prepared for, a Phase 2a study of the T2Biotc in obese and diabetic patients, as a follow-on to the completed Phase1a trial.
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Managing director Hall said: “Medlab’s strategy is to pursue meaningful discussions with major pharmaceutical companies to have them appreciate our potential, leading to possible favourable financial outcomes for shareholders.
“Events during these past three years have supported our concentration on chronic illnesses.”
He pointed to the overuse of opioids, and deaths from their use, and the costs of depression, mental illness and obesity as illnesses and crises the company could respond to.
Hall said the company had made good progress towards achieving the goals it set at the time of listing on the Australian Securities Exchange.
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He argued the company’s research was a market differentiator that set Medlab apart from other organisations.
Hall said: “R&D is the driver of potential from its focus on chronic diseases while nutraceutical sales assist cash flow funding of Medlab’s programs.”
He highlighted the company had received human ethics approval for a trial of Medlab’s commercialised MultiBiotic product as a treatment for mucositis.
Mucositis is the painful condition where the mucous membranes lining the digestive tract become inflamed and ulcerate, usually after chemotherapy or radiotherapy treatment for cancer.