Zymeworks (ZYME) TD Cowen 46th Annual Health Care Conference summary

Strategic direction and business model

• Evolving into a hybrid biotech and royalty company, leveraging protein engineering expertise and capital from royalties to acquire and develop new assets, then partner them out for downstream economics.

• Focused on R&D partnerships, holding onto long-term economics while using capital from royalties and recent financing for acquisitions and internal development.

• $250 million debt financing from Royalty Pharma secured by 30% of Ziihera royalties, providing cash runway through or beyond 2028 and flexibility for M&A or pipeline investment.

• $440 million in near-term regulatory milestones expected from Jazz and BeiGene, plus a $125 million share repurchase program and over $100 million in recent revenue.

• Capital deployment decisions are ROI-driven, balancing between share buybacks, business development, and pipeline investments.

Pipeline highlights and clinical progress

• Zanidatamab (Ziihera) showed strong data in frontline gastric cancer, with unprecedented ORR, OS, and PFS, and is expected to become standard of care in combination regimens.

• HERIZON-GEA-1 phase 3 trial demonstrated significant PFS and OS benefits for both doublet and triplet arms, with triplet likely to be widely adopted due to efficacy and tolerability.

• ZW191 (folate receptor alpha ADC) is in dose optimization, showing activity across high and low expression levels in ovarian and endometrial cancers, with future strategy dependent on maturing data.

• ZW251 (GPC3 ADC) is in early clinical development for HCC, with expansion potential into other indications like squamous non-small cell lung cancer.

• MSAT programs (DLL3, Claudin 18.2) and autoimmune assets (ZW1528, ZW1572) are advancing, with partnership strategies similar to oncology assets.

Platform and differentiation

• Azymetric platform enables efficient protein engineering and modeling, supporting both ADC and multi-specific antibody development, and is licensed to external partners.

• ADC design emphasizes fit-for-purpose linker and payload choices to optimize efficacy and tolerability, exemplified by ZW191’s favorable profile.

• Differentiation in T-cell engagers (DLL3) will focus on balancing efficacy with improved tolerability and outpatient feasibility.