As filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on January 15, 2025.

Registration No. 333-

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UNITED STATES

SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION

Washington, D.C. 20549

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FORM S-1

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REGISTRATION STATEMENT

UNDER

THE SECURITIES ACT OF 1933

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MUSTANG BIO, INC.

(Exact name of registrant as specified in its charter)

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377 Plantation Street

Worcester, Massachusetts 01605

(781) 652-4500

(Address, including zip code, and telephone number, including area code, of registrant’s principal executive offices)

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Manuel Litchman, M.D.

President and Chief Executive Officer

Mustang Bio, Inc.

377 Plantation Street

Worcester, Massachusetts 01605

(781) 652-4500

(Name, address, including zip code, and telephone number, including area code, of agent for service)

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Copies to:

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Approximate date of commencement of proposed sale to the public: As soon as practicable after the effective date of this Registration Statement.

If any of the securities being registered on this Form are to be offered on a delayed or continuous basis pursuant to Rule 415 under the Securities Act of 1933, check the following box. ☒

If this Form is filed to register additional securities for an offering pursuant to Rule 462(b) under the Securities Act, please check the following box and list the Securities Act registration statement number of the earlier effective registration statement for the same offering. ☐

If this Form is a post-effective amendment filed pursuant to Rule 462(c) under the Securities Act, check the following box and list the Securities Act registration statement number of the earlier effective registration statement for the same offering. ☐

If this Form is a post-effective amendment filed pursuant to Rule 462(d) under the Securities Act, check the following box and list the Securities Act registration statement number of the earlier effective registration statement for the same offering. ☐

Indicate by check mark whether the registrant is a large accelerated filer, an accelerated filer, a non-accelerated filer, a smaller reporting company or an emerging growth company. See the definitions of “large accelerated filer,” “accelerated filer,” “smaller reporting company,” and “emerging growth company” in Rule 12b-2 of the Exchange Act.

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If an emerging growth company, indicate by check mark if the registrant has elected not to use the extended transition period for complying with any new or revised financial accounting standards provided pursuant to Section 7(a)(2)(B) of the Securities Act. ☐

The registrant hereby amends this Registration Statement on such date or dates as may be necessary to delay its effective date until the Registrant shall file a further amendment which specifically states that this Registration Statement shall thereafter become effective in accordance with Section 8(a) of the Securities Act of 1933 or until the Registration Statement shall become effective on such date as the Commission, acting pursuant to said Section 8(a), may determine.

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The information in this prospectus is not complete and may be changed. We may not sell these securities until the registration statement filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission is effective. This prospectus is not an offer to sell these securities and it is not soliciting an offer to buy these securities in any jurisdiction where the offer or sale is prohibited.

SUBJECT TO COMPLETION, DATED JANUARY 15, 2025

PRELIMINARY PROSPECTUS

Up to                  Shares of Common Stock

Pre-funded Warrants to Purchase up to                  Shares of Common Stock

Series C-1 Warrants to Purchase up to                  Shares of Common Stock

Series C-2 Warrants to Purchase up to                  Shares of Common Stock

Series C-3 Warrants to Purchase up to                  Shares of Common Stock

Placement Agent Warrants to Purchase up to                  Shares of Common Stock

Up to                  Shares of Common Stock Issuable Upon Exercise of

the Series C-1 Warrants, Series C-2 Warrants, Series C-3 Warrants, Pre-funded Warrants and Placement Agent Warrants

We are offering up to                  shares of common stock, together with accompanying Series C-1 warrants (the “Series C-1 Warrants”) to purchase up to                  shares of common stock, Series C-2 warrants (the “Series C-2 Warrants”) to purchase up to                  shares of common stock, and Series C-3 warrants to purchase up to                  shares of common stock (the “Series C-3 Warrants” and collectively with the Series C-1 Warrants and Series C-2 Warrants, the “Warrants”), pursuant to this prospectus. The combined public offering price for each share of common stock, together with one Series C-1 Warrant, one Series C-2 Warrant and one Series C-3 Warrant, each to purchase one share of common stock, is $                 , which is equal to the last reported sale price of our common stock on the Nasdaq Capital Market on                 , 2025. The shares of common stock and Warrants will be separately issued. Each Warrant will have an exercise price of $                  per share, will be exercisable beginning on the effective date of stockholder approval of the issuance of the shares upon exercise of the Warrants (“Warrant Stockholder Approval”), provided, however, if the Pricing Conditions (as defined below) are met, the Warrants will be exercisable upon issuance (the “Initial Exercise Date”). The Series C-1 Warrant will expire on the five-year anniversary of the Initial Exercise Date. The Series C-2 Warrant will expire on the twenty-four-month anniversary of the Initial Exercise Date. The Series C-3 Warrant will expire on the nine-month anniversary of the Initial Exercise Date. As used herein “Pricing Conditions” mean that the combined offering price per share and accompanying Warrants is such that the Warrant Stockholder Approval is not required under the rules of The Nasdaq Stock Market LLC (“Nasdaq”) because either (i) the offering is an at-the-market offering under Nasdaq rules and such price equals or exceeds the sum of (a) the applicable “Minimum Price” per share under Nasdaq Rule 5635(d) plus (b) $0.125 per whole share of common stock underlying the Warrants or (ii) the offering is a discounted offering where the pricing and discount (including attributing a value of $0.125 per whole share underlying the Warrants) meet the pricing requirements under Nasdaq’s rules.

We are also offering up to                  pre-funded warrants (the “pre-funded warrants”), together with accompanying Series C-1 warrants to purchase up to                 shares of common stock, Series C-2 warrants to purchase up to                 shares of common stock, and Series C-3 warrants to purchase up to                 shares of common stock to those purchasers whose purchase of shares of common stock in this offering would result in the purchaser, together with its affiliates and certain related parties, beneficially owning more than 4.99% (or, at the election of the purchaser, 9.99%) of our outstanding common stock following the consummation of this offering or if such purchaser otherwise elects to purchase pre-funded warrants, in lieu of the shares of our common stock that would result in ownership in excess of 4.99% (or, at the election of the purchaser, 9.99%). Each pre-funded warrant will be exercisable for one share of common stock at an exercise price of $0.0001 per share. Each pre-funded warrant is being issued together with the same Warrants described above being issued with each share of common stock. The combined public offering price for each such pre-funded warrant, together with accompanying Warrants, is $                 , which is the combined public offering price per share and Warrants (equal to the last reported sale price of our common stock on the Nasdaq Capital Market on                 , 2025), minus $0.0001. Each pre-funded warrant will be exercisable upon issuance and may be exercised at any time until all of the pre-funded warrants are exercised in full. The pre-funded warrants and accompanying Warrants are immediately separable and will be issued separately in this offering. This prospectus also relates to the offering of the shares of common stock issuable upon exercise of the Warrants, pre-funded warrants and Placement Agent Warrants (as defined herein).

There is no established public trading market for the Warrants or the pre-funded warrants, and we do not expect a market to develop. We do not intend to apply for listing of the Warrants or the pre-funded warrants on any securities exchange or other nationally recognized trading system. Without an active trading market, the liquidity of the Warrants and the pre-funded warrants will be limited.

The securities will be offered at a fixed combined public offering price and are expected to be issued in a single closing. We expect this offering to be completed on or about                 , 2025, and we will deliver all securities to be issued in connection with this offering delivery versus payment/receipt versus payment upon receipt by us of investor funds. Accordingly, neither we nor the placement agent have made any arrangements to place investor funds in an escrow account or trust account since the placement agent will not receive investor funds in connection with the sale of the securities offered hereunder.

We have engaged                  (the “Placement Agent”), to act as our exclusive placement agent in connection with this offering. The Placement Agent has agreed to use its reasonable best efforts to arrange for the sale of the securities offered by this prospectus. The Placement Agent is not purchasing or selling any of the securities we are offering and the Placement Agent is not required to arrange the purchase or sale of any specific number of securities or dollar amount. We have agreed to pay to the Placement Agent the Placement Agent fees set forth in the table below, which assumes that we sell all of the securities offered by this prospectus. There is no minimum number of securities or amount of proceeds required as a condition to closing in this offering. Because there is no minimum offering amount required as a condition to closing this offering, we may sell fewer than all of the securities offered hereby, which may significantly reduce the amount of proceeds received by us, and investors in this offering will not receive a refund in the event that we do not sell an amount of securities sufficient to pursue our business goals described in this prospectus. In addition, because there is no escrow trust or similar arrangement and no minimum offering amount, investors could be in a position where they have invested in our company, but we are unable to fulfill all of our contemplated objectives due to a lack of interest in this offering. Further, any proceeds from the sale of securities offered by us will be available for our immediate use, despite uncertainty about whether we would be able to use such funds to effectively implement our business plan. We will bear all costs associated with the offering. See “Plan of Distribution” on page 136 of this prospectus for more information regarding these arrangements.

Our common stock is listed on the Nasdaq Capital Market under the symbol “MBIO”. On January 14, 2025, the last reported sale price of our common stock on the Nasdaq Capital Market was $0.1438 per share.

The combined offering price per share of common stock and accompanying Warrants and the combined offering price per pre-funded warrant and accompanying Warrants we are offering and the exercise price and other terms of the Warrants were negotiated between us and the purchasers, in consultation with the Placement Agent based on the trading of our common stock prior to this offering, among other factors. Other factors considered in determining the offering price of the securities we are offering and the exercise price and other terms of the Warrants include the history and prospects of our company, the stage of development of our business, our business plans for the future and the extent to which they have been implemented, an assessment of our management, general conditions of the securities markets at the time of the offering and such other factors as were deemed relevant.

We are a “smaller reporting company” as defined under the federal securities laws and, as such, have elected to comply with certain reduced public company reporting requirements for this prospectus and may elect to comply with reduced public company reporting requirements in future filings. See “Prospectus Summary––Implications of Being a Smaller Reporting Company.”

Investing in our securities involves risks. Before deciding whether to invest in our securities, you should consider carefully the risks that we have described on page 16 of this prospectus under the caption “Risk Factors.”

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Neither the Securities and Exchange Commission nor any other regulatory body has approved or disapproved of these securities or passed upon the accuracy or adequacy of this prospectus. Any representation to the contrary is a criminal offense.

We expect to deliver the securities to the purchasers in the offering on or about                 , 2025, subject to satisfaction of certain conditions.

, 2025

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

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ABOUT THIS PROSPECTUS

The registration statement we filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (the “SEC”) includes exhibits that provide more detail of the matters discussed in this prospectus. You should read this prospectus and the related exhibits filed with the SEC before making your investment decision. You should rely only on the information provided in this prospectus. You should not assume that the information contained in this prospectus or any related free writing prospectus is accurate on any date subsequent to the date set forth on the front of the document, even though this prospectus or any related free writing prospectus is delivered, or securities are sold, on a later date. This prospectus contains summaries of certain provisions contained in some of the documents described herein, but reference is made to the actual documents for complete information. All of the summaries are qualified in their entirety by the actual documents. Copies of some of the documents referred to herein have been or will be filed as exhibits to the registration statement of which this prospectus forms a part, and you may obtain copies of those documents as described in this prospectus under the heading “Where You Can Find More Information.”

You should rely only on the information that we have included in this prospectus and any related free writing prospectus that we may authorize to be provided to you. Neither we, nor the placement agent, have authorized any dealer, salesman or other person to give any information or to make any representation other than those contained in this prospectus or any related free writing prospectus that we may authorize to be provided to you. You must not rely upon any information or representation not contained in this prospectus or any related free writing prospectus. This prospectus and any related free writing prospectus do not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy any securities other than the registered securities to which they relate, nor does this prospectus or any related free writing prospectus constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy securities in any jurisdiction to any person to whom it is unlawful to make such offer or solicitation in such jurisdiction.

When we refer to “Mustang,” “we,” “our,” “us” and the “Company” in this prospectus, we mean Mustang Bio, Inc., unless otherwise specified. When we refer to “you,” we mean the potential holders of the applicable securities.

Solely for convenience, tradenames referred to in this prospectus appear without the ^® and ^™ symbols, but those references are not intended to indicate, in any way, that we will not assert, to the fullest extent under applicable law, our rights, or that the applicable owner will not assert its rights, to these tradenames.

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PROSPECTUS SUMMARY

This summary highlights information contained elsewhere in this prospectus. This summary is not complete and does not contain all of the information you should consider in making your investment decision. Before investing in our common stock, you should carefully read the entire prospectus, including the risks of investing in our securities discussed under the heading “Risk Factors” and “Special Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements.” You should also carefully read our financial statements and the exhibits to the registration statement of which this prospectus forms a part. Unless the context otherwise requires, the terms “Mustang” “Mustang Bio” “the Company,” “we,” “us,” “our” and similar references in this prospectus refer to Mustang Bio, Inc., the registrant on the cover page of the registration statement of which this prospectus forms a part.

Our Business

Overview and Product Candidate Development

We are a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company focused on translating today’s medical breakthroughs into potential cures for difficult-to-treat cancers. We aim to acquire rights to these technologies by licensing or otherwise acquiring an ownership interest in the technologies, funding their research and development and eventually either out-licensing or bringing the technologies to market.

Our pipeline is currently focused in two core areas: CAR T therapies for hematologic malignancies and CAR T therapies for solid tumors. For these therapies we have partnered with world class research institutions, including the City of Hope National Medical Center (“COH” or “City of Hope”), Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center (“Fred Hutch”), and Nationwide Children’s Hospital (“Nationwide”).

CAR T Therapies

Our pipeline of CAR T therapies is being developed under exclusive licenses from several world class research institutions. Our strategy is to license these technologies, support preclinical and clinical research activities by our partners and transfer the underlying technology to our or our contract manufacturer’s cell processing facility in order to conduct our own clinical trials.

We are developing CAR T therapy for hematologic malignancies in partnership with Fred Hutch targeting CD20 (MB-106). In May 2021, we announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (“FDA”) accepted our Investigational New Drug (“IND”) Application for MB-106. As of January 2025, 53 patients have been treated in an ongoing Phase 1 clinical trial sponsored by Fred Hutch (ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT03277729) and 20 patients have been treated in the Phase 1 clinical trial sponsored by us (ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT05360238). In 2023, we received Safety Review Committee approval to continue dose escalation in all three active arms of the ongoing Mustang-sponsored Phase 1 trial. We presented the latest results, demonstrating a favorable safety profile, complete response rate, and durability, from the ongoing Mustang-sponsored Phase 1 trial at the 2023 American Society of Hematology (“ASH”) Annual Meeting.

We are also developing CAR T therapy for solid tumors in partnership with COH targeting IL13Rα2 (MB-101). In addition, we have partnered with Nationwide for a herpes simplex virus type 1 (“HSV-1”) oncolytic virus (MB-108) in order to enhance the activity of MB-101 for the treatment of patients with high-grade malignant brain tumors. The Phase 1 clinical trial sponsored by COH for MB-101 (ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT02208362) has completed the treatment phase and patients continue to be assessed for long-term safety. A Phase 1 clinical trial sponsored by the University of Alabama at Birmingham (“UAB”) for MB-108 (ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT03657576) began during the third quarter of 2019. In October 2023, we announced that the FDA accepted our IND application for the combination of MB-101 and MB-108 – which is referred to as MB-109 – for the treatment of patients with IL13Rα2+ relapsed or refractory glioblastoma (“GBM”) and high-grade astrocytoma.

MB-106 (CD20-targeted CAR T cell therapy for Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma and Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia)

In the first quarter of 2024, we completed a successful End-of-Phase 1 meeting with the FDA regarding a potential pivotal Phase 2 single-arm clinical trial for the treatment of WM. Per the discussions, the FDA agreed with the proposed overall design of the pivotal trial for Waldenstrom macroglobulinemia (“WM”) at the recommended dose of 1 x 10⁷ CAR-T cells/kg and requested only minimal modifications to the study protocol. No additional nonclinical studies are expected prior to Phase 2 or a Biologics License Application (“BLA”) filing. Due to limited resources, and as a result of the reduction in work force described below, we do not expect to initiate our pivotal Phase 2 single-arm clinical trial of MB-106 for the treatment of WM trial in 2025. Subject to available funds, we intend to rely on third party service providers to conduct study and manufacturing services to advance our priority potential product candidates.

Also in the first quarter of 2024, we completed enrollment of the indolent lymphoma arm in our multicenter Phase 1 trial. The tenth and final patient enrolled on that arm was a patient with follicular lymphoma (FL) who achieved a complete response following treatment with 1 x 10⁷ CAR-T cells/kg. As a result, the overall complete response rate for FL in the Phase 1 portion of this trial was sustained at 100% (N=6), with no occurrence of cytokine release syndrome (“CRS”) above grade 1 and no immune effector cell-associated neurotoxicity syndrome (“ICANS”) of any grade, despite not using prophylactic tocilizumab or dexamethasone.

In March 2024, we announced plans to collaborate with Fred Hutch for a proof-of-concept Phase 1 investigator-sponsored clinical trial evaluating MB-106 in autoimmune diseases.

In March 2024, we were granted the Regenerative Medicine Advanced Therapy (“RMAT”) designation by the FDA for the treatment of relapsed or refractory CD20 positive WM and FL, based on potential improvement in response as seen in clinical data to date. Drugs eligible for RMAT designation are those intended to treat, modify, reverse or cure a serious or life-threatening disease or condition, and that present preliminary clinical evidence indicating the drug has the potential to address unmet medical needs for such disease or condition. RMAT designation provides regenerative medicine advanced therapy products with the same benefits to expedite the development and review of a marketing application that are available to drugs that receive Breakthrough Therapy Designation. These advantages include timely advice and interactive communications with FDA, as well as proactive and collaborative involvement by senior FDA managers and experienced review and regulatory health project management staff. A product designated as an RMAT also may be eligible for other FDA-expedited programs, such as Priority Review. The FDA also may conduct a rolling review of products in its expedited programs, reviewing portions of a marketing application before the complete application is submitted.

In June 2024, we announced that updated data for MB-106 in the Phase 1/2 Fred Hutch investigator-sponsored trial showed a favorable safety and efficacy profile in 10 patients with WM. There was an overall response rate (“ORR”) of 90% with durable responses observed, including three complete responses (“CR”), two very good partial responses (“VGPR”), and four partial responses (“PR”). One of the patients who achieved a CR remained in remission for 31 months, with an immunoglobulin M (IgM) level that decreased rapidly to the normal range after treatment with MB-106 and remained normal since. Patients had a median of nine prior lines of therapy, and only one patient started additional anti-WM treatment after being treated with MB-106. From a safety perspective, CRS occurred in nine patients: five patients with grade 1 and four patients with grade 2. One patient experienced grade 1 ICANS. No grade 3 or 4 CRS or grade 2, 3 or 4 ICANS was observed, despite dose escalation.

In May 2024, we informed the clinical sites participating in the Mustang-sponsored Phase 1/2 study in non-Hodgkin lymphoma and chronic lymphocytic leukemia, MB106-CD20-001, that we had decided to close the trial. In June 2024, we similarly informed the clinical sites participating in the Mustang-sponsored Long-term Follow-up Study in Patients Previously Treated with Mustang Bio, Inc. CAR-T Cell Investigational Products, MB100-OBS-001, that we had decided to close that trial. As a result, further clinical development of MB-106 is currently focused solely on autoimmune diseases unless funding and resources become available to restart the program for hematologic malignancies. Planning for the aforementioned Phase 1 investigator-sponsored clinical trial in autoimmune diseases is in progress, with initiation of the trial planned for 2025.

MB-109 (Combination of MB-101 CAR T Therapy with MB-108 Oncolytic Virus Therapy for Malignant Brain Tumors)

In October 2023, we received a safe-to-proceed “approval” from the FDA for our MB-109 IND application allowing us to initiate a Phase 1, open-label, non-randomized, multicenter study of MB-109 in patients with IL13Rα2+ recurrent GBM and high-grade astrocytoma. In this Phase 1 clinical study, we intend to evaluate the combination of CAR-T cells (MB-101) and the herpes simplex virus type 1 oncolytic virus (MB-108) in patients with IL13Rα2+ high-grade gliomas. The design of this study involves first a lead-in cohort, wherein patients are treated with MB-101 alone without prior MB-108 administration. After successful confirmation of the safety profile of MB-101 alone, the study will then investigate increasing doses of intratumorally administered MB-108 followed by dual intratumoral (ICT) and intraventricular (ICV) administration of MB-101.

On November 7, 2024, we announced that the FDA granted Orphan Drug Designation to Mustang for MB-108, a herpes simplex virus type 1 (“HSV-1”) oncolytic virus, for the treatment of malignant glioma. The Orphan Drug Designation provides certain incentives, such as tax credits toward the cost of clinical trials upon approval and prescription drug user fee waivers. If a product receives Orphan Drug Status from the FDA, that product is entitled to seven years of market exclusivity for the disease in which it has Orphan Drug designation, which is independent from intellectual property protection. We are currently exploring with COH to conduct an investigator-sponsored single-institution trial under the COH IND to treat patients with IL13Rα2+ recurrent GBM and high-grade astrocytoma with MB-109 and could potentially be initiated in the second half of 2025.

To date, we have not received approval for the sale of any of our product candidates in any market and, therefore, have not generated any product sales from our product candidates. In addition, we have incurred substantial operating losses since our inception, and expect to continue to incur significant operating losses for the foreseeable future and may never become profitable. As of September 30, 2024, we have an accumulated deficit of $395.8 million.

Recent Developments

October 2024 Private Placement

On October 24, 2024, we entered into an inducement offer letter agreement (the “Inducement Letter”) with an institutional accredited investor (the “Investor”) which held certain outstanding (i) Series A-1 Warrants to purchase up to an aggregate of 16,877,638 shares of common stock, (ii) Series A-2 Warrants to purchase up to an aggregate of 16,877,638 shares of common stock, and (iii) Series A-3 Warrants to purchase up to an aggregate of 16,877,638 shares of common stock, originally issued to the Investor on May 2, 2024 (the “May 2024 Warrants”). The May 2024 Warrants had an exercise price of $0.237 per share.

Pursuant to the Inducement Letter, the Investor agreed to exercise in full, for cash, the Series A-3 Warrants (the “Existing Warrants”) at the exercise price of $0.237 per share in consideration for our agreement to issue in a private placement (x) new Series B-1 Warrants to purchase Series B-1 Warrant Shares and (y) new Series B-2 Warrants to purchase Series B-2 Warrant Shares. In addition, we issued to H.C. Wainwright & Co., LLC (“H.C. Wainwright,” together with the Investor, the “Holders”) or its designees Placement Agent Warrants to purchase Placement Agent Warrant Shares. The Placement Agent Warrants have the same terms as the Series B-1 Warrants, except that the Placement Agent Warrants have an exercise price equal to $0.2963 per share. The transactions contemplated by the Inducement Letter closed on October 25, 2024. We received aggregate gross proceeds of approximately $4 million from the exercise of the Existing Warrants by the Investor, before deducting placement agent fees and other expenses payable by us.

Non-Compliance with Nasdaq Continued Listing Requirements

On March 13, 2024, we received a deficiency letter (the “Letter”) from the Listing Qualifications Department (the “Staff”) of Nasdaq notifying us that we were not in compliance with the minimum stockholders’ equity requirement for continued listing on the Nasdaq Capital Market under Nasdaq Listing Rule 5550(b)(1) (the “Equity Rule”). The Equity Rule requires companies listed on the Nasdaq Capital Market to maintain stockholders’ equity of at least $2.5 million (or, in the alternative, a market value of listed securities of $35 million or net income from continued operations of $500,000 in the most recently completed fiscal year or in two of the last three most recently completed fiscal years). As of December 31, 2023, we reported stockholders’ equity of $123,000, and as of September 30, 2024, we reported stockholders’ deficit of approximately $8.7 million.

The Letter had no immediate effect on our continued listing on Nasdaq, subject to our compliance with the other continued listing requirements. In accordance with the Nasdaq Listing Rules, we were provided 45 calendar days, or until April 29, 2024, to submit a plan to regain compliance with the Equity Rule (the “Compliance Plan”). We submitted our Compliance Plan on April 29, 2024, and the Staff granted our request for an extension of 180 calendar days through September 9, 2024, to regain compliance with the Equity Rule. We were unable to demonstrate compliance with the Equity Rule by September 9, 2024.

On September 10, 2024, the Staff formally notified us that it had determined to delist our securities from Nasdaq based upon our continued non-compliance with the Equity Rule unless we timely request a hearing before the Nasdaq Hearings Panel (the “Panel”). On September 17, 2024, we requested a hearing before the Panel, which stayed any further action by Nasdaq at least pending completion of the hearing and the expiration of any extension that may be granted by the Panel to us following the hearing.

On May 16, 2024, we received a notice (the “Second Letter”) from the Staff of Nasdaq indicating that the bid price of our common stock had closed below $1.00 per share for 31 consecutive business days and, as a result, we were not in compliance with Nasdaq Listing Rule 5550(a)(2), which sets forth the minimum bid price requirement for continued listing on the Nasdaq Capital Market (the “Bid Price Rule”). The Second Letter from Nasdaq had no immediate effect on the listing of our common stock on Nasdaq. Pursuant to Nasdaq Listing Rule 5810(c)(3)(A), we were afforded a 180-calendar day grace period, or until November 12, 2024, to regain compliance with the Bid Price Rule. Compliance can be achieved by evidencing a closing bid price of at least $1.00 per share for a minimum of ten consecutive business days (but generally not more than 20 consecutive business days) during the 180-calendar day grace period.

The hearing before the Panel occurred on October 29, 2024. By decision dated November 8, 2024, the Panel granted our request for an extension to evidence compliance with all applicable criteria for continued listing on the Nasdaq Capital Market, including the Bid Price Rule, through January 31, 2025, and the Equity Rule through February 18, 2025. We are considering all available options that may enable us to timely evidence compliance with the continued listing criteria and maintain our listing on Nasdaq. There can be no assurance that we will be successful in our efforts to maintain the listing of our common stock on the Nasdaq Capital Market.

Reverse Stock Split

On January 14, 2025, we announced that we will effect a 1-for-50 reverse stock split of our issued and outstanding common stock. The reverse stock split was approved on June 27, 2024 by our board of directors and stockholders representing approximately 56% of the voting power of our outstanding capital stock, with the authorization to determine the final ratio having been granted to our board of directors. The reverse stock split is intended to bring the Company into compliance with Nasdaq’s Bid Price Rule.

The reverse stock split will be effected on our common stock by the filing of a certificate of amendment (the “Amendment”) to our amended and restated certificate of incorporation, as amended, with the Secretary of State of the State of Delaware on January 15, 2025, without any change to par value. The Amendment will become effective upon such filing. No fractional shares will be issued in connection with the reverse stock split as all fractional shares will be rounded down to the next whole share.

Corporate Information

We are a majority-controlled subsidiary of Fortress Biotech, Inc. (“Fortress”). We were incorporated under the laws of the State of Delaware on March 13, 2015. Our principal executive offices are located at 377 Plantation Street, Worcester, Massachusetts 01605, and our telephone number is 781-652-4500. We maintain a website on the Internet at www.mustangbio.com and our e-mail address is info@mustangbio.com. Information on our website, or any other website, is not incorporated by reference in this prospectus. We have included our website address in this prospectus solely as an inactive textual reference.

Implications of Being a Smaller Reporting Company

We are a smaller reporting company as defined in the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended (the “Exchange Act”). We may take advantage of certain of the scaled disclosures available to smaller reporting companies and will be able to take advantage of these scaled disclosures for so long as (i) the market value of our voting and non-voting common stock held by non-affiliates is less than $250 million measured on the last business day of our second fiscal quarter or (ii) our annual revenue is less than $100 million during the most recently completed fiscal year and the market value of our voting and non-voting common stock held by non-affiliates is less than $700 million measured on the last business day of our second fiscal quarter. Specifically, as a smaller reporting company, we may choose to present only the two most recent fiscal years of audited financial statements in our Annual Reports on Form 10-K and have reduced disclosure obligations regarding executive compensation, and if we are a smaller reporting company with less than $100 million in annual revenue, we would not be required to obtain an attestation report on internal control over financial reporting issued by our independent registered public accounting firm.

Risks Associated with the Company

Our business is subject to a number of risks of which you should be aware before making a decision to invest in our common stock. These risks are more fully described in the section titled “Risk Factors” immediately following this prospectus summary. These risks include, among others, the following:

Risks Related to our Finances and Capital Requirements

Risks Pertaining to our Business Strategy, Structure and Organization

Risks Inherent in Drug Development and Commercialization

Risks Related to Reliance on Third Parties

Risks Relating to Legislation and Regulation Affecting the Biopharmaceutical and Other Industries

Risks Pertaining to Intellectual Property and Potential Disputes with Licensors Thereof

Risks Relating to Our Control by Fortress Biotech, Inc. (“Fortress”)

Risks Relating to this Offering

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THE OFFERING

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The number of shares of our common stock to be outstanding after this offering is based on 64,768,830 shares of our stock outstanding as of January 10, 2025, and excludes:

Unless otherwise indicated, all information contained in this prospectus assumes:

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RISK FACTORS

Investing in our common stock involves a high degree of risk. You should carefully consider the risks described below, as well as the other information in this prospectus, including our financial statements and the related notes and “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations,” before deciding whether to invest in our common stock. We have listed below (not necessarily in order of importance or probability of occurrence) what we believe to be the most significant risk factors applicable to us. The occurrence of any of the events or developments described below could materially and adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects. In such an event, the market price of our common stock could decline and you may lose all or part of your investment. Additional risks and uncertainties not presently known to us or that we currently deem immaterial may also impair our business operations. Some of the statements in the following risk factors constitute forward-looking statements. Please see the section titled “Special Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements.”

Risks Related to Our Finances and Capital Requirements

We have incurred significant losses since our inception. We expect to incur losses for the foreseeable future and may never achieve or maintain profitability. We do not have any products that are approved for commercial sale and therefore do not expect to generate any revenues from product sales in the foreseeable future, if ever.

We have a limited operating history. We have focused primarily on organizing, acquiring and developing and securing our proprietary technology and identifying and obtaining preclinical data for various product candidates, with the goal of supporting regulatory approval for these product candidates. We have incurred losses since our inception in March 2015. Our net losses were $14.8 million and $43.0 million for the nine months ended September 30, 2024 and 2023, respectively, and we had an accumulated deficit of $395.8 million as of September 30, 2024. We expect to continue to incur significant operating losses for the foreseeable future. We also do not anticipate that we will achieve profitability for a period of time after generating material revenues, if ever. If we are unable to generate revenues, we will not become profitable and may be unable to continue operations without continued funding.

Because of the numerous risks and uncertainties associated with developing pharmaceutical products, we are unable to predict the timing or amount of increased expenses or when or if, we will be able to achieve profitability. Our net losses may fluctuate significantly from quarter to quarter and year to year. We anticipate that our expenses will increase substantially if:

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Our ability to become profitable depends upon our ability to generate revenue. To date, we have not generated any revenue from our development stage products, and we do not know when, or if, we will generate any revenue. Our ability to generate revenue depends on a number of factors, including, but not limited to, our ability to:

Even if we do achieve profitability, we may not be able to sustain or increase profitability on a quarterly or annual basis. Our failure to become and remain profitable would depress the value of our Company and could impair our ability to raise capital, expand our business, maintain our research and development efforts, diversify our product offerings or even continue our operations. A decline in the value of our Company could also cause you to lose all or part of your investment in our Securities.

There is substantial doubt regarding our ability to continue as a going concern. We will need to raise additional funding (which may not be available on acceptable terms to us, or at all) and/or delay, limit or terminate our product development efforts or other operations. If we are unable to raise capital, we could be required to seek bankruptcy protection or other alternatives that would likely result in our securityholders losing some or all of their investment in us.

We are currently advancing our programs in hematologic cancers and solid tumors through clinical development. Developing and commercializing CAR T products is expensive, and we do not expect to generate meaningful product revenues in the foreseeable future until we obtain marketing approval for products in the United States and following any potential commercial launch.

As of September 30, 2024, our cash and cash equivalents were $3.5 million. Based on our current business plan, there is substantial doubt regarding our ability to continue as a going concern for a period of one year after the date that our financial statements for the year ended September 30, 2024, are issued. Our fundraising efforts to raise additional funding may divert our management from their day-to-day activities, which may adversely affect our ability to develop and commercialize our potential products following marketing approval if and when obtained. In addition, we cannot guarantee that financing will be available in sufficient amounts or on terms acceptable to us, if at all. Moreover, the terms of any financing may adversely affect the holdings or the rights of our stockholders and the issuance of additional securities, whether equity or debt, by us, or the possibility of such issuance, may cause the market price of our shares to decline. The sale of additional equity or convertible securities would dilute all of our stockholders. Potential indebtedness, if incurred, would result in increased fixed payment obligations, and we may be required to agree to certain restrictive covenants, such as limitations on our ability to incur additional debt, limitations on our ability to acquire, sell or license intellectual property rights and other operating restrictions that could adversely impact our ability to conduct our business. We could also be required to seek funds through arrangements with collaborative partners or otherwise at an earlier stage than otherwise would be desirable and we may be required to relinquish rights to some of our technologies or product candidates or otherwise agree to terms unfavorable to us, any of which may have a material adverse effect on our business, operating results and prospects.

In addition, in order to address our current funding constraints, we may be required to further revise our business plan and strategy, which may result in us (i) further curtailing, delaying or discontinuing one or more of our research or development programs or the commercialization of any product candidates, (ii) selling certain of our assets and/or (iii) may result in our being unable to expand our operations or otherwise capitalize on our business opportunities. Such actions may become necessary whether or not we are able to raise additional capital. As a result, our business, financial condition, and results of operations could be materially affected. Furthermore, if we are unable to raise capital, we could be required to seek bankruptcy protection or other alternatives that would likely result in our securityholders losing some or all of their investment in us.

Our short operating history makes it difficult to evaluate our business and prospects.

We have been conducting operations only since our incorporation in March 2015. Our operations to date have been limited. We have not yet demonstrated an ability to successfully complete clinical trials, obtain regulatory approvals, manufacture a clinical scale or commercial scale product, or arrange for a third party to do so on our behalf, or conduct sales and marketing activities necessary for successful product commercialization. Consequently, any predictions about our future performance may not be as accurate as they could be if we had a history of successfully developing and commercializing pharmaceutical products.

In addition, as a young business, we may encounter unforeseen expenses, difficulties, complications, delays and other known and unknown factors. We will need to expand our capabilities to support commercial activities. We may not be successful in adding such capabilities.

We expect our financial condition and operating results to continue to fluctuate significantly from quarter to quarter and year to year due to a variety of factors, many of which are beyond our control. Accordingly, you should not rely upon the results of any past quarterly period as an indication of future operating performance.

We will require substantial additional funding which may not be available to us on acceptable terms, or at all. If we fail to raise the necessary additional capital, we may be unable to complete the development and commercialization of our product candidates or continue our development programs.

Our operations have consumed substantial amounts of cash since inception. We will need to significantly increase our spending to advance the preclinical and clinical development of our product candidates and launch and commercialize any product candidates for which we may receive regulatory approval, including building our own commercial organizations to address certain markets. We will require substantial additional capital for the further development and, if approved, commercialization of our product candidates, as well as to fund our other operating expenses and capital expenditures. As of September 30, 2024, we had $3.9 million in cash and restricted cash and have not generated positive cash flows from operations. We cannot provide any assurance that we will be able to raise funds to complete the development of our product candidates. Additionally, if we are unable to secure additional funding, it is likely that we will need to delay or terminate the development of certain product candidates; any such delay or termination, or the announcement of any such delay or termination, may impact our potential growth and have a material adverse effect on the value of our Securities.

In order to carry out our business plan and implement our strategy, we will need to obtain substantial additional financing and may choose to raise additional funds through strategic collaborations, licensing arrangements, public or private equity or debt financing, bank lines of credit, asset sales, government grants, or other arrangements. We cannot be certain that additional funding will be available on acceptable terms, or at all. Additional funding may be more difficult to obtain, or may be more expensive, as a result of recent increases in inflation and interest rates in the U.S. economy generally. If we are unable to raise additional capital in sufficient amounts or on terms acceptable to us, we may have to significantly delay, scale back or discontinue the development or, if approved, commercialization of one or more of our product candidates. We may also seek collaborators for one or more of our current or future product candidates at an earlier stage than otherwise would be desirable or on terms that are less favorable than might otherwise be available. Any of these events could significantly harm our business, financial condition and prospects.

Our future funding requirements will depend on many factors, including, but not limited to:

Under current SEC regulations, if at the time we file our Annual Report on Form 10-K our public float is less than $75 million, and for so long as our public float remains less than $75 million, the amount we can raise through primary public offerings of securities in any twelve-month period using shelf registration statements is limited to an aggregate of one-third of our public float, which is referred to as the “baby shelf rules.” SEC regulations permit us to use the highest closing sales price of our common stock (or the average of the last bid and last ask prices of our common stock) on any day within 60 days of sales under the registration statement to calculate our public float.

As of the date of the 2023 Form 10-K, our public float was less than $75 million. As a result, for sales following the date of the 2023 Form 10-K, and until we again have a public float with a value in excess of $75 million, if ever, we only have the capacity to sell shares up to one-third of our public float under shelf registration statements in any twelve-month period. If our public float decreases, the amount of securities we may sell under our Form S-3 shelf registration statements will also decrease.

Our inability to raise capital when needed would harm our business, financial condition and results of operations, and could cause our stock value to decline or require that we wind down our operations altogether.

Raising additional capital, including through lending arrangements, may cause dilution to our existing stockholders, restrict our operations or require us to relinquish proprietary rights.

Until such time, if ever, as we can generate substantial product revenue, we expect to finance our cash needs through a combination of equity offerings, debt financings, grants and license and development agreements in connection with any collaborations. To the extent that we raise additional capital through the sale of equity or convertible debt securities, your ownership interest will be diluted, and the terms of these securities may include liquidation or other preferences that adversely affect your rights as a stockholder. Debt financing, including through lending arrangements, and preferred equity financing, if available, may involve agreements that include covenants limiting or restricting our ability to take specific actions, such as incurring additional debt, making capital expenditures or declaring dividends.

If we raise additional funds through collaborations, strategic alliances or marketing, distribution or licensing arrangements with third parties, we may have to relinquish valuable rights to our technologies, future revenue streams, research programs or product candidates or grant licenses on terms that may not be favorable to us. If we are unable to raise additional funds through equity or debt financings when needed, we may be required to delay, limit, reduce or terminate our product development or future commercialization efforts or grant rights to develop and market product candidates that we would otherwise prefer to develop and market ourselves.

We will continue to incur significant increased costs as a result of operating as a public company, and our management will be required to devote substantial time to new compliance initiatives.

As a public company, we incur significant legal, accounting and other expenses under the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, (the “Sarbanes-Oxley Act”), as well as rules subsequently implemented by the SEC, and the rules of the Nasdaq Stock Exchange. These rules impose various requirements on public companies, including requiring establishment and maintenance of effective disclosure and financial controls and appropriate corporate governance practices. Our management and other personnel have devoted and will continue to devote a substantial amount of time to these compliance initiatives. Moreover, these rules and regulations increase our legal and financial compliance costs and make some activities more time-consuming and costly. For example, these rules and regulations make it more difficult and more expensive for us to obtain director and officer liability insurance, and we may be required to accept reduced policy limits and coverage or incur substantially higher costs to obtain the same or similar coverage. As a result, it may be more difficult for us to attract and retain qualified persons to serve on our Board, our Board committees or as executive officers.

The Sarbanes-Oxley Act requires, among other things, that we maintain effective internal controls for financial reporting and disclosure controls and procedures. As a result, we are required to periodically perform an evaluation of our internal controls over financial reporting to allow management to report on the effectiveness of those controls, as required by Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. These efforts to comply with Section 404 and related regulations have required, and continue to require, the commitment of significant financial and managerial resources. While we anticipate maintaining the integrity of our internal controls over financial reporting and all other aspects of Section 404, we cannot be certain that a material weakness will not be identified when we test the effectiveness of our control systems in the future. If a material weakness is identified, we could be subject to sanctions or investigations by the SEC or other regulatory authorities, which would require additional financial and management resources, costly litigation or a loss of public confidence in our internal controls, which could have an adverse effect on the market price of our stock.

We are a “smaller reporting company,” and the reduced disclosure requirements applicable to smaller reporting companies may make our common stock less attractive to investors.

We are a smaller reporting company, and we will remain a smaller reporting company until the fiscal year following the determination that our voting and non-voting common shares held by non-affiliates is more than $250 million measured on the last business day of our second fiscal quarter, or our annual revenues are more than $100 million during the most recently completed fiscal year and our voting and non-voting common shares held by non-affiliates is more than $700 million measured on the last business day of our second fiscal quarter. Smaller reporting companies are able to provide simplified executive compensation disclosure, are exempt from the auditor attestation requirements of Section 404, and have certain other reduced disclosure obligations, including, among other things, being required to provide only two years of audited financial statements and not being required to provide selected financial data, supplemental financial information or risk factors.

We have elected to take advantage of certain of the reduced reporting obligations available to us. We cannot predict whether investors will find our common stock less attractive if we rely on these exemptions. If some investors find our common stock less attractive as a result, there may be a less active trading market for our common stock and our stock price may be reduced or more volatile.

Our ability to use our pre-change NOLs and other pre-change tax attributes to offset post-change taxable income or taxes may be subject to limitation.

We may, from time to time, carry net operating loss carryforwards (“NOLs”) as deferred tax assets on our balance sheet. Under Sections 382 and 383 of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended, if a corporation undergoes an “ownership change” (generally defined as a greater than 50-percentage- point cumulative change (by value) in the equity ownership of certain stockholders over a rolling three-year period), the corporation’s ability to use its pre-change NOLs and other pre-change tax attributes to offset its post-change taxable income or taxes may be limited. We may experience ownership changes in the future as a result of shifts in our stock ownership, some of which changes are outside our control. As a result, our ability to use our pre-change NOLs and other pre-change tax attributes to offset post-change taxable income or taxes may be subject to limitation.

Risks Related to Our Business Strategy, Structure, and Organization

We currently have no products for sale. We are heavily dependent on the success of our product candidates, and we cannot give any assurances that any of our product candidates will receive regulatory approval or be successfully commercialized.

To date, we have invested a significant portion of our efforts and financial resources in the acquisition and development of our product candidates. We have not demonstrated our ability to perform the functions necessary for the successful acquisition, development or commercialization of the technologies we are seeking to develop. As an early stage company, we have limited experience and have not yet demonstrated an ability to successfully overcome many of the risks and uncertainties frequently encountered by companies in new and rapidly evolving fields, particularly in the biopharmaceutical area. Our future success is substantially dependent on our ability to successfully develop, obtain regulatory approval for, and then commercialize such product candidates. Most of our product candidates are currently in early stage clinical trials. Our business depends entirely on the successful development and commercialization of our product candidates, which may never occur. We currently have no drug products for sale, currently generate no revenues from sales of any drug products and may never be able to develop or commercialize a marketable product.

The successful development, and any commercialization, of our technologies and any product candidates that may occur would require us to successfully perform a variety of functions, including:

Our operations have historically been limited to organizing the Company, acquiring, developing and securing our proprietary technology and identifying and obtaining preclinical data or clinical data for various product candidates. These operations provide a limited basis for you to assess our ability to continue to develop our technology, identify product candidates, develop and commercialize any product candidates we are able to identify and enter into successful collaborative arrangements with other companies, as well as for you to assess the advisability of investing in our securities. Each of these requirements will require substantial time, effort and financial resources.

Each of our product candidates will require additional clinical development, management of clinical and manufacturing activities, regulatory approval in the jurisdictions in which we plan to market the product, obtaining manufacturing supply, building a commercial organization, and significant marketing efforts before we generate any revenues from product sales, which may not occur. We are not permitted to market or promote any of our product candidates in the U.S. or any other jurisdiction before we receive regulatory approval from the FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authority, respectively, and we may never receive such regulatory approval for any of our product candidates.

Our approach to the development of our product candidates is unproven, and we do not know whether we will be able to develop any products of commercial value.

Our product candidates are emerging technologies and, consequently, it is conceivable that such technologies may ultimately fail to develop into commercially viable therapies to treat human patients with cancer or other diseases. One of the reasons for the lack of commercial viability could be our inability to obtain regulatory approval for such technologies.

CAR T is a new approach to cancer treatment that presents significant challenges.

We have concentrated much of our research and development efforts on CAR T technology, and our future success is highly dependent on the successful development of T cell immunotherapies in general and our CAR T technology and product candidates in particular. Because CAR T is a relatively new approach to cancer immunotherapy and cancer treatment generally, developing and commercializing our product candidates subjects us to a number of challenges, including, but not necessarily limited to:

We may expend our limited resources to pursue a particular product candidate or indication and fail to capitalize on product candidates or indications that may be more profitable or for which there is a greater likelihood of success.

Because we have limited financial and managerial resources, we focus on research programs and product candidates that we identify for specific indications. As a result, we may forego or delay the pursuit of opportunities with other product candidates or for other indications that later prove to have greater commercial potential. Our resource allocation decisions may cause us to fail to capitalize on viable commercial products or profitable market opportunities. Our spending on current and future research and development programs and product candidates for specific indications may not yield any commercially viable products. If we do not accurately and/or effectively evaluate the commercial potential or target market for a particular product candidate, we may relinquish valuable rights to that product candidate through collaboration, licensing or other royalty arrangements in cases in which it would have been more advantageous for us to retain sole development and commercialization rights to such product candidate.

Risks Inherent in Drug Development and Commercialization

Delays in the commencement or conduct of our clinical trials could result in increased costs and delay our ability to pursue regulatory approval.

Clinical trials are expensive and can take many years to complete, and the outcome is inherently uncertain. We cannot guarantee that any clinical trials will be conducted as planned or will be completed on schedule, if at all. A failure of one or more clinical trials can occur at any stage and our future clinical trials may not be successful. The commencement or conduct of clinical trials can be delayed for a variety of reasons, including, but not necessarily limited to, delays in:

Any delays in the commencement of our clinical trials will delay our ability to pursue regulatory approval for product candidates. In addition, many of the factors that cause, or lead to, a delay in the commencement of clinical trials may also ultimately lead to the denial of regulatory approval of a product candidate.

Suspensions or delays in the completion of clinical testing could result in increased costs and delay or prevent our ability to complete development of that product candidate or generate product revenues, if approved.

Once a clinical trial has begun, patient recruitment and enrollment may be slower than we anticipate due to the nature of the clinical trial plan, the proximity of patients to clinical sites, the eligibility criteria for participation in the study or other factors. Clinical trials may also be delayed as a result of ambiguous or negative interim results or difficulties in obtaining sufficient quantities of product manufactured in accordance with regulatory requirements and on a timely basis. Further, a clinical trial may be modified, suspended or terminated by us, an IRB, an ethics committee or a data safety monitoring committee overseeing the clinical trial, any clinical trial site with respect to that site, or the FDA or other regulatory authorities, due to a number of factors, including, but not necessarily limited to:

Changes in regulatory requirements and guidance also may occur, and we may need to amend clinical trial protocols to reflect these changes. Amendments may require us to resubmit clinical trial protocols to IRBs for re-examination, which may in turn impact the costs and timing of, and the likelihood of successfully completing, a clinical trial. If we experience delays in the completion of, or if we must suspend or terminate, any clinical trial of any product candidate, our ability to obtain regulatory approval for that product candidate will be delayed, and the commercial prospects, if any, for the product candidate may suffer as a result. In addition, many of these factors may also ultimately lead to the denial of regulatory approval of a product candidate.

Product candidates that we advance into clinical trials may not receive regulatory approval.

Pharmaceutical development has inherent risks. We will be required to demonstrate through well-controlled clinical trials that product candidates are effective with a favorable benefit-risk profile for use in their target indications before seeking regulatory approvals for their commercial sale. Success in early clinical trials does not mean that later clinical trials will be successful, as product candidates in later-stage clinical trials may fail to demonstrate sufficient safety or efficacy despite having progressed through initial clinical testing. Also, we may need to conduct additional clinical trials that are not currently anticipated. Companies frequently suffer significant setbacks in advanced clinical trials, even after earlier clinical trials have shown promising results. As a result, product candidates that we advance into clinical trials may not receive regulatory approval.

In addition, even if our product candidates were to obtain approval, regulatory authorities may approve any such product candidates or any future product candidate for fewer or more limited indications than we request, may not approve the price we intend to charge for our products, may grant approval contingent on the performance of costly post-marketing clinical trials, or may approve a product candidate with a label that does not include the labeling claims necessary or desirable for the successful commercialization of that product candidate. The regulatory authority may also require the label to contain warnings, contraindications, or precautions that limit the commercialization of the product. Any of these scenarios could impact the commercial prospects for one or more of our current or future product candidates.

Any product candidates we advance into clinical development are subject to extensive regulation, which can be costly and time consuming, cause unanticipated delays or prevent the receipt of the required approvals to commercialize product candidates.

The research and clinical development, testing, manufacturing, labeling, storage, record-keeping, advertising, promotion, import, export, marketing and distribution of any product candidate, including our product candidates, is subject to extensive regulation by the FDA in the United States and by comparable health authorities in foreign markets. In the United States, we are not permitted to market a product candidate until such product candidate’s BLA or NDA is approved by the FDA. The process of obtaining approval is uncertain, expensive, often spanning many years, and can vary substantially based upon the type, complexity and novelty of the products involved. In addition to significant and expensive clinical testing requirements, our ability to obtain marketing approval for product candidates depends on obtaining the final results of required non-clinical testing, including characterization of the manufactured components of our product candidates and validation of our manufacturing processes. The FDA may determine that our product manufacturing processes, testing procedures or equipment and facilities are inadequate to support approval. Approval policies or regulations may change, and the FDA has substantial discretion in the pharmaceutical approval process, including the ability to delay, limit or deny approval of a product candidate for many reasons. Despite the time and expense invested in the clinical development of product candidates, regulatory approval is never guaranteed.

The FDA and other regulatory agencies can delay, limit or deny approval of a product candidate for many reasons, including, but not limited to:

With respect to foreign markets, approval procedures vary among countries and, in addition to the aforementioned risks, can involve additional product testing, administrative review periods and agreements with pricing authorities. In addition, rapid drug and biological development during the COVID-19 pandemic has raised questions about the safety and efficacy of certain marketed pharmaceuticals and may result in increased cautiousness by the FDA and comparable foreign regulatory authorities in reviewing new pharmaceuticals based on safety, efficacy or other regulatory considerations and may result in significant delays in obtaining regulatory approvals. Any delay in obtaining, or inability to obtain, applicable regulatory approvals would prevent us from commercializing our product candidates.

Regulatory approval for our product candidates by the FDA, or any similar regulatory authorities outside the United States, is limited to those specific indications and conditions for which clinical safety and efficacy have been demonstrated.

Any regulatory approval is limited to the indications for use and related treatment of those specific diseases and indications set forth in the approval for which a product is deemed to be safe and effective by the FDA, or other similar regulatory authorities outside the United States. In addition to the regulatory approval required for new drug products, new formulations or indications for an approved product also require regulatory approval. If we are not able to obtain regulatory approval for any desired future indications for our products, our ability to effectively market and sell our products may be reduced and our business may be adversely affected.

While physicians may choose to prescribe drugs for uses that are not described in the product’s labeling and for uses that differ from those tested in clinical studies and approved by the regulatory authorities (“off-label uses”), our ability to promote the products is limited to those indications that are specifically approved by the FDA, or similar regulatory authorities outside the United States. Such off-label uses are common across medical specialties and may constitute an appropriate treatment for some patients in certain circumstances. Regulatory authorities in the U.S. generally do not regulate practice of medicine or the behavior of physicians in their choice of treatments. Regulatory authorities do, however, restrict communications by pharmaceutical companies on the promotion of off-label use. If our promotional activities fail to comply with these regulations or guidelines, we may be subject to compliance or enforcement actions, including Warning Letters, by these authorities. In addition, our failure to follow FDA laws, regulations and guidelines relating to promotion and advertising may cause the FDA to suspend or withdraw an approved product from the market, request a recall or institute fines or penalties, or could result in disgorgement of money, operating restrictions, corrective advertising, injunctions or criminal prosecution, any of which could harm our business.

If any of our product candidates are approved and we or our contract manufacturer(s) fail to produce the product, or components of the product, in the volumes that we require on a timely basis, or fail to comply with stringent regulations applicable to pharmaceutical drug manufacturers, we may face delays in the commercialization of our product candidates, if approved, or be unable to meet market demand, and may lose potential revenues.

The manufacture of pharmaceutical products requires significant expertise and capital investment, including the development of advanced manufacturing techniques and process controls, and the use of specialized processing equipment. We may enter into development and supply agreements with contract manufacturers for the completion of pre-commercialization manufacturing development activities and, if approved, the manufacture of commercial supplies for one or more of our product candidates. Any termination or disruption of our relationships with our contract manufacturers may materially harm our business and financial condition and frustrate any commercialization efforts for each respective product candidate.

All of our contract manufacturers must comply with strictly enforced federal, state and foreign regulations, including cGMP requirements enforced by the FDA through its establishment inspection program. We are required by law to establish adequate oversight and control over raw materials, components and finished products furnished by our third-party suppliers and contract manufacturers, but we have little control over their compliance with these regulations. Any failure to comply with applicable regulations may result in fines and civil penalties, suspension of production, restrictions on imports and exports, suspension or delay in product approval, product seizure or recall, or withdrawal of product approval, and would limit the availability of our product and customer confidence in our product. Any manufacturing defect or error discovered after products have been produced and distributed could result in even more significant consequences, including costly recalls, re-stocking costs, damage to our reputation and potential for product liability claims.

If the contract manufacturers upon whom we may rely to manufacture one or more of our product candidates, and any future product candidate we may in-license, fails to deliver the required commercial quantities on a timely basis at commercially reasonable prices, we would likely be unable to meet demand for our approved product and we would lose potential revenues.

If serious adverse or unacceptable side effects are identified during the development of one or more of our product candidates or any future product candidate, we may need to abandon or limit the development of some of our product candidates.

If one or more of our product candidates or any future product candidate are associated with undesirable side effects or adverse events in clinical trials or have characteristics that are unexpected, we may need to abandon their development or limit development to more narrow uses or subpopulations in which the adverse events, undesirable side effects or other characteristics are less prevalent, less severe or more acceptable from a risk-benefit perspective. In our industry, many compounds that initially showed promise in early stage testing have later been found to cause serious adverse events that prevented further development of the compound. In the event that our clinical trials reveal a high or unacceptable severity and prevalence of adverse events, our trials could be suspended or terminated, and the FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authorities could order us to cease further development or deny approval of one or more of our product candidates or any future product candidate for any or all targeted indications. The FDA could also issue a letter requesting additional data or information prior to making a final decision regarding whether or not to approve a product candidate. The number of requests for additional data or information issued by the FDA in recent years has increased and has resulted in substantial delays in the approval of several new drugs. Adverse events or undesirable side effects caused by one or more of our product candidates or any future product candidate could also result in the inclusion of unfavorable information in our product labeling or in denial of regulatory approval by the FDA or other regulatory authorities for any or all targeted indications, which would, in turn, prevent us from commercializing and generating market acceptance and revenues from the sale of that product candidate. Adverse events or side effects could affect patient recruitment or the ability of enrolled patients to complete the trial and could result in potential product liability claims.

Additionally, if one or more of our product candidates or any future product candidate receives marketing approval and we or others later identify undesirable side effects caused by this product, a number of potentially significant negative consequences could result, including:

Any of these events could prevent us from achieving or maintaining market acceptance of any of our product candidates or any future product candidate or could substantially increase our commercialization costs and expenses, which in turn could delay or prevent us from generating significant revenues, or any revenues, from their sale.

Even if one or more of our product candidates receives regulatory approval, it and any other products we may market will remain subject to substantial regulatory scrutiny.

If one or more of our product candidates that we may license or acquire is approved, the approved product candidate will be subject to ongoing requirements and review by the FDA and other regulatory authorities. These requirements include labeling, packaging, storage, advertising, promotion, record-keeping and submission of safety and other post-market information and reports, registration and listing requirements, cGMP requirements relating to manufacturing, quality control, quality assurance and corresponding maintenance of records and documents, requirements regarding the distribution of samples to physicians and recordkeeping of the drug, and requirements regarding our presentations to and interactions with health care professionals.

The FDA, or other regulatory authorities, may also impose requirements for costly post-marketing studies or clinical trials and surveillance to monitor the safety or efficacy of the product. The FDA and other applicable regulatory authorities closely regulates the post-approval marketing and promotion of drugs to ensure drugs are marketed only for the approved indications and in accordance with the provisions of the approved labeling. The FDA and other applicable regulatory authorities impose stringent restrictions on manufacturers’ communications regarding off-label use and if we market any approved product for uses other than their approved indications, we may be subject to enforcement action for off-label marketing. Violations of the Federal Food Drug and Cosmetics Act (“FDCA”) relating to the promotion of prescription drugs may lead to investigations, civil claims, and/or criminal charges alleging violations of federal and state health care fraud and abuse laws, as well as state consumer protection laws.

In addition, later discovery of previously unknown adverse events or other problems with our products, manufacturers or manufacturing processes, or failure to comply with regulatory requirements, may yield various results, including:

The FDA’s policies may change, and additional government regulations may be enacted that could prevent, limit or delay regulatory approval of our product candidates, or negatively affect those products for which we may have already received regulatory approval, if any. If we are slow or unable to adapt to changes in existing requirements or the adoption of new requirements or policies, or if we are not able to maintain regulatory compliance, we may be subject to the various actions listed above, including losing any marketing approval that we may have obtained. We do not know what impact any changes made by the new presidential administration will have on our business. Such actions may impact the development and commercialization of drug products and could materially harm our business and financial condition.

We will need to obtain FDA approval of any proposed product brand names, and any failure or delay associated with such approval may adversely impact our business.

A pharmaceutical product cannot be marketed in the U.S. or other countries until we have completed a rigorous and extensive regulatory review process, including approval of a brand name. Any brand names we intend to use for our product candidates will require approval from the FDA regardless of whether we have secured a formal trademark registration from the USPTO. The FDA typically conducts a review of proposed product brand names, including an evaluation of the potential for confusion with other product names. The FDA may also object to a product brand name if it believes the name inappropriately implies medical claims. If the FDA objects to any of our proposed product brand names, we may be required to adopt an alternative brand name for our product candidates. If we adopt an alternative brand name, we would lose the benefit of our existing trademark applications for such product candidate and may be required to expend significant additional resources in an effort to identify a suitable product brand name that would qualify under applicable trademark laws, not infringe the existing rights of third parties and be acceptable to the FDA. We may be unable to build a successful brand identity for a new trademark in a timely manner or at all, which would limit our ability to commercialize our product candidates.

Public concern regarding the safety of drug products could delay or limit our ability to obtain regulatory approval, result in the inclusion of unfavorable information in our labeling or require us to undertake other activities that may entail additional costs.

In light of widely publicized events concerning the safety risk of certain drug products, the FDA, members of the U.S. Congress, the Government Accountability Office, medical professionals and the general public have raised concerns about potential drug safety issues. These events have resulted in the withdrawal of drug products, revisions to drug labeling that further limit use of the drug products and the establishment of risk management programs. The Food and Drug Administration Amendments Act of 2007 (“FDAAA”), grants significant expanded authority to the FDA, much of which is aimed at improving the safety of drug products before and after approval. In particular, the new law authorizes the FDA to, among other things, require post-approval studies and clinical trials, mandate changes to drug labeling to reflect new safety information and require risk evaluation and mitigation strategies for certain drugs, including certain currently approved drugs. It also significantly expands the federal government’s clinical trial registry and results databank, which we expect will result in significantly increased government oversight of clinical trials. Under the FDAAA, companies that violate these and other provisions of the new law are subject to substantial civil monetary penalties, among other regulatory, civil and criminal penalties. The increased attention to drug safety issues may result in a more cautious approach by the FDA in its review of data from our clinical trials. Data from clinical trials may receive greater scrutiny, particularly with respect to safety, which may make the FDA or other regulatory authorities more likely to require additional preclinical studies or clinical trials. If the FDA requires us to conduct additional preclinical studies or clinical trials prior to approving any of our product candidates, our ability to obtain approval of this product candidate will be delayed. If the FDA requires us to provide additional clinical or preclinical data following the approval of any of our product candidates, the indications for which this product candidate is approved may be limited or there may be specific warnings or limitations on dosing, and our efforts to commercialize our product candidates may be otherwise adversely impacted.

If we experience delays or difficulties in the enrollment of patients in clinical trials, our receipt of necessary regulatory approvals could be delayed or prevented.

We may not be able to initiate or continue clinical trials for one or more of our product candidates if we are unable to locate and enroll a sufficient number of eligible patients to participate in these trials as required by the FDA or similar regulatory authorities outside the United States. Some of our competitors have ongoing clinical trials for product candidates that treat the same indications that we are targeting for our product candidates, and patients who would otherwise be eligible for our clinical trials may instead enroll in clinical trials of our competitors’ product candidates. Available therapies for the indications we are pursuing can also affect enrollment in our clinical trials. Patient enrollment is affected by other factors including, but not necessarily limited to:

Our inability to enroll a sufficient number of patients for our clinical trials would result in significant delays and could require us to abandon one or more clinical trials altogether. Enrollment delays in our clinical trials may result in increased development costs for our product candidates or future product candidates, which would cause the value of our Company to decline and limit our ability to obtain additional financing.

If our competitors develop treatments for any of our product candidates’ target indications and those competitor products are approved more quickly, marketed more successfully or demonstrated to be more effective, the commercial opportunity for our product candidate will be reduced or eliminated.

The biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries are subject to rapid and intense technological change. We face, and will continue to face, competition in the development and, if approved, marketing of our product candidates from academic institutions, government agencies, research institutions and biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies. There can be no assurance that developments by others will not render one or more of our product candidates obsolete or noncompetitive. Furthermore, new developments, including the development of other drug technologies and methods of preventing the incidence of disease, occur in the pharmaceutical industry at a rapid pace. These developments may render one or more of our product candidates obsolete or noncompetitive.

Competitors may seek to develop alternative formulations that do not directly infringe on our in-licensed patent rights. The commercial opportunity for one or more of our product candidates could be significantly harmed if competitors are able to develop alternative formulations outside the scope of our in-licensed patents. Compared to us, many of our potential competitors have substantially greater:

As a result of these factors, our competitors may obtain regulatory approval of their products more rapidly than we are able to or may obtain patent protection or other intellectual property rights that limit our ability to develop or commercialize one or more of our product candidates. Our competitors may also develop drugs that are more effective, safe, useful and less costly than ours and may be more successful than us in manufacturing and marketing their products. Smaller or early-stage companies may also prove to be significant competitors, particularly through collaborative arrangements with large and established companies. We will also face competition from these third parties in establishing clinical trial sites, in patient registration for clinical trials, and in identifying and in-licensing new product candidates.

Further, generic therapies are typically sold at lower prices than branded therapies and are generally preferred by hospital formularies and managed care providers of health services. We anticipate that, if approved, our product candidates will face increasing competition in the form of generic versions of branded products of competitors, including those that have lost or will lose their patent exclusivity. In the future, we may face additional competition from a generic form of our own candidates when the patents covering them begin to expire, or earlier if the patents are successfully challenged. If we are unable to demonstrate to physicians and payers that the key differentiating features of our product candidates translate to overall clinical benefit or lower cost of care, we may not be able to compete with generic alternatives.

If any of our product candidates are successfully developed but, if approved, do not achieve broad market acceptance among physicians, patients, healthcare payors and the medical community, the revenues that any such product candidates generate from sales will be limited.

Even if our product candidates receive regulatory approval, they may not gain market acceptance among physicians, patients, healthcare payors and the medical community. Coverage and reimbursement of our product candidates by third-party payors, including government payors, generally would also be necessary for commercial success. The degree of market acceptance of any approved products would depend on a number of factors, including, but not necessarily limited to:

If any product candidate that we develop does not provide a treatment regimen that is as beneficial as, or is not perceived as being as beneficial as, the current standard of care or otherwise does not provide patient benefit, that product candidate, if approved for commercial sale by the FDA or other regulatory authorities, likely will not achieve market acceptance. Our ability to effectively promote and sell any approved products will also depend on pricing and cost-effectiveness, including our ability to produce a product at a competitive price and our ability to obtain sufficient third-party coverage or reimbursement. If any product candidate is approved but does not achieve an adequate level of acceptance by physicians, patients and third-party payors, our ability to generate revenues from that product would be substantially reduced. In addition, our efforts to educate the medical community and third-party payors on the benefits of our product candidates may require significant resources, may be constrained by FDA rules and policies on product promotion, and may never be successful.

Reimbursement may be limited or unavailable in certain market segments for our product candidates, which could make it difficult for us to sell our products profitably.

There is significant uncertainty related to the third-party coverage and reimbursement of newly approved drugs. Such third-party payors include government health programs such as Medicare, managed care providers, private health insurers and other organizations. We intend to seek approval to market our product candidates in the U.S., the European Union (“EU”) and other selected foreign jurisdictions. Market acceptance and sales of our product candidates in both domestic and international markets will depend significantly on the availability of adequate coverage and reimbursement from third-party payors for any of our product candidates and may be affected by existing and future health care reform measures. Government and other third-party payors are increasingly attempting to contain healthcare costs by limiting both coverage and the level of reimbursement for new drugs and, as a result, they may not cover or provide adequate payment for our product candidates, if approved. These payors may conclude that our product candidates are less safe, less effective or less cost-effective than existing or future introduced products, and third-party payors may not approve our product candidates, if approved, for coverage and reimbursement or may cease providing coverage and reimbursement for these product candidates.

Obtaining coverage and reimbursement approval for a product from a government or other third-party payor is a time consuming and costly process that could require us to provide to the payor supporting scientific, clinical and cost-effectiveness data for the use of our products. We may not be able to provide data sufficient to gain acceptance with respect to coverage and reimbursement. If reimbursement of our future products is unavailable or limited in scope or amount, or if pricing is set at unsatisfactory levels, we may be unable to achieve or sustain profitability.

In some foreign countries, particularly in the EU, the pricing of prescription pharmaceuticals is subject to governmental control. In these countries, pricing negotiations with governmental authorities can take considerable time after the receipt of marketing approval for a product candidate. To obtain reimbursement or pricing approval in some countries, we may be required to conduct additional clinical trials that compare the cost-effectiveness of our product candidates to other available therapies. If reimbursement of our product candidates, if approved, is unavailable or limited in scope or amount in a particular country, or if pricing is set at unsatisfactory levels, we may be unable to achieve or sustain profitability of our products in such a country.

If we are unable to establish sales, marketing and distribution capabilities or to enter into agreements with third parties to market and sell our product candidates, we may be unsuccessful in commercializing our product candidates, if they are approved.

We currently do not have a marketing or sales organization for the marketing, sales and distribution of pharmaceutical products. In order to commercialize any approved product candidate, we would need to build marketing, sales, distribution, managerial and other non-technical capabilities or arrange for third parties to perform these services, and we may be unsuccessful in doing so. In the event of successful development and regulatory approval of any of our current or future product candidates, we expect to build a targeted specialist sales force to market or co-promote the product. There are risks involved with establishing our own sales, marketing and distribution capabilities. For example, recruiting and training a sales force is expensive and time consuming and could delay any product launch. If the commercial launch of a product candidate for which we recruit a sales force and establish marketing capabilities is delayed or does not occur for any reason, we would have prematurely or unnecessarily incurred these commercialization expenses. This may be costly, and our investment would be lost if we cannot retain or reposition our sales and marketing personnel.

Factors that may inhibit our efforts to commercialize our product candidates, if approved, on our own include, but are not necessarily limited to:

We face potential product liability exposure, and if successful claims are brought against us, we may incur substantial liability for one or more of our product candidates or a future product candidate, if approved, we may license or acquire and may have to limit their commercialization.

The use of one or more of our product candidates and any future product candidate we may license or acquire in clinical trials and the sale of any products for which we obtain marketing approval expose us to the risk of product liability claims. For example, we may be sued if any product candidate we develop allegedly causes injury or is found to be otherwise unsuitable during clinical testing, manufacturing, and, if approved, during marketing or sale. Any such product liability claims may include allegations of defects in manufacturing, defects in design, a failure to warn of dangers inherent in the product, negligence, strict liability or a breach of warranties. Product liability claims might be brought against us by consumers, health care providers or others using, administering or selling our products. If we cannot successfully defend ourselves against these claims, we will incur substantial liabilities. Regardless of merit or eventual outcome, liability claims may result in:

We will obtain limited product liability insurance coverage for any and all of our upcoming clinical trials. However, our insurance coverage may not reimburse us or may not be sufficient to reimburse us for any expenses or losses we may suffer. Moreover, insurance coverage is becoming increasingly expensive, and, in the future, we may not be able to maintain insurance coverage at a reasonable cost or in sufficient amounts to protect us against losses due to liability. When needed we intend to expand our insurance coverage to include the sale of commercial products if we obtain marketing approval for one or more of our product candidates in development, but we may be unable to obtain commercially reasonable product liability insurance for any products approved for marketing. On occasion, large judgments have been awarded in class action lawsuits based on drugs that had unanticipated side effects. A successful product liability claim or series of claims brought against us could cause our stock price to fall and, if judgments exceed our insurance coverage, could decrease our cash and adversely affect our business.

Product candidates, even if successfully developed and commercialized, may be effective only in combating certain specific types of cancer, and the market for drugs designed to combat such cancer type(s) may be small and unprofitable.

There are many different types of cancer, and a treatment that is effective against one type of cancer may not be effective against another. CAR T or other technologies we pursue may only be effective in combating specific types of cancer but not others. Even if one or more of our product candidates, if approved, proves to be an effective treatment against a given type of cancer, the number of patients suffering from such cancer may be small, in which case potential sales from a therapy designed to combat such cancer would be limited.

Negative public opinion and increased regulatory scrutiny of the therapies that underpin many of our product candidates may damage public perception of our product candidates or adversely affect our ability to conduct our business or obtain regulatory approvals for our product candidates.

Public perception may be influenced by claims that one or more of the therapies underpinning our product candidates is unsafe, and such therapy may not gain the acceptance of the public or the medical community. More restrictive government regulations or negative public opinion would have a negative effect on our business or financial condition and may delay or impair the development and commercialization of our product candidates or demand for any products we may develop. Adverse events in our clinical trials, even if not ultimately attributable to our product candidates, and the resulting publicity, could lead to increased governmental regulation, unfavorable public perception, potential regulatory delays in the testing or approval of our potential product candidates, stricter labeling requirements for those product candidates that do obtain approval and/or a decrease in demand for any such product candidates. Concern about environmental spread of our products, whether real or anticipated, may also hinder the commercialization of our products.

Risks Related to Reliance on Third Parties

We rely, and expect to continue to rely, on third parties to conduct our preclinical studies and clinical trials, and those third parties may not perform satisfactorily, including failing to meet deadlines for the completion of such trials or complying with applicable regulatory requirements.

We rely on our licensors to conduct some of our preclinical studies and some of our clinical trials for our product candidates and for future product candidates, and we rely on third-party CROs and site management organizations to conduct most of the remainder of our preclinical studies and all the rest of our clinical trials. We expect to continue to rely on third parties, such as our licensors, CROs, site management organizations, clinical data management organizations, medical institutions and clinical investigators, to conduct some of our preclinical studies and all of our clinical trials. The agreements with these third parties might terminate for a variety of reasons, including a failure to perform by the third parties. If we need to enter into alternative arrangements, that could delay our product development activities.

Our reliance on these third parties for research and development activities reduces our control over these activities but does not relieve us of our responsibilities. For example, we remain responsible for ensuring that each of our preclinical studies and clinical trials is conducted in accordance with the general investigational plan and protocols for the trial and for ensuring that our preclinical studies are conducted in accordance with good laboratory practices (“GLPs”) as appropriate. Moreover, the FDA requires us to comply with standards, commonly referred to as good clinical practices (“GCPs”) for conducting, recording and reporting the results of clinical trials to assure that data and reported results are credible and accurate and that the rights, integrity and confidentiality of trial participants are protected. Regulatory authorities enforce these requirements through periodic inspections of trial sponsors, clinical investigators and trial sites. If we or any of our CROs fail to comply with applicable GCPs, the clinical data generated in our clinical trials may be deemed unreliable and the FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authorities may require us to perform additional clinical trials before approving our marketing applications. We cannot assure you that upon inspection by a regulatory authority, such regulatory authority will determine that any of our clinical trials complies with GCP regulations. In addition, our clinical trials must be conducted with product produced under cGMP regulations. Our failure to comply with these regulations may require us to repeat clinical trials, which would delay the regulatory approval process. We also are required to register certain clinical trials and post the results of completed clinical trials on a government-sponsored database, ClinicalTrials.gov, within specified timeframes. Failure to do so can result in fines, adverse publicity and civil and criminal sanctions.

The third parties with whom we have contracted to help perform our preclinical studies and/or clinical trials may also have relationships with other entities, some of which may be our competitors. If these third parties do not successfully carry out their contractual duties, meet expected deadlines or conduct our preclinical studies or clinical trials in accordance with regulatory requirements or our stated protocols, we will not be able to obtain, or may be delayed in obtaining, marketing approvals for our product candidates and will not be able to, or may be delayed in our efforts to, successfully commercialize our product candidates, if approved.

If any of our relationships with these third-party CROs or site management organizations terminates, we may not be able to enter into arrangements with alternative CROs or site management organizations or to do so on commercially reasonable terms. Switching or adding additional CROs or site management organizations involves additional cost and requires management time and focus. In addition, there is a natural transition period when a new CRO or site management organization commences work. As a result, delays could occur, which could compromise our ability to meet our desired development timelines.

We are currently reliant on COH, Fred Hutch, and UAB for a substantial portion of our research and development efforts and the early clinical testing of our product candidates.

A substantial portion of our research and development has been and will continue to be conducted by COH, Fred Hutch, and UAB, pursuant to a sponsored research agreement and/or clinical trial agreements with each of those parties. As a result, our future success is heavily dependent on the results of research and development efforts of these institutions and their personnel. We have limited control over the nature or timing of their research and limited visibility into their day-to-day activities, and as a result can provide little assurance that their efforts will be successful.

We contract with third parties for the manufacture of our product candidates for preclinical and clinical testing and may also do so for commercialization, if and when our product candidates are approved. This reliance on third parties increases the risk that we will not have sufficient quantities of our product candidates or any future product candidate or such quantities at an acceptable cost, which could delay, prevent or impair our development or commercialization efforts.

Due to limited resources, and in light of our reduction in work force in April 2024, we may increase our reliance on third-party manufacturers or third-party collaborators for the manufacture of commercial supply of one or more product candidates for which our collaborators or we obtain marketing approval. We may be unable to establish any agreements with third-party manufacturers or to do so on acceptable terms. Even if we are able to establish agreements with third-party manufacturers, reliance on third-party manufacturers entails additional risks, including, but not necessarily limited to:

We rely on our third-party manufacturers to produce or purchase from third-party suppliers the materials and equipment necessary to produce our product candidates for our preclinical and clinical trials. Forces beyond our control could disrupt the global supply chain and impact our or our third-party manufacturers’ ability to obtain raw materials or other products necessary to manufacture our product candidates. There are a limited number of suppliers for raw materials and equipment that we use (or that are used on our behalf) to manufacture our product candidates, and there may be a need to assess alternate suppliers to prevent a possible disruption of the manufacture of the materials and equipment necessary to produce our product candidates for our preclinical and clinical trials, and if approved, ultimately for commercial sale. We do not have any control over the process or timing of the acquisition of these raw materials or equipment by our third-party manufacturers. Any significant delay in the supply of a product candidate, or the raw material components thereof, for an ongoing preclinical or clinical trial due to the need to replace a third-party manufacturer could considerably delay completion of our preclinical or clinical trials, product testing and potential regulatory approval of our product candidates. If our manufacturers or we are unable to purchase these raw materials or equipment after regulatory approval has been obtained for our product candidates, the commercial launch of our product candidates would be delayed or there would be a shortage in supply, which would impair our ability to generate revenues from the sale of our product candidates.

The facilities used by contract manufacturers to potentially manufacture our product candidates must be approved by the FDA pursuant to inspections that will be conducted after we submit an New Drug Application (NDA) or BLA to the FDA. We are required by law to establish adequate oversight and control over raw materials, components and finished products furnished by our contract manufacturers, but we do not control the day-to-day manufacturing operations of, and are dependent on, the contract manufacturers for compliance with current Good Manufacturing Practices (“cGMP”) regulations for manufacture of our product candidates. Third-party manufacturers may not be able to comply with the cGMP regulations or similar regulatory requirements outside the United States. Our failure, or the failure of our third-party manufacturers, to comply with applicable regulations could result in sanctions being imposed on us, including clinical holds, fines, injunctions, restrictions on imports and exports, civil penalties, delays, suspension or withdrawal of approvals, license revocation, seizures or recalls of product candidates or products, operating restrictions and criminal prosecutions, any of which could significantly and adversely affect supplies of our products.

One or more of the product candidates that we may develop may compete with other product candidates and products for access to manufacturing facilities. There are a limited number of manufacturers that operate under cGMP regulations and that might be capable of manufacturing for us. Any performance failure on the part of our existing or future manufacturers could delay clinical development or marketing approval. We do not currently have arrangements in place for redundant supply. If our current contract manufacturers cannot perform as agreed, we may be required to replace such manufacturers. We may incur added costs and delays in identifying and qualifying any replacement manufacturers.

Future dependence upon others for the manufacture of our product candidates or products may adversely affect our future profit margins and our ability to commercialize any products that may receive marketing approval on a timely and competitive basis. We also expect to rely on third parties to distribute drug supplies for our clinical trials. Any performance failure on the part of our distributors could delay clinical development or marketing approval of our product candidates or commercialization of our products, if approved, producing additional losses and depriving us of potential product revenue.

We rely on third parties to conduct all aspects of our LV vector production and these third parties may not perform satisfactorily.

We do not independently conduct our LV vector production and we currently rely, and expect to continue to rely, on third parties with respect to the manufacture of these items.

Our reliance on these third parties for manufacturing LV vector reduces our control over these activities but will not relieve us of our responsibility to ensure compliance with all required regulations and study protocols. For products that we develop and, if approved, commercialize, we will remain responsible for ensuring that each of our IND-enabling studies and clinical studies is conducted in accordance with the study plan and protocols, and that our LV vectors are manufactured in accordance with GMP as applied in the relevant jurisdictions.

If these third parties do not successfully carry out their contractual duties, meet expected deadlines, conduct our studies in accordance with regulatory requirements or our stated study plans and protocols, or manufacture our LV vectors in accordance with GMP, we will not be able to complete, or may be delayed in completing, the preclinical and clinical studies and manufacturing process validation activities required to support future IND, market authorization application and BLA submissions and approval of our product candidates, or to support commercialization of our products, if approved. Many of our agreements with these third parties contain termination provisions that allow these third parties to terminate their relationships with us at any time. If we need to enter into alternative arrangements, our product development and commercialization activities could be delayed.

We may be forced to enter into an agreement with a different manufacturer, which we may not be able to do on reasonable terms, if at all. In some cases, the technical skills required to manufacture LV vector for our drug product candidates may be unique or proprietary to the original manufacturer, and we may have difficulty or there may be contractual restrictions prohibiting us from, transferring such skills to a back-up or alternate supplier, or we may be unable to transfer such skills at all. Any of these events could lead to clinical study delays or failure to obtain marketing approval or impact our ability to successfully commercialize our product candidates or any future product candidates, if approved. Some of these events could be the basis for FDA action, including injunction, recall, seizure or total or partial suspension of production.

We rely on clinical data and results obtained by third parties that could ultimately prove to be inaccurate or unreliable.

As part of our strategy to mitigate development risk, we seek to develop product candidates with well-studied mechanisms of action, and we utilize biomarkers to assess potential clinical efficacy early in the development process. This strategy necessarily relies upon clinical data and other results obtained by third parties that may ultimately prove to be inaccurate or unreliable. Further, such clinical data and results may be based on products or product candidates that are significantly different from our product candidates or any future product candidate. If the third-party data and results we rely upon prove to be inaccurate, unreliable or not applicable to our product candidates or future product candidate, we could make inaccurate assumptions and conclusions about our product candidates and our research and development efforts could be compromised.

We may need to license certain intellectual property from third parties, and such licenses may not be available or may not be available on commercially reasonable terms.

A third party may hold intellectual property, including patent rights that are important or necessary to the development and commercialization of our products. It may be necessary for us to use the patented or proprietary technology of third parties, who may or may not be interested in granting such a license, to commercialize our products, in which case we would be required to obtain a license from these third parties on commercially reasonable terms, or our business could be harmed, possibly materially.

Collaborative relationships with third parties could cause us to expend significant resources and incur substantial business risk with no assurance of financial return.

Establishing strategic collaborations is difficult and time-consuming. Our discussions with potential collaborators may not lead to the establishment of collaborations on favorable terms, if at all. Potential collaborators may reject collaborations based upon their assessment of our financial, regulatory or intellectual property position. In addition, there has been a significant number of recent business combinations among large pharmaceutical companies that have resulted in a reduced number of potential future collaborators. Even if we successfully establish new collaborations, these relationships may never result in the successful development or commercialization of product candidates or the generation of sales revenue. To the extent that we enter into collaborative arrangements, the related product revenues are likely to be lower than if we directly marketed and sold products. Such collaborators may also consider alternative product candidates or technologies for similar indications that may be available to collaborate on and whether such a collaboration could be more attractive than the one with us for any future product candidate.

Risks Relating to Legislation and Regulation Affecting the Biopharmaceutical and Other Industries

Any products for which we receive marketing authorization may become subject to unfavorable pricing regulations, third-party coverage and reimbursement practices or healthcare reform initiatives, which could harm our business.

Our ability to successfully commercialize any product candidate for which we receive marketing authorization, will depend in part on the extent to which coverage and reimbursement for these products and related treatments will be available from government health administration authorities, private health insurers and other organizations. Government authorities and other third-party payors, such as private health insurers and health maintenance organizations, decide which medications they will pay for and establish reimbursement levels. A primary trend in the healthcare industry in the United States and elsewhere is cost containment. It is currently unknown what impact, if any, proposed changes by the federal and state governments in the U.S. and similar changes in foreign countries may have on pricing and reimbursement, particularly with respect to government programs such as Medicare and Medicaid.

The United States and many foreign jurisdictions have enacted or proposed legislative and regulatory changes affecting the healthcare system, including implementing cost-containment programs to limit the growth of government-paid healthcare costs, including price controls, restrictions on reimbursement and requirements for substitution of generic products for branded prescription drugs. In the United States, the Affordable Care Act was intended to broaden access to health insurance, reduce or constrain the growth of healthcare spending, enhance remedies against fraud and abuse, add transparency requirements for the healthcare and health insurance industries, impose new taxes and fees on the health industry and impose additional health policy reforms. There have been significant ongoing judicial, administrative, executive and legislative efforts to modify or eliminate the Affordable Care Act.

Changes to and under the Affordable Care Act remain possible but it is unknown what form any such changes or any law proposed to replace or revise the Affordable Care Act would take, and how or whether it may affect our business in the future. We expect that changes to the Affordable Care Act, the Medicare and Medicaid programs, changes allowing the federal government to directly negotiate drug prices and changes stemming from other healthcare reform measures, especially with regard to healthcare access, financing or other legislation in individual states, could have a material adverse effect on the healthcare industry. We also expect that the Affordable Care Act, as well as other healthcare reform measures that have and may be adopted in the future, may result in more rigorous coverage criteria and in additional downward pressure on the price that we receive for our products and product candidates, if approved. Any reduction in reimbursement from Medicare, Medicaid, or other government programs may result in a similar reduction in payments from private payers.

The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 (the “IRA”) contains substantial drug pricing reforms, including the establishment of a drug price negotiation program within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services that would require manufacturers to charge a negotiated “maximum fair price” for certain selected drugs or pay an excise tax for noncompliance, the establishment of rebate payment requirements on manufacturers of certain drugs payable under Medicare Parts B and D to penalize price increases that outpace inflation, and requires manufacturers to provide discounts on Part D drugs. Orphan drugs that treat only one rare disease are exempt from the IRA’s drug negotiation program. Substantial penalties can be assessed for noncompliance with the drug pricing provisions in the IRA. The effects of the IRA on the pharmaceutical industry in general are not yet known.

At the state level, legislatures have increasingly passed legislation and implemented regulations designed to control pharmaceutical product pricing, including price or patient reimbursement constraints, discounts, restrictions on certain product access and marketing cost disclosure and transparency measures, and, in some cases, designed to encourage importation from other countries and bulk purchasing. We expect that additional federal, state and foreign healthcare reform measures will be adopted in the future, any of which could limit the amounts that federal and state governments will pay for healthcare products and services, which could result in limited coverage and reimbursement and reduced demand for our products, once approved, or additional pricing pressures.

These and other healthcare reform measures that may be adopted in the future may result in more rigorous coverage criteria and in additional downward pressure on the price that we receive for any current product or future product candidate. Any reduction in reimbursement from Medicare or other government healthcare programs may result in a similar reduction in payments from private payors. The implementation of cost containment measures or other healthcare reforms may prevent us from being able to generate revenue, attain profitability or commercialize our products. Legislative and regulatory proposals have been made to expand post-approval requirements and restrict sales and promotional activities for drugs. We cannot be sure whether additional legislative changes will be enacted, or whether the FDA regulations, guidance or interpretations will be changed, or what the impact of such changes on the marketing approvals of any product candidates, if any, may be. In addition, increased Congressional scrutiny of the FDA’s approval process may significantly delay or prevent marketing approval, as well as subject us to more stringent product labeling and post-marketing testing and other requirements. We also do not know what impact any changes made by the new presidential administration will have on our business. Such actions may impact the development and commercialization of drug products and could materially harm our business and financial condition.

Changes in funding for the FDA and other government agencies could hinder their ability to hire and retain key leadership and other personnel, or otherwise prevent new products and services from being developed or commercialized in a timely manner, which could negatively impact our business or the business of our partners.

The ability of the FDA to review and approve new products can be affected by a variety of factors, including government budget and funding levels, ability to hire and retain key personnel, ability to accept the payment of user fees, and statutory, regulatory, and policy changes. Average review times at the agency have fluctuated in recent years as a result. In addition, government funding of other government agencies that fund research and development activities is subject to the political process, which is inherently fluid and unpredictable. There is additional uncertainty with the new presidential administration.

Disruptions at the FDA and other agencies may also slow the time necessary for new drugs to be reviewed and/or approved by necessary government agencies, which would adversely affect our business or the business of our partners. The U.S. government has shut down several times in the past, and certain regulatory agencies, such as the FDA, have had to furlough nonessential FDA employees and stop routine activities. If a prolonged government shutdown occurs, it could significantly impact the ability of the FDA to timely review and process our regulatory submissions, which could have a material adverse effect on our business. If the timing of FDA’s review and approval of new products is delayed, the timing of our or our partners’ development process may be delayed, which could result in delayed milestone revenues and materially harm our operations or business.

Our current and future relationships with customers and third-party payors in the United States and elsewhere may be subject, directly or indirectly, to applicable anti-kickback, fraud and abuse, false claims, transparency, health information privacy and security and other healthcare laws and regulations, which could expose us to criminal sanctions, civil penalties, contractual damages, reputational harm, administrative burdens and diminished profits and future earnings.

Healthcare providers, physicians and third-party payors in the U.S. and elsewhere will play a primary role in the recommendation and prescription of any product candidates for which we obtain marketing approval. Our future arrangements with third-party payors and customers may expose us to broadly applicable fraud and abuse and other healthcare laws and regulations, including, without limitation, the federal Anti-Kickback Statute and the federal False Claims Act, which may constrain the business or financial arrangements and relationships through which we sell, market and distribute any product candidates for which we obtain marketing approval. In addition, we may be subject to transparency laws and patient privacy regulation by the federal and state governments and by governments in foreign jurisdictions in which we conduct our business. The applicable federal, state and foreign healthcare laws and regulations that may affect our ability to operate include, but are not necessarily limited to:

Efforts to ensure that our business arrangements with third parties will comply with applicable healthcare laws and regulations may involve substantial costs. It is possible that governmental authorities will conclude that our business practices may not comply with current or future statutes, regulations or case law involving applicable fraud and abuse or other healthcare laws and regulations. If our operations are found to be in violation of any of these laws or any other governmental regulations that may apply to us, we may be subject to significant civil, criminal and administrative penalties, including, without limitation, damages, fines, imprisonment, exclusion from participation in government healthcare programs, such as Medicare and Medicaid, and the curtailment or restructuring of our operations, which could have a material adverse effect on our business. If any of the physicians or other healthcare providers or entities with whom we expect to do business, including our collaborators, is found not to be in compliance with applicable laws, it may be subject to criminal, civil or administrative sanctions, including exclusions from participation in government healthcare programs, which could also materially affect our business.

If we fail to comply with environmental, health and safety laws and regulations, we could become subject to fines or penalties or incur costs that could harm our business.

We are subject to numerous environmental, health and safety laws and regulations, including those governing laboratory procedures and the handling, use, storage, treatment and disposal of hazardous materials and wastes. Our operations involve the use of hazardous and flammable materials, including chemicals and biological materials. Our operations also produce hazardous waste products. We generally contract with third parties for the disposal of these materials and wastes. We cannot eliminate the risk of contamination or injury from these materials. Although we believe that the safety procedures for handling and disposing of these materials comply with the standards prescribed by these laws and regulations, we cannot eliminate the risk of accidental contamination or injury from these materials. In the event of contamination or injury resulting from our use of hazardous materials, we could be held liable for any resulting damages, and any liability could exceed our resources. We also could incur significant costs associated with civil or criminal fines and penalties for failure to comply with such laws and regulations.

Although we maintain workers’ compensation insurance to cover us for costs and expenses, we may incur due to injuries to our employees resulting from the use of hazardous materials, this insurance may not provide adequate coverage against potential liabilities. We do not maintain insurance for environmental liability or toxic tort claims that may be asserted against us in connection with our storage or disposal of biological, hazardous or radioactive materials.

In addition, we may incur substantial costs in order to comply with current or future environmental, health and safety laws and regulations, including climate-related initiatives. These current or future laws and regulations may impair our research, development or production efforts. Our failure to comply with these laws and regulations also may result in substantial fines, penalties or other sanctions.

The use of artificial intelligence in the healthcare industry and challenges with properly managing its use could adversely affect our business.

We may incorporate artificial intelligence (“AI”) solutions into our business, and applications of AI may become important in our operations over time. Our competitors or other third parties may incorporate AI into their businesses more quickly or more successfully than us, which could impair our ability to compete effectively and adversely affect our results of operations. There are also significant risks involved in developing and deploying AI, and there can be no assurance that the usage of AI will enhance the development of our product candidates or be beneficial to our business, including our efficiency or profitability. For example, any AI-related efforts, particularly those related to generative AI, could subject us to risks related to harmful content, inaccuracies, bias, discrimination, toxicity, intellectual property infringement or misappropriation, defamation, data privacy, cybersecurity, and sanctions and export controls, among others. It is also uncertain how various laws will apply to content generated by AI. We are subject to the risks of new or enhanced governmental or regulatory scrutiny, litigation, or other legal liability, ethical concerns, negative consumer perceptions as to automation and AI, or other complications that could adversely affect our business, reputation, or financial results.

AI’s rapid development is the subject of evolving review by various U.S. governmental and regulatory agencies, and other foreign jurisdictions are applying, or are considering applying, their intellectual property, cybersecurity, data protection and other laws to AI, and/or are considering general legal frameworks on AI. We may not be able to timely comply with these frameworks and, if such regulatory actions are contrary to our use of AI, would require us to expend our limited resources to adjust our use accordingly.

Risks Related to Intellectual Property and Potential Disputes Thereof

If we are unable to obtain and maintain sufficient patent protection for our technology and products, our competitors could develop and commercialize technology and products similar or identical to ours, and our ability to successfully commercialize our technology and products may be impaired.

Our success depends, in large part, on our ability to obtain patent protection for product candidates and their formulations and uses. The patent application process is subject to numerous risks and uncertainties, and there can be no assurance that we or our partners will be successful in obtaining patents or what the scope of an issued patent may ultimately be. These risks and uncertainties include, but are not necessarily limited to, the following:

In addition, patents that may be issued or in-licensed may be challenged, invalidated, modified, revoked, circumvented, found to be unenforceable, or otherwise may not provide any competitive advantage. Moreover, we may be subject to a third-party pre-issuance submission of prior art to the USPTO, or become involved in opposition, derivation, reexamination, inter partes review, post-grant review or interference proceedings challenging our patent rights or the patent rights of others. The costs of these proceedings could be substantial, and it is possible that our efforts to establish priority of invention would be unsuccessful, resulting in a material adverse effect on our U.S. patent positions. An adverse determination in any such submission, patent office trial, proceeding or litigation could reduce the scope of, render unenforceable, or invalidate, our patent rights, allow third parties to commercialize our technologies or products and compete directly with us, without payment to us, or result in our inability to manufacture or commercialize products without infringing third-party patent rights. In addition, if the breadth or strength of protection provided by our patents and patent applications is threatened, it could dissuade companies from collaborating with us to license, develop or commercialize current or future product candidates. Third parties are often responsible for maintaining patent protection for our product candidates, at our and their expense. If that party fails to appropriately prosecute and maintain patent protection for a product candidate, our abilities to develop and commercialize products may be adversely affected, and we may not be able to prevent competitors from making, using and selling competing products. Such a failure to properly protect intellectual property rights relating to any of our product candidates could have a material adverse effect on our financial condition and results of operations. In addition, U.S. patent laws may change, which could prevent or limit us from filing patent applications or patent claims to protect products and/or technologies or limit the exclusivity periods that are available to patent holders, as well as affect the validity, enforceability, or scope of issued patents.

We and our licensors also rely on trade secrets and proprietary know-how to protect product candidates. Although we have taken steps to protect our and their trade secrets and unpatented know-how, including entering into confidentiality and non-use agreements with third parties, and proprietary information and invention assignment agreements with employees, consultants and advisers, third parties may still come upon this same or similar information independently. Despite these efforts, any of these parties may also breach the agreements and may unintentionally or willfully disclose our or our licensors’ proprietary information, including our trade secrets, and we may not be able to identify such breaches or obtain adequate remedies. Enforcing a claim that a party illegally disclosed or misappropriated a trade secret is difficult, expensive and time-consuming, and the outcome is unpredictable. In addition, some courts inside and outside the United States are less willing or unwilling to protect trade secrets. Moreover, if any of our or our licensors’ trade secrets were to be lawfully obtained or independently developed by a competitor, we and our licensors would have no right to prevent them, or those to whom they communicate it, from using that technology or information to compete with us. If any of our or our licensors’ trade secrets were to be disclosed to or independently developed by a competitor, our competitive positions would be harmed.

The patent prosecution process is expensive and time-consuming, and we may not be able to file and prosecute all necessary or desirable patent applications at a reasonable cost or in a timely manner. It is also possible that we will fail to identify any patentable aspects of our research and development output and methodology, and, even if we do, an opportunity to obtain patent protection may have passed. Given the uncertain and time-consuming process of filing patent applications and prosecuting them, it is possible that our product(s) or process(es) originally covered by the scope of the patent application may have changed or been modified, leaving our product(s) or process(es) without patent protection. If our licensors or we fail to obtain or maintain patent protection or trade secret protection for one or more product candidates or any future product candidate we may license or acquire, third parties may be able to leverage our proprietary information and products without risk of infringement, which could impair our ability to compete in the market and adversely affect our ability to generate revenues and achieve profitability. Moreover, should we enter into other collaborations we may be required to consult with or cede control to collaborators regarding the prosecution, maintenance and enforcement of licensed patents. Therefore, these patents and applications may not be prosecuted and enforced in a manner consistent with the best interests of our business.

The patent position of biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies generally is highly uncertain, involves complex legal and factual questions and has in recent years been the subject of much litigation. In addition, no consistent policy regarding the breadth of claims allowed in pharmaceutical or biotechnology patents has emerged to date in the U.S. The patent situation outside the U.S. is even more uncertain. The laws of foreign countries may not protect our rights to the same extent as the laws of the U.S., and we may fail to seek or obtain patent protection in all major markets. For example, European patent law restricts the patentability of methods of treatment of the human body more than U.S. law does. Publications of discoveries in the scientific literature often lag behind the actual discoveries, and patent applications in the U.S. and other jurisdictions are typically not published until 18 months after a first filing, or in some cases not at all. Therefore, we cannot know with certainty whether we or our licensors were the first to make the inventions claimed in patents or pending patent applications that we own or licensed, or that we or our licensors were the first to file for patent protection of such inventions. In the event that a third party has also filed a U.S. patent application relating to our product candidates or a similar invention, depending upon the priority dates claimed by the competing parties, we may have to participate in interference proceedings declared by the USPTO to determine priority of invention in the U.S. We might also become involved in derivation proceedings in an event that a third party misappropriates one or more of our inventions and files their own patent application directed to such one or more inventions. The costs of these proceedings could be substantial, and it is possible that our efforts to establish priority of invention (or that a third party derived an invention from us) would be unsuccessful, resulting in a material adverse effect on our U.S. patent position. As a result, the issuance, scope, validity, enforceability and commercial value of our patent rights are highly uncertain. Our pending and future patent applications may not result in patents being issued which protect our technology or products, in whole or in part, or which effectively prevent others from commercializing competitive technologies and products. Changes in either the patent laws or interpretation of the patent laws in the U.S. and other countries may diminish the value of our patents or narrow the scope of our patent protection. For example, the federal courts of the U.S. have taken an increasingly dim view of the patent eligibility of certain subject matter, such as naturally occurring nucleic acid sequences, amino acid sequences and certain methods of utilizing the same, which include their detection in a biological sample and diagnostic conclusions arising from their detection. Such subject matter, which had long been a staple of the biotechnology and biopharmaceutical industry to protect their discoveries, is now considered, with few exceptions, ineligible in the first instance for protection under the patent laws of the U.S. Accordingly, we cannot predict the breadth of claims that may be allowed and remain enforceable in our patents or in those licensed from a third party.

Even if our patent applications issue as patents, they may not issue in a form that will provide us with any meaningful protection, prevent competitors from competing with us or otherwise provide us with any competitive advantage. Our competitors may be able to circumvent our owned or licensed patents by developing similar or alternative technologies or products in a non-infringing manner.

We also may rely on the regulatory period of market exclusivity for any of our biologic product candidates that are successfully developed and approved for commercialization. Although this period in the United States is generally 12 years from the date of marketing approval (depending on the nature of the specific product), there is a risk that the U.S. Congress could amend laws to significantly shorten this exclusivity period. Once any regulatory period of exclusivity expires, depending on the status of our patent coverage and the nature of the product, we may not be able to prevent others from marketing products that are biosimilar to or interchangeable with our products, which would materially adversely affect our business.

We depend on our licensors to maintain and enforce the intellectual property covering certain of our product candidates. We have limited, if any, control over the resources that our licensors can or will devote to securing, maintaining, and enforcing patents protecting our product candidates.

We depend on our licensors to protect the proprietary rights covering our product candidates and we have limited, if any, control over the amount or timing of resources that they devote on our behalf, or the priority they place on, maintaining patent rights and prosecuting patent applications to our advantage. Moreover, we have limited, if any, control over the strategies and arguments employed in the maintenance of patent rights and the prosecution of patent applications to our advantage. Our licensors might become involved in disputes with one of their other licensees, and we or a portion of our licensed patent rights might become embroiled in such disputes.

Our licensors, depending on the patent or application, are responsible for maintaining issued patents and prosecuting patent applications. We cannot be sure that they will perform as required. Should they decide they no longer want to maintain any of the patents licensed to us, they are required to afford us the opportunity to do so at our expense. If our licensors do not perform, and if we do not assume the maintenance of the licensed patents in sufficient time to make required payments or filings with the appropriate governmental agencies, we risk losing the benefit of all or some of those patent rights. Moreover, and possibly unbeknownst to us, our licensors may experience serious difficulties related to their overall business or financial stability, and they may be unwilling or unable to continue to expend the financial resources required to maintain and prosecute these patents and patent applications. While we intend to take actions reasonably necessary to enforce our patent rights, we depend, in part, on our licensors to protect a substantial portion of our proprietary rights and to inform us of the status of those protections and efforts thereto.

Our licensors may also be notified of alleged infringement and be sued for infringement of third-party patents or other proprietary rights. We may have limited, if any, control or involvement over the defense of these claims, and our licensors could be subject to injunctions and temporary or permanent exclusionary orders in the U.S. or other countries. Our licensors are not obligated to defend or assist in our defense against third-party claims of infringement. We have limited, if any, control over the amount or timing of resources, if any, that our licensors devote on our behalf or the priority they place on defense of such third-party claims of infringement.

Because of the uncertainty inherent in any patent or other litigation involving proprietary rights, we or our licensors may not be successful in defending claims of intellectual property infringement alleged by third parties, which could have a material adverse effect on our results of operations. Regardless of the outcome of any litigation, defending the litigation may be expensive, time-consuming and distracting to management.

Protecting our proprietary rights is difficult and costly, and we may be unable to ensure their protection.

The degree of future protection for our proprietary rights is uncertain, because legal means afford only limited protection and may not adequately protect our rights or permit us to gain or keep our competitive advantage, in addition to being costly and time consuming to undertake. For example:

We may become involved in lawsuits to protect or enforce our patents or other intellectual property, which could be expensive, time consuming and unsuccessful, and an unfavorable outcome in any litigation would harm our business.

Competitors may infringe our issued patents or other intellectual property. To counter infringement or unauthorized use, we may be required to file one or more actions for patent infringement, which can be expensive and time consuming. Any claims we assert against accused infringers could provoke these parties to assert counterclaims against us alleging that we infringe their patents; or provoke those parties to petition the USPTO to institute inter partes review against the asserted patents, which may lead to a finding that all or some of the claims of the patent are invalid. In addition, in a patent infringement proceeding, a court may decide that a patent of ours is invalid or unenforceable, in whole or in part, construe the patent’s claims narrowly or refuse to stop the other party from using the technology at issue on the grounds that our patents do not cover the technology in question or as a matter of public policy. An adverse result in any litigation proceeding could put one or more of our patents at risk of being invalidated, rendered unenforceable, or interpreted narrowly. Furthermore, adverse results on U.S. patents may affect related patents in our global portfolio.

If we or our licensors are sued for infringing intellectual property rights of third parties, it will be costly and time consuming, and an unfavorable outcome in that litigation would have a material adverse effect on our business.

Our success also depends on our ability, and the abilities of any of our respective current or future collaborators, to develop, manufacture, market and sell product candidates without infringing the proprietary rights of third parties. Numerous U.S. and foreign issued patents and pending patent applications, which are owned by third parties, exist in the fields in which we are developing products, some of which may be directed at claims that overlap with the subject matter of our or our licensors’ intellectual property. Because patent applications can take many years to issue, there may be currently pending applications, unknown to us, which may later result in issued patents that our product candidates or proprietary technologies may infringe. Similarly, there may be issued patents relevant to our product candidates of which we or our licensors are not aware. Publications of discoveries in the scientific literature often lag behind the actual discoveries, and patent applications in the U.S. and other jurisdictions are typically not published until 18 months after a first filing, or in some cases not at all. Therefore, we cannot know with certainty whether we or such licensors were the first to make the inventions claimed in patents or pending patent applications that we own or licensed, or that we and our licensors were the first to file for patent protection of such inventions. In the event that a third party has also filed a U.S. patent application relating to our product candidates or a similar invention, depending upon the priority dates claimed by the competing parties, we may have to participate in interference proceedings declared by the USPTO to determine priority of invention in the U.S. The costs of these proceedings could be substantial, and it is possible that our efforts to establish priority of invention would be unsuccessful, resulting in a material adverse effect on our U.S. patent position. As a result, the issuance, scope, validity, enforceability and commercial value of our or any of our licensors’ patent rights are highly uncertain.

There is a substantial amount of litigation involving patent and other intellectual property rights in the biotechnology and biopharmaceutical industries generally. If a third party claims that we or any of our licensors, suppliers or collaborators infringe the third party’s intellectual property rights, we may have to, among other things:

Intellectual property litigation could cause us to spend substantial resources and distract our personnel from their normal responsibilities.

Even if resolved in our favor, litigation or other legal proceedings relating to intellectual property claims may cause us to incur significant expenses and could distract our technical and management personnel from their normal responsibilities. In addition, there could be public announcements of the results of hearings, motions or other interim proceedings or developments and if securities analysts or investors perceive these results to be negative, it could have a substantial adverse effect on the price of our common stock. Such litigation or proceedings could substantially increase our operating losses and reduce the resources available for development activities or any future sales, marketing or distribution activities. We may not have sufficient financial or other resources to conduct such litigation or proceedings adequately. Some of our competitors may be able to sustain the costs of such litigation or proceedings more effectively than we can because of their greater financial resources. Uncertainties resulting from the initiation and continuation of patent litigation or other proceedings could compromise our ability to compete in the marketplace.

If we fail to comply with our obligations under our intellectual property licenses and third party funding arrangements, we could lose rights that are important to our business.

We are currently a party to license agreements with COH, Fred Hutch, Nationwide and Mayo Clinic. In the future, we may become party to licenses that are important for product development and commercialization. If we fail to comply with our obligations under current or future license and funding agreements, our counterparties may have the right to terminate these agreements, in which event we might not be able to develop, manufacture or market any product or utilize any technology that is covered by these agreements or may face other penalties under the agreements. Such an occurrence could materially and adversely affect the value of a product candidate being developed under any such agreement or could restrict our drug discovery activities. Termination of these agreements or reduction or elimination of our rights under these agreements may result in our having to negotiate new or reinstated agreements with less favorable terms, or cause us to lose our rights under these agreements, including our rights to important intellectual property or technology.

We may be subject to claims that our employees and/or consultants have wrongfully used or disclosed to us alleged trade secrets of their former employers or other clients.

As is common in the biopharmaceutical industry, we rely on employees and consultants to assist in the development of product candidates, many of whom were previously employed at, or may have previously been or are currently providing consulting services to, other biopharmaceutical companies, including our competitors or potential competitors. We may become subject to claims related to whether these individuals have inadvertently or otherwise used, disclosed or misappropriated trade secrets or other proprietary information of their former employers or their former or current clients. Litigation may be necessary to defend against these claims. Even if we are successful in defending these claims, litigation could result in substantial costs and be a distraction to management and/or the employees or consultants that are implicated.

If we are unable to protect the confidentiality of our trade secrets, our business and competitive position would be harmed.

In addition to seeking patent protection for our product candidates or any future product candidate, we also rely on trade secrets, including unpatented know-how, technology and other proprietary information, to maintain our competitive position, particularly where we do not believe patent protection is appropriate or obtainable. However, trade secrets are difficult to protect. We limit disclosure of such trade secrets where possible but we also seek to protect these trade secrets, in part, by entering into non-disclosure and confidentiality agreements with parties who do have access to them, such as our employees, our licensors, corporate collaborators, outside scientific collaborators, contract manufacturers, consultants, advisors and other third parties. We also enter into confidentiality and invention or patent assignment agreements with our employees and consultants. Despite these efforts, any of these parties may breach the agreements and may unintentionally or willfully disclose our proprietary information, including our trade secrets, and we may not be able to obtain adequate remedies for such breaches. Enforcing a claim that a party illegally disclosed or misappropriated a trade secret is difficult, expensive and time-consuming, and the outcome is unpredictable. In addition, some courts inside and outside the United States are less willing or unwilling to protect trade secrets. Moreover, if any of our trade secrets were to be lawfully obtained or independently developed by a competitor, we would have no right to prevent them, or those to whom they communicate it, from using that technology or information to compete with us. If any of our trade secrets were to be disclosed to or independently developed by a competitor, our competitive position would be harmed.

We in-license intellectual property pertaining to certain product candidates from third parties. As such, any dispute with the licensors or the non-performance of such license agreements may adversely affect our ability to develop and commercialize the applicable product candidates.

The types of disputes which may arise between us and the third parties from whom we license intellectual property include, but are not limited to:

In addition, the agreements under which we currently license intellectual property or technology from third parties are complex, and certain provisions in such agreements may be susceptible to multiple interpretations or may conflict in such a way that puts us in breach of one or more agreements, which would make us susceptible to lengthy and expensive disputes with one or more of such third-party licensing partners. The resolution of any contract interpretation disagreement that may arise could narrow what we believe to be the scope of our rights to the relevant intellectual property or technology, or increase what we believe to be our financial or other obligations under the relevant agreements, either of which could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects. Moreover, if disputes over intellectual property that we have licensed prevent or impair our ability to maintain our current licensing arrangements on commercially acceptable terms, we may be unable to successfully develop and commercialize the affected product candidates, which could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial conditions, results of operations and prospects.

Risks Relating to Our Control by Fortress

Fortress controls a voting majority of our common stock.

Pursuant to the terms of the Class A Preferred Stock held by Fortress, Fortress is entitled to cast, for each share of Class A Preferred held by Fortress, the number of votes that is equal to one and one-tenth (1.1) times a fraction, the numerator of which is the sum of (A) the shares of outstanding common stock and (B) the whole shares of common stock into which the shares of outstanding Class A common shares and the Class A Preferred Stock are convertible and the denominator of which is the number of shares of outstanding Class A Preferred Stock. Accordingly, Fortress is able to control or significantly influence all matters requiring approval by our stockholders, including the election of directors and the approval of mergers or other business combination transactions. The interests of Fortress may not always coincide with the interests of other stockholders, and Fortress may take actions that advance its own interests and are contrary to the desires of our other stockholders. Moreover, this concentration of voting power may delay, prevent or deter a change in control of us even when such a change may be in the best interests of all stockholders, could deprive our stockholders of an opportunity to receive a premium for their common stock as part of a sale of our Company or our assets, and might affect the prevailing market price of our common stock.

Fortress has the right to receive a significant grant of shares of our common stock annually which will result in the dilution of your holdings of common stock upon each grant, which could reduce their value.

Under the terms of the Second Amended and Restated Founders Agreement (the “Founders Agreement”), which became effective July 22, 2016, Fortress will receive a grant of shares of our common stock equal to two and one-half percent (2.5%) of the gross amount of any equity or debt financing. Additionally, the Class A Preferred Stock, as a class, will receive an annual dividend on January 1st, payable in shares of common stock in an amount equal to two and one-half percent (2.5%) of our fully-diluted outstanding capital stock as of the business day immediately prior to January 1st of such year. Fortress currently owns all outstanding shares of Class A Preferred Stock. These share issuances to Fortress and any other holder of Class A Preferred Stock will dilute your holdings in our common stock and, if the value of our Company has not grown proportionately over the prior year, would result in a reduction in the value of your shares. The Founders Agreement has a term of 15 years and renews automatically for subsequent one-year periods unless terminated by Fortress or upon a Change in Control (as defined in the Founders Agreement).

We might have received better terms from unaffiliated third parties than the terms we receive in our agreements with Fortress.

The agreements we have entered into with Fortress include a Management Services Agreement and the Founders Agreement. While we believe the terms of these agreements are reasonable, they might not reflect terms that would have resulted from arm’s-length negotiations between unaffiliated third parties. The terms of the agreements relate to, among other things, payment of a royalty on product sales and the provision of employment and transition services. We might have received better terms from third parties because, among other things, third parties might have competed with each other to win our business.

The dual roles of our directors who also serve in similar roles with Fortress could create a conflict of interest and will require careful monitoring by our independent directors.

We share some directors with Fortress which could create conflicts of interest between the two companies in the future. While we believe that the Founders Agreement and the Management Services Agreement were negotiated by independent parties on both sides on arm’s length terms, and the fiduciary duties of both parties were thereby satisfied, in the future situations may arise under the operation of both agreements that may create a conflict of interest. We will have to be diligent to ensure that any such situation is resolved by independent parties. In particular, under the Management Services Agreement, Fortress and its affiliates are free to pursue opportunities which could potentially be of interest to us, and they are not required to notify us prior to pursuing such opportunities. Any conflict of interest or pursuit by Fortress of such a corporate opportunity could expose us to claims by our investors and/or creditors and could harm our results of operations.

General Risks and Risks Associated with Ownership of our Common Stock

Our business and operations would suffer in the event of computer system failures, cyber-attacks, or deficiencies in our or third parties’ cybersecurity.

We are increasingly dependent upon information technology systems, infrastructure, and data to operate our business. In the ordinary course of business, we collect, store, and transmit confidential information, including, but not limited to, information related to our intellectual property and proprietary business information, personal information, and other confidential information. It is critical that we maintain such confidential information in a manner that preserves its confidentiality and integrity. Furthermore, we have outsourced elements of our operations to third party vendors, who each have access to our confidential information, which increases our disclosure risk.

Despite the implementation of our internal security and business continuity measures and our information technology infrastructure, our internal computer systems and those of current and future third parties on which we rely may fail and are vulnerable to damage from computer viruses and unauthorized access. Our information technology and other internal infrastructure systems, including corporate firewalls, servers, data center facilities, lab equipment, and connection to the internet, face the risk of breakdown or other damage or interruption from service interruptions, system malfunctions, natural disasters, terrorism, war, and telecommunication and electrical failures, as well as security breaches from inadvertent or intentional actions by our employees, contractors, consultants, business partners, and/or other third parties, or from cyber-attacks by malicious third parties (including the deployment of harmful malware, ransomware, denial-of-service attacks, social engineering and other means to affect service reliability and threaten the confidentiality, integrity and availability of information), each of which could compromise our system infrastructure or lead to the loss, destruction, alteration, disclosure, or dissemination of, or damage or unauthorized access to, our data or data that is processed or maintained on our behalf, or other assets.

If such an event were to occur and cause interruptions in our operations, it could result in a material disruption of our development programs and our business operations, and could result in financial, legal, business, and reputational harm to us.

In addition, the loss or corruption of, or other damage to, clinical trial data from completed or future clinical trials could result in delays in our regulatory approval efforts and significantly increase our costs to recover or reproduce the data. Likewise, we rely on third parties for the manufacture of our drug candidates or any future drug candidates and to conduct clinical trials, and similar events relating to their systems and operations could also have a material adverse effect on our business and lead to regulatory agency actions. The risk of a security breach or disruption, particularly through cyber-attacks or cyber intrusion, including by computer hackers, foreign governments, and cyber terrorists, has generally increased as the number, intensity, and sophistication of attempted attacks and intrusions from around the world have increased. Sophisticated cyber attackers (including foreign adversaries engaged in industrial espionage) are skilled at adapting to existing security technology and developing new methods of gaining access to organizations’ sensitive business data, which could result in the loss of proprietary information, including trade secrets. We may not be able to anticipate all types of security threats, and we may not be able to implement preventive measures effective against all such security threats. The techniques used by cyber criminals change frequently, may not be recognized until launched, and can originate from a wide variety of sources, including outside groups such as external service providers, organized crime affiliates, terrorist organizations, or hostile foreign governments or agencies.

Any security breach or other event leading to the loss or damage to, or unauthorized access, use, alteration, disclosure, or dissemination of, personal information, including personal information regarding clinical trial subjects, contractors, directors, or employees, our intellectual property, proprietary business information, or other confidential or proprietary information, could directly harm our reputation, enable competitors to compete with us more effectively, compel us to comply with federal and/or state breach notification laws and foreign law equivalents, subject us to mandatory corrective action, or otherwise subject us to liability under laws and regulations that protect the privacy and security of personal information. Each of the foregoing could result in significant legal and financial exposure and reputational damage that could adversely affect our business. Notifications and follow-up actions related to a security incident could impact our reputation or cause us to incur substantial costs, including legal and remediation costs, in connection with these measures and otherwise in connection with any actual or suspected security breach. We expect to incur significant costs in an effort to detect and prevent security incidents and otherwise implement our internal security and business continuity measures, and actual, potential, or anticipated attacks may cause us to incur increasing costs, including costs to deploy additional personnel and protection technologies, train employees, and engage third-party experts and consultants.

The costs related to significant security breaches or disruptions could be material, and our insurance policies may not be adequate to compensate us for the potential losses arising from any such disruption in, or failure or security breach of, our systems or third-party systems where information important to our business operations or commercial development is stored or processed. In addition, such insurance may not be available to us in the future on economically reasonable terms, or at all. Further, our insurance may not cover all claims made against us and could have high deductibles in any event, and defending a suit, regardless of its merit, could be costly and divert management attention. Furthermore, if the information technology systems of our third-party vendors and other contractors and consultants become subject to disruptions or security breaches, we may have insufficient recourse against such third parties and we may have to expend significant resources to mitigate the impact of such an event, and to develop and implement protections to prevent future events of this nature from occurring.

Our business could be adversely affected by the effects of health pandemics or epidemics, which could cause significant disruptions in our operations.

Health pandemics or epidemics, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, have in the past and could again in the future result in quarantines, stay-at-home orders, remote work policies or other similar events that may disrupt businesses, delay our research and development programs and timelines, negatively impact productivity and increase risks associated with cybersecurity, the future magnitude of which will depend, in part, on the length and severity of the restrictions and other limitations. More specifically, these types of events may negatively impact personnel at third-party manufacturing facilities or the availability or cost of materials, which could disrupt our supply chain. In addition, impact on the operations of the FDA or other regulatory authorities could negatively affect our planned approval processes. Finally, economic conditions and business activity may be negatively impacted and may not recover as quickly as anticipated. The effects of epidemics and pandemic are highly uncertain and subject to change. If we are not able to respond to and manage the impact of such events effectively, our business, operating results, financial condition and cash flows could be adversely affected.

Our growth is subject to economic and geopolitical conditions.

Our business is affected by global and local economic and geopolitical conditions as well as the state of the financial markets, inflation, recession, financial liquidity, currency volatility, growth, and policy initiatives. There can be no assurance that global economic conditions and financial markets will not worsen and that we will not experience any adverse effects that may be material to our consolidated cash flows, results of operations, financial position or our ability to access capital, such as the adverse effects resulting from a prolonged shutdown in government operations both in the United States and internationally. Geopolitical changes, including war or other conflicts (including the conflicts between Russia and Ukraine and Israel and Hamas), some of which may be disruptive, could interfere with our supply chain, our customers and all of our activities in a particular location.

Additionally, trade policies and geopolitical disputes and other international conflicts can result in tariffs, sanctions and other measures that restrict international trade, and can materially adversely affect our business, particularly if these measures occur in regions where drug products are manufactured or raw materials are sourced. Tensions between the United States and China have led to a series of tariffs being imposed by the United States on imports from China mainland, as well as other business restrictions. Countries may also adopt other measures, such as controls on imports or exports of goods, technology or data, that could adversely impact our operations and supply chain. As these tensions continue to rise, more targeted approaches by the U.S. or Chinese governments on certain products, industries or companies could significantly impact our development and commercialization efforts. With the new presidential administration in the U.S. in 2025, additional and higher tariffs and sanctions may be imposed on goods imported from China and other countries which could increase the cost of goods needed to commercialize our products and continue development of our product candidates. Further, such actions by the U.S. could result in retaliatory action by those countries which could impact our ability to profitably commercialize our products in those jurisdictions. As a result, our business, operations, and financial condition could be materially harmed.

We may not be able to manage our business effectively if we are unable to attract and retain key personnel.

We may not be able to attract or retain qualified management and commercial, scientific and clinical personnel in the future due to the intense competition for qualified personnel among biotechnology, pharmaceutical and other businesses. If we are not able to attract and retain necessary personnel to accomplish our business objectives, we may experience constraints that will significantly impede the achievement of our development objectives, our ability to raise additional capital and our ability to implement our business strategy.

Our employees, consultants, or third-party partners may engage in misconduct or other improper activities, including but not necessarily limited to noncompliance with regulatory standards and requirements or internal procedures, policies or agreements to which such employees, consultants and partners are subject, any of which could have a material adverse effect on our business.

We are exposed to the risk of employee fraud or other misconduct. Misconduct by employees, consultants, or third-party partners could include intentional failures to comply with FDA regulations, provide accurate information to the FDA, comply with cGMPs, comply with federal and state healthcare fraud and abuse laws and regulations, report financial information or data accurately, comply with internal procedures, policies or agreements to which such employees, consultants or partners are subject, or disclose unauthorized activities to us. In particular, sales, marketing and business arrangements in the healthcare industry are subject to extensive laws and regulations intended to prevent fraud, kickbacks, self-dealing and other abusive practices. These laws and regulations may restrict or prohibit a wide range of pricing, discounting, marketing and promotion, sales commission, customer incentive programs and other business arrangements. Employee, consultant, or third-party misconduct could also involve the improper use of information obtained in the course of clinical trials, which could result in regulatory sanctions and serious harm to our reputation, as well as civil and criminal liability. The precautions we take to detect and prevent this activity may not be effective in controlling unknown or unmanaged risks or losses or in protecting us from governmental investigations or other actions or lawsuits stemming from a failure to be in compliance with such laws or regulations. If any such actions are instituted against us, and we are not successful in defending ourselves or asserting our rights, those actions could have a significant impact on our business and results of operations, including the imposition of significant fines or other civil and/or criminal sanctions.

We receive a large amount of proprietary information from potential or existing licensors of intellectual property and potential acquisition target companies, all pursuant to confidentiality agreements. The confidentiality and proprietary invention assignment agreements that we have in place with each of our employees and consultants prohibit the unauthorized disclosure of such information, but such employees or consultants may nonetheless disclose such information through negligence or willful misconduct. Any such unauthorized disclosures could subject us to monetary damages and/or injunctive or equitable relief. The notes, analyses and memoranda that we have generated based on such information are also valuable to our businesses, and the unauthorized disclosure or misappropriation of such materials by our employees and consultants could significantly harm our strategic initiatives – especially if such disclosures are made to our competitors.

We rely on information technology, and any internet or internal computer system failures, inadequacies, interruptions or compromises of our systems or the security of confidential information could damage our reputation and harm our business.

Although a significant portion of our business is conducted using traditional methods of contact and communications such as face-to-face meetings, our business is increasingly dependent on critical, complex and interdependent information technology systems, including internet-based systems, to support business processes as well as internal and external communications. We could experience system failures and degradations in the future. We cannot assure you that we will be able to prevent an extended and/or material system failure if any of the following or similar events occurs:

If any of the foregoing events were to occur, our business operations could be disrupted in ways that would require the incurrence of substantial expenditures to remedy. Any system failure, accident or security breach that causes interruptions in our operations could result in a material disruption of our drug development programs. For example, the loss of clinical trial data from completed clinical trials for one or more of our product conducts could result in delays in our regulatory approval efforts and significantly increase our costs to recover or reproduce the data. To the extent that any disruption or security breach were to result in a loss of, or damage to, our data and applications, or inappropriate/unauthorized disclosure of confidential or proprietary information (including trade secrets), we could incur liability and our business and financial condition could be harmed.

The occurrence of a catastrophic disaster could damage our facilities beyond insurance limits, or we could lose key data which could cause us to curtail or cease operations.

We are vulnerable to damage and/or loss of vital data from natural disasters, such as earthquakes, tornadoes, power loss, fire, health epidemics and pandemics, floods and similar events, as well as from accidental loss or destruction. If any disaster were to occur, our ability to operate our businesses could be seriously impaired. We have property, liability and business interruption insurance that may not be adequate to cover losses resulting from disasters or other similar significant business interruptions, and we do not plan to purchase additional insurance to cover such losses due to the cost of obtaining such coverage. Any significant losses that are not recoverable under our insurance policies could seriously impair our business, financial condition and prospects. Any of the aforementioned circumstances, including without limitation the resurgence of COVID-19 virus, may also impede our employees’ and consultants’ abilities to provide services in-person and/or in a timely manner; hinder our ability to raise funds to finance our operations on favorable terms or at all; and trigger effectiveness of “force majeure” clauses under agreements with respect to which we receive goods and services, or under which we are obligated to achieve developmental milestones on certain timeframes. Disputes with third parties over the applicability of such “force majeure” clauses, or the enforceability of developmental milestones and related extension mechanisms in light of such business interruptions, may arise and may become expensive and time-consuming.

The market price for our common stock has been volatile and may continue to fluctuate or may decline significantly in the future.

An active, liquid and orderly market for our common stock may not be sustained, which could depress the trading price of our common stock or cause it to continue to be highly volatile or subject to wide fluctuations. Some of the factors that could negatively affect our share price or result in fluctuations in the price or trading volume of our common stock include, among other things:

These broad market and industry factors may decrease the market price of our common stock, regardless of our actual operating performance. The stock market in general has from time to time experienced extreme price and volume fluctuations. In addition, in the past, following periods of volatility in the overall market and decreases in the market price of a company’s securities, securities class action litigation has often been instituted against these companies. This litigation, if instituted against us, could result in substantial costs and a diversion of our management’s attention and resources.

We may become involved in securities class action litigation that could divert management’s attention and harm our business.

The stock markets have from time to time experienced significant price and volume fluctuations that have affected the market prices for the common stock of biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies. These broad market fluctuations may cause the market price of our stock to decline. In the past, securities class action litigation has often been brought against a company following a decline in the market price of its securities. This risk is especially relevant for us because biotechnology and biopharmaceutical companies have experienced significant stock price volatility in recent years. We may become involved in this type of litigation in the future. Litigation often is expensive and diverts management’s attention and resources, which could adversely affect our business.

If we are unable to maintain compliance with all applicable continued listing requirements and standards of Nasdaq, our common stock may be delisted from Nasdaq.

Our common stock is listed on the Nasdaq Capital Market under the symbol “MBIO.” The Nasdaq Capital Market requires that listed companies satisfy continued listing standards to maintain their listing. On March 13, 2024, we received a deficiency letter (the “Letter”) from the Listing Qualifications Department (the “Staff”) of The Nasdaq Stock Market LLC (“Nasdaq”) notifying us that we were not in compliance with the minimum stockholders’ equity requirement for continued listing on the Nasdaq Capital Market under Nasdaq Listing Rule 5550(b)(1) (the “Equity Rule”). The Equity Rule requires companies listed on the Nasdaq Capital Market to maintain stockholders’ equity of at least $2.5 million (or, in the alternative, a market value of listed securities of $35 million or net income from continued operations of $500,000 in the most recently completed fiscal year or in two of the last three most recently completed fiscal years). As of December 31, 2023, we reported stockholders’ equity of $123,000, and as of September 30, 2024, we reported stockholders’ deficit of approximately $8.7 million.

The Letter had no immediate effect on our continued listing on Nasdaq, subject to our compliance with the other continued listing requirements. In accordance with the Nasdaq Listing Rules, we were provided 45 calendar days, or until April 29, 2024, to submit a plan to regain compliance with the Equity Rule (the “Compliance Plan”). We submitted our Compliance Plan on April 29, 2024, and the Staff granted our request for an extension of 180 calendar days through September 9, 2024, to regain compliance with the Equity Rule. We were unable to demonstrate compliance with the Equity Rule by September 9, 2024.

On September 10, 2024, the Staff formally notified us that it had determined to delist our securities from Nasdaq based upon our continued non-compliance with the Equity Rule unless we timely request a hearing before the Nasdaq Hearings Panel (the “Panel”). On September 17, 2024, we requested a hearing before the Panel, which stayed any further action by Nasdaq at least pending completion of the hearing and the expiration of any extension that may be granted by the Panel to us following the hearing.

On May 16, 2024, we received a notice (the “Second Letter”) from the Staff of Nasdaq indicating that the bid price of our common stock had closed below $1.00 per share for 31 consecutive business days and, as a result, we were not in compliance with Nasdaq Listing Rule 5550(a)(2), which sets forth the minimum bid price requirement for continued listing on the Nasdaq Capital Market (the “Bid Price Rule”). The Second Letter from Nasdaq had no immediate effect on the listing of our common stock on Nasdaq. Pursuant to Nasdaq Listing Rule 5810(c)(3)(A), we were afforded a 180-calendar day grace period, or until November 12, 2024, to regain compliance with the Bid Price Rule. Compliance can be achieved by evidencing a closing bid price of at least $1.00 per share for a minimum of ten consecutive business days (but generally not more than 20 consecutive business days) during the 180-calendar day grace period.

The hearing before the Panel occurred on October 29, 2024. By decision dated November 8, 2024, the Panel granted our request for an extension to evidence compliance with all applicable criteria for continued listing on the Nasdaq Capital Market, including the Bid Price Rule, through January 31, 2025, and the Equity Rule through February 18, 2025. We are considering all available options that may enable us to timely evidence compliance with the continued listing criteria and maintain our listing on Nasdaq. There can be no assurance that we will be successful in our efforts to maintain the listing of our common stock on the Nasdaq Capital Market.

If we are delisted from Nasdaq, there can be no assurance that our common stock will be eligible for trading on another stock exchange or quotation on an over-the-counter market. If we are not able to obtain a listing on another stock exchange or quotation service for our common stock, it may be extremely difficult or impossible for stockholders to sell their shares. Additionally, if we are delisted from Nasdaq, but obtain a substitute listing or quotation service for our common stock, it will likely be on a market with less liquidity and our common stock may therefore experience potentially more price volatility than it has historically experienced on Nasdaq. Stockholders may not be able to sell their shares of common stock on any such substitute market in the quantities, at the times, or at the prices that could potentially be available on a more liquid trading market. As a result of these factors, if our common stock is delisted from Nasdaq, the value and liquidity of our common stock would likely be adversely affected. A delisting of our common stock from Nasdaq could also adversely affect our ability to obtain financing for our operations and/or result in a loss of confidence by investors, employees and/or business partners.

Risks Related to this Offering

We believe that the proceeds of this offering, combined with our limited funds currently on hand, will only be sufficient for us to operate for a relatively limited amount of time. Since we will be unable to generate sufficient funds, if any, to fund our operations for at least several years, we will need to seek additional equity or debt financing to provide the capital required to implement our business plan. If we are unable to raise capital, we could be required to seek bankruptcy protection or other alternatives that would likely result in our securityholders losing some or all of their investment in us.

We believe that the proceeds of this offering, combined with our limited funds currently on hand, will only be sufficient for us to operate for a relatively limited amount of time. Since we will be unable to generate sufficient, if any, revenue or cash flow to fund our operations for at least several years, we will need to seek additional equity or debt financing to provide the capital required to implement our business plan.

Additionally, this offering is being made on a “best efforts” basis and we may sell fewer than all of the securities offered hereby and may receive significantly less in net proceeds from this offering, which will provide us only limited working capital. We believe that the net proceeds from this offering, together with our existing cash and cash equivalents, will meet our capital needs for the next six to nine months under our current business plan. Without giving effect to the receipt of any proceeds from this offering, we currently estimate that our existing cash and cash equivalents are sufficient to fund business operations into the fourth quarter of 2025.

We do not currently have any arrangements or credit facilities in place as a source of funds. There can be no assurance that we will be able to raise sufficient additional capital on acceptable terms, or at all. If such financing is not available on satisfactory terms, or is not available at all, we may be required to further delay, scale back or eliminate the development of business opportunities and our operations and financial condition may be materially adversely affected. Furthermore, if we are unable to raise capital, we could be required to seek bankruptcy protection or other alternatives that would likely result in our securityholders losing some or all of their investment in us.

You will experience immediate dilution in the book value per share of the common stock purchased in the offering.

Since the public offering price of our common stock in this offering is substantially higher than the net tangible book value per share of our outstanding common stock outstanding prior to this offering, you will suffer dilution in the book value of the common stock you purchase in this offering. The shares of common stock sold in this offering, if any, will be sold from time to time at various prices. After giving effect to the sale of our common stock in the aggregate offering amount of $million at an offering price of $per share, and after deducting estimated offering commissions and expenses payable by us, you would suffer immediate dilution of $per share in the net tangible book value of the common stock. See the section titled “Dilution” for a more detailed discussion of the dilution you will incur if you purchase shares in this offering.

If you purchase our securities in this offering you may experience future dilution as a result of future equity offerings or other equity issuances.

We will likely offer and issue additional shares of our common stock or other equity or convertible debt securities in order to raise additional capital. Future equity offerings or other equity issuances may be at a price per share that is equal to or greater than the price per share paid by investors in this offering. Future investors in such offerings may have rights superior to existing stockholders, and the price per share at which we sell additional shares of common stock or other equity or convertible debt securities in future transactions may be at a higher or lower price per share than the price per share in this offering.

A substantial number of shares of common stock may be sold in the market following this offering, which may depress the market price for our common stock.

The securities offered hereby will be freely tradable without restriction or further registration under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the “Securities Act”). Sales of a substantial number of shares of our common stock in the public market following this offering, or the perception that such sales could occur, could cause the market price of our common stock to decline.

We have broad discretion to determine how to use the funds raised in this offering and may use them in ways that may not enhance our operating results or the price of our common stock.

Our management will have broad discretion over the use of net proceeds from this offering, and we could spend the net proceeds from this offering in ways our stockholders may not agree with or that do not yield a favorable return, if at all. We currently expect to use the net proceeds from this offering for working capital and general corporate purposes, including costs and expenses associated with being a public company. However, our use of these net proceeds may differ substantially from our current plans. If we do not invest or apply the net proceeds of this offering in ways that improve our operating results, we may fail to achieve expected financial results, which could cause our stock price to decline.

FINRA sales practice requirements may limit a stockholder’s ability to buy and sell our securities.

Effective June 30, 2020, the SEC implemented Regulation Best Interest requiring that “[a] broker, dealer, or a natural person who is an associated person of a broker or dealer, when making a recommendation of any securities transaction or investment strategy involving securities (including account recommendations) to a retail customer, shall act in the best interest of the retail customer at the time the recommendation is made, without placing the financial or other interest of the broker, dealer, or natural person who is an associated person of a broker or dealer making the recommendation ahead of the interest of the retail customer.” This is a significantly higher standard for broker-dealers to recommend securities to retail customers than before under FINRA “suitability rules. FINRA suitability rules do still apply to institutional investors and require that in recommending an investment to a customer, a broker-dealer must have reasonable grounds for believing that the investment is suitable for that customer. Prior to recommending securities to their customers, broker-dealers must make reasonable efforts to obtain information about the customer’s financial status, tax status, investment objectives and other information, and for retail customers determine the investment is in the customer’s “best interest” and meet other SEC requirements. Both SEC Regulation Best Interest and FINRA’s suitability requirements may make it more difficult for broker-dealers to recommend that their customers buy speculative, low-priced securities. They may affect investing in our common stock, which may have the effect of reducing the level of trading activity in our securities. As a result, fewer broker-dealers may be willing to make a market in our common stock, reducing a stockholder’s ability to resell our common stock.

Purchasers who purchase our securities in this offering pursuant to a securities purchase agreement may have rights not available to purchasers that purchase without the benefit of a securities purchase agreement.

In addition to rights and remedies available to all purchasers in this offering under federal securities and state law, the purchasers that enter into a securities purchase agreement will also be able to bring claims of breach of contract against us. The ability to pursue a claim for breach of contract provides those investors with the means to enforce the covenants uniquely available to them under the securities purchase agreement including, but not limited to: (i) timely delivery of shares; (ii) agreement to not enter into variable rate financings for one year from closing, subject to certain exceptions; (iii) agreement to not enter into any financings for 45 days from closing, subject to certain exceptions; and (iv) indemnification for breach of contract.

There is no public market for the Warrants and pre-funded warrants being offered in this offering.

There is no established public trading market for the Warrants and pre-funded warrants being offered in this offering, and we do not expect a market to develop. In addition, we do not intend to apply to list the Warrants or pre-funded warrants on any securities exchange or nationally recognized trading system, including the Nasdaq Capital Market. Without an active market, the liquidity of the Warrants or pre-funded warrants will be limited.

The holders of Warrants and pre-funded warrants purchased in this offering will have no rights as common stockholders until such holders exercise their Warrants or pre-funded warrants and acquire shares of our common stock, except as set forth in the Warrants and pre-funded warrants.

Until a holder of Warrants and pre-funded warrants acquires the shares of common stock upon exercise of the Warrants and pre-funded warrants, as the case may be, such holder will have no rights with respect to the shares of common stock underlying such Warrants and pre-funded warrants, except as set forth in the Warrants and pre-funded warrants. Upon exercise of the Warrants and pre-funded warrants, holders will be entitled to exercise the rights of common stockholders only as to matters for which the record date occurs after the exercise date.

The Warrants are speculative in nature.

The Warrants do not confer any rights of common stock ownership on their holders, such as voting rights, but rather merely represent the right to acquire shares of common stock at a fixed price for a limited period of time. There can be no assurance that the market price of the common stock will ever equal or exceed the exercise price of the Warrants, and consequently, it may not ever be profitable for holders of the Warrants to exercise the Warrants.

The Warrants are not exercisable until stockholder approval, provided however, if the Pricing Conditions are met, the Warrants will be exercisable upon issuance.

The Warrants will have an exercise price of $          per share and will be exercisable beginning on the effective date of the Warrant Stockholder Approval, provided, however, if the Pricing Conditions are met, the Warrants will be exercisable upon issuance (the “Initial Exercise Date”). The Series C-1 Warrants will expire on the five-year anniversary of the Initial Exercise Date. The Series C-2 Warrants will expire on the twenty-four-month anniversary of the Initial Exercise Date. The Series C-3 Warrants will expire on the nine-month anniversary of the Initial Exercise Date.

While we intend to promptly seek Warrant Stockholder Approval, there is no guarantee that the Warrant Stockholder Approval will ever be obtained. If we are unable to obtain the Warrant Stockholder Approval, the Warrants may have no value.

The market price for our common stock has been volatile and may continue to fluctuate or may decline significantly in the future.

An active, liquid and orderly market for our common stock may not be sustained, which could depress the trading price of our common stock or cause it to continue to be highly volatile or subject to wide fluctuations. Some of the factors that could negatively affect our share price or result in fluctuations in the price or trading volume of our common stock include, among other things:

These broad market and industry factors may decrease the market price of our common stock, regardless of our actual operating performance. The stock market in general has from time to time experienced extreme price and volume fluctuations. In addition, in the past, following periods of volatility in the overall market and decreases in the market price of a company’s securities, securities class action litigation has often been instituted against these companies. This litigation, if instituted against us, could result in substantial costs and a diversion of our management’s attention and resources.

This is a “best efforts” offering, no minimum amount of securities is required to be sold, and we may not raise the amount of capital we believe is required for our business plans, including our near-term business plans.

The Placement Agent has agreed to use its reasonable best efforts to solicit offers to purchase the securities in this offering. The Placement Agent has no obligation to buy any of the securities from us or to arrange for the purchase or sale of any specific number or dollar amount of the securities. There is no required minimum number of securities that must be sold as a condition to completion of this offering. Because there is no minimum offering amount required as a condition to the closing of this offering, the actual offering amount, Placement Agent fees and proceeds to us are not presently determinable and may be substantially less than the maximum amounts set forth herein. We may sell fewer than all of the securities offered hereby, which may significantly reduce the amount of proceeds received by us, and investors in this offering will not receive a refund in the event that we do not sell an amount of securities sufficient to support our continued operations, including our near-term continued operations. Thus, we may not raise the amount of capital we believe is required for our operations in the short-term and may need to raise additional funds to complete such short-term operations. Such additional fundraises may not be available on terms acceptable to us, or at all.

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SPECIAL NOTE REGARDING FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS

This prospectus contains forward-looking statements about us and our industry that involve substantial risks and uncertainties. All statements other than statements of historical or current facts included in this prospectus are forward-looking statements. In some cases, you can identify forward-looking statements by terminology such as “aim,” “anticipate,” “assume,” “believe,” “contemplate,” “continue,” “could,” “design,” “due,” “estimate,” “expect,” “goal,” “intend,” “may,” “objective,” “plan,” “positioned,” “potential,” “predict,” “seek,” “should,” “target,” “will,” “would” and other similar expressions that are predictions of or indicate future events and future trends, or the negative of these terms or other comparable terminology. In addition, statements that “we believe” or similar statements reflect our beliefs and opinions on the relevant subject. All forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed in, or implied by these, forward-looking statements and therefore, you should not unduly rely on such statements, including, but not limited to:

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We have based these forward-looking statements largely on our current expectations, estimates, forecasts, and projections about future events and financial trends that we believe may affect our financial condition, results of operations, business strategy, and financial needs. In light of the significant uncertainties in these forward-looking statements, you should not rely upon forward-looking statements as predictions of future events. Although we believe that we have a reasonable basis for each forward-looking statement contained in this prospectus, we cannot guarantee that the future results, levels of activity, performance, or events and circumstances reflected in the forward-looking statements will be achieved or occur at all. You should refer to the section entitled “Risk Factors” in this prospectus for a discussion of important factors that may cause our actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by our forward-looking statements. Furthermore, if our forward-looking statements prove to be inaccurate, the inaccuracy may be material. Except as required by law, we undertake no obligation to publicly update any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

You should read this prospectus completely and with the understanding that our actual future results may be materially different from what we expect. We qualify all of the forward-looking statements in this prospectus by these cautionary statements.

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USE OF PROCEEDS

We estimate that the net proceeds from this offering will be approximately $million, after deducting the Placement Agent’s fees and estimated offering expenses payable by us, and assuming no exercise of the Warrants being issued in this offering. However, because this is a “best efforts” offering and there is no minimum offering amount required as a condition to the closing of this offering, the actual offering amount, the Placement Agent’s fees and net proceeds to us are not presently determinable and may be substantially less than the maximum amounts set forth on the cover page of this prospectus.

These estimates exclude the proceeds, if any, from the exercise of Warrants issued in this offering. If all of the Warrants issued in this offering were to be exercised in cash at an exercise price of $per share of common stock, we would receive additional proceeds of approximately $million. We cannot predict when or if these Warrants will be exercised. It is possible that these Warrants may expire and may never be exercised. Additionally, the Warrants contain a cashless exercise provision that permit exercise of Warrants on a cashless basis at any time where there is no effective registration statement under the Securities Act covering the issuance of the underlying shares.

We intend to use the net proceeds of this offering for working capital, general corporate purposes and the payment of outstanding payables incurred in the ordinary course. General corporate purposes may include, and are not limited to, research and development costs, manufacturing costs, the acquisition or licensing of other businesses, products or product candidates, working capital and capital expenditures. These expected uses represent our intentions based upon our current plans and business conditions, which could change in the future as our plans and business conditions evolve. The amounts and timing of our actual expenditures may vary significantly depending on numerous factors, including the progress of our development, the status of and results from clinical trials, as well as any new collaborations that we may enter into with third parties for our product candidates, the commercialization of our products or our product candidates, if approved, and any unforeseen cash needs. As a result, our management will have broad discretion in the application of the net proceeds from this offering, and the investors will be relying on the judgment of our management regarding the application of the net proceeds from this offering.

Pending application of the net proceeds as described above, we intend to invest the net proceeds of this offering in short-term, investment-grade, interest-bearing securities.

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MARKET INFORMATION FOR COMMON STOCK AND DIVIDEND POLICY

Market Information

Our common stock is currently listed on the Nasdaq Capital Market under the symbol “MBIO”.

As of January 10, 2025, we had approximately 64,768,830 shares of common stock issued and outstanding held of record by approximately 72 registered holders.

Dividends

We have never declared or paid cash dividends on our common stock. We intend to retain all available funds and any future earnings for use in the operation of our business and do not anticipate paying any cash dividends on our capital stock in the foreseeable future. Notwithstanding the foregoing, any determination to pay cash dividends will be at the discretion of our board of directors and will depend upon a number of factors, including our results of operations, financial condition, future prospects, contractual restrictions, restrictions imposed by applicable law and other factors our board of directors deems relevant.

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CAPITALIZATION

The following table sets forth our capitalization as of September 30, 2024 as follows:

You should read this table together with “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations,” as well as our financial statements and related notes and the other financial information appearing elsewhere in this prospectus. The information presented in the capitalization table has been adjusted to reflect the effect of this current offering.

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The foregoing discussion and tables above are based on 36,827,671 shares of common stock outstanding as of September 30, 2024, and excludes:

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DILUTION

If you invest in our common stock, your interest will be immediately diluted to the extent of the difference between the public offering price per share and the as adjusted net tangible book value per share of our common stock after this offering. Net tangible book value per share represents our total tangible assets less total liabilities, divided by the number of shares of our common stock outstanding.

As of September 30, 2024, our net tangible book deficit was $(8.7) million, or $(0.24) per share of common stock, based on 36,827,671 shares of common stock outstanding as of September 30, 2024.

After giving effect to the sale of up to             shares of common stock, pre-funded warrants to purchase up to             shares of common stock, Series C-1 Warrants to purchase up to             shares of common stock, Series C-2 Warrants to purchase up to             shares of common stock, and Series C-3 Warrants to purchase up to             shares of common stock at a public offering price per share of common stock and accompanying Warrants of $             assuming exercise in full of any pre-funded warrants offered in this offering, and after deducting the estimated placement agent fees and estimated offering expenses payable by us, and excluding the proceeds, if any, from the exercise of the Warrants issued in this offering, our as adjusted net tangible book value as of September 30, 2024 would have been approximately $             million, or approximately $             per share. This represents an immediate increase in net tangible book value to existing shareholders of $             per share and an immediate dilution in net tangible book value of $             per share of our common stock to the investors purchasing securities in this offering.

The following table illustrates this per share dilution to the new investors purchasing shares of common stock in this offering:

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The foregoing discussion and tables above are based on 36,827,671 shares of common stock outstanding as of September 30, 2024, and excludes:

To the extent that any outstanding options or warrants are exercised, new options or other equity awards are issued under our equity incentive plans, or we issue additional shares in the future, there will be further dilution to new investors participating in this offering.

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MANAGEMENT’S DISCUSSION AND ANALYSIS OF FINANCIAL CONDITION AND RESULTS OF OPERATIONS

You should read the following discussion and analysis of our financial condition and results of operations together with our financial statements and related notes appearing elsewhere in this prospectus. Some of the information contained in this discussion and analysis or set forth elsewhere in this prospectus, including information with respect to our plans and strategy for our business and related financing, includes forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties. As a result of many factors, including those factors set forth in the section entitled “Risk Factors,” our actual results could differ materially from the results described in or implied by the forward-looking statements contained in the following discussion and analysis. You should carefully read the sections entitled “Risk Factors” and “Special Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements” to gain an understanding of the important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from our forward-looking statements.

Overview

We are a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company focused on translating today’s medical breakthroughs into potential cures for difficult-to-treat cancers. We aim to acquire rights to these technologies by licensing or otherwise acquiring an ownership interest in the technologies, funding their research and development and eventually either out-licensing or bringing the technologies to market.

Our pipeline is currently focused in two core areas: CAR T therapies for hematologic malignancies and CAR T therapies for solid tumors. For these therapies we have partnered with world class research institutions, including the City of Hope National Medical Center (“COH” or “City of Hope”), Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center (“Fred Hutch”), and Nationwide Children’s Hospital (“Nationwide”).

We expect to incur substantial expenses for the foreseeable future relating to research, development and commercialization of our potential products. However, there can be no assurance that we will be successful in securing additional resources when needed, on terms acceptable to us, if at all. Therefore, there exists substantial doubt about our ability to continue as a going concern. The financial statements included in this prospectus do not include any adjustments related to the recoverability of assets that might be necessary despite this uncertainty.

CAR T Therapies

Our pipeline of CAR T therapies is being developed under exclusive licenses from several world class research institutions. Our strategy is to license these technologies, support preclinical and clinical research activities by our partners and transfer the underlying technology to our or our contract manufacturer’s cell processing facility in order to conduct our own clinical trials.

We are developing CAR T therapy for hematologic malignancies in partnership with Fred Hutch targeting CD20 (MB-106). In May 2021, we announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (“FDA”) accepted our Investigational New Drug (“IND”) Application for MB-106. As of January 2025, 53 patients have been treated in an ongoing Phase 1 clinical trial sponsored by Fred Hutch (ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT03277729) and 20 patients have been treated in the Phase 1 clinical trial sponsored by us (ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT05360238). In 2023, we received Safety Review Committee approval to continue dose escalation in all three active arms of the ongoing Mustang-sponsored Phase 1 trial. We presented the latest results, demonstrating a favorable safety profile, complete response rate, and durability, from the ongoing Mustang-sponsored Phase 1 trial at the 2023 American Society of Hematology (“ASH”) Annual Meeting.

We are also developing CAR T therapy for solid tumors in partnership with COH targeting IL13Rα2 (MB-101). In addition, we have partnered with Nationwide for a herpes simplex virus type 1 (“HSV-1”) oncolytic virus (MB-108) in order to enhance the activity of MB-101 for the treatment of patients with high-grade malignant brain tumors. The Phase 1 clinical trial sponsored by COH for MB-101 (ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT02208362) has completed the treatment phase and patients continue to be assessed for long-term safety. A Phase 1 clinical trial sponsored by the University of Alabama at Birmingham (“UAB”) for MB-108 (ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT03657576) began during the third quarter of 2019. In October 2023, we announced that the FDA accepted our IND application for the combination of MB-101 and MB-108 – which is referred to as MB-109 – for the treatment of patients with IL13Rα2+ relapsed or refractory glioblastoma (“GBM”) and high-grade astrocytoma.

MB-106 (CD20-targeted CAR T cell therapy for Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma and Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia)

In the first quarter of 2024, we completed a successful End-of-Phase 1 meeting with the FDA regarding a potential pivotal Phase 2 single-arm clinical trial for the treatment of WM. Per the discussions, the FDA agreed with the proposed overall design of the pivotal trial for Waldenstrom macroglobulinemia (“WM”) at the recommended dose of 1 x 10⁷ CAR-T cells/kg and requested only minimal modifications to the study protocol. No additional nonclinical studies are expected prior to Phase 2 or a Biologics License Application (“BLA”) filing. Due to limited resources, and as a result of the reduction in work force described below, we do not expect to initiate our pivotal Phase 2 single-arm clinical trial of MB-106 for the treatment of WM trial in 2025. Subject to available funds, we intend to rely on third party service providers to conduct study and manufacturing services to advance our priority potential product candidates.

Also in the first quarter of 2024, we completed enrollment of the indolent lymphoma arm in our multicenter Phase 1 trial. The tenth and final patient enrolled on that arm was a patient with follicular lymphoma (FL) who achieved a complete response following treatment with 1 x 10⁷ CAR-T cells/kg. As a result, the overall complete response rate for FL in the Phase 1 portion of this trial was sustained at 100% (N=6), with no occurrence of cytokine release syndrome (“CRS”) above grade 1 and no immune effector cell-associated neurotoxicity syndrome (“ICANS”) of any grade, despite not using prophylactic tocilizumab or dexamethasone.