Richard A. Stewart
Analyst · Lake Street
Thank you, Nicole, and good morning, everyone. The NDA submission in June 2025 started the transformation of Achieve from a pure-play clinical development company into a commercially focused enterprise. Our primary objective now is to make cytisinicline available to the 25 million patients who smoke and nearly 18 million who vape. The need for a new nicotine dependence treatment like cytisinicline has never been greater. Achieve is committed to providing the new therapeutic tool to patients seeking to break free from the cycle of nicotine dependence. I'm incredibly impressed by the commitment and resilience of the entire Achieve team and their dedication to addressing the nicotine dependence public health crisis in the U.S. Key highlights in 2025 include: firstly, the submission of the New Drug Application or NDA for the smoking cessation indication and its acceptance by the FDA, moving us one important step closer to becoming the first new FDA-approved treatment in 20 years. Secondly, Achieve's vaping cessation indication was one of the first recipients of the Commissioner's National Priority Voucher. Recognition of cytisinicline as a national priority is an incredible achievement of the work conducted by Achieve and the importance of cytisinicline in tackling the previously intractable problem of nicotine dependence. The Commissioner's voucher gives us an accelerated pathway to be the first and only FDA-approved vaping cessation treatment. Thirdly, our clinical team delivered on all planned regulatory milestones and generated encouraging clinical data across our program during the year. This includes concluding the ORCA-OL long-term exposure trial, which underlined cytisinicline safety profile, demonstrating strong tolerability and excellent patient satisfaction data. We should not underestimate the importance of the findings from the ORCA-OL safety study, which demonstrated the tolerability of cytisinicline over long-term, 52-week exposure to treatment. Dr. Mark Rubinstein will elaborate in a minute. And lastly, post-hoc data published in Thorax, a leading peer-reviewed medical journal, demonstrated that cytisinicline significantly improved smoking quit rates compared to placebo in adults with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. There are 6 million COPD smokers in the U.S. today with few options to help them quit. Their level of nicotine dependence must be high, as continued smoking exacerbates COPD symptoms and impairs the efficacy of COPD drugs. The positive data on COPD patients highlights the expansive scope of opportunities for cytisinicline in terms of the range of comorbidities that could potentially benefit from treatment, and broad range of health care providers who would be interested in its benefits. Our commercial team has moved forward decisively towards building a scalable, data-driven commercial model that will position us to launch successfully. Our model is built to address the rapidly evolving health care environment, where approximately 75% of primary care physicians will no longer meet with medical reps. Achieve's omnichannel digital platform provides precision targeting of physicians and patients, which will allow us to identify high-volume prescribers and the patients motivated to quit, deploying resources efficiently and maximizing impact per dollar spent. AI is a critical enabler in this evolution. We'll be using advanced analytics and machine learning to enhance decision-making, automate customer engagement, and generate predictive insights about which messages will resonate most with target audiences, positioning us to continue building an efficient commercial organization that punches well above its weight. We also just announced that we have selected Adare Pharma Solutions, a U.S.-based manufacturing organization that will produce cytisinicline drug product as we prepare for potential commercial launch and future demand. We believe this partnership will secure our supply chain, reduce risks associated with international pharmaceutical importation, and may lower overall costs, including the risk and uncertainty for tariffs on international imports of drug product. I'm pleased to report that work has commenced and our technology transfer to Adare is already underway. The Adare partnership provides redundancy in our supply chain, allowing contingency capacity in the U.S. The manufacturer named in the cytisinicline NDA recently had an FDA Good Manufacturing Practices inspection with 2 observations related to solid oral dose manufacture, which are being addressed through an ongoing communication of its remedial action plan with the FDA. By establishing U.S.-manufacturing with Adare, we increase confidence in our supply-chain security as we advance towards a planned commercial launch of cytisinicline expected in the first half of 2027. We remain focused on bringing cytisinicline to patients as quickly as possible, and our decision to work with Adare positions us to launch with the manufacturing reliability and the operational readiness our patients and stakeholders expect. Now, let me take a moment to remind you why our team is so passionate about bringing cytisinicline to market. Recent data issued by CDC estimated that in 2024, approximately 25 million adults in the United States smoked cigarettes. It's estimated that more than 15 million attempt to quit every year. Smoking remains the leading cause of preventable death in the U.S., claiming approximately 500,000 lives annually and costing over $600 billion each year in health care cost and loss productivity. The comorbidities are devastating. To name a few, respiratory disease, cardiovascular disease, metabolic disease and cancer. We also know that 60% of the nearly 18 million adult e-cigarette users in the U.S. want to quit, and adult nicotine e-cigarette use is on the rise. However, there is no FDA-approved treatment for e-cigarette cessation. Patients are frustrated, physicians are frustrated. The narrative around nicotine dependence needs to change. We've seen this transformation happen with obesity. When GLP-1s emerged, they helped society recognize obesity for what it truly is, a medical condition, not a personal failure. Nicotine dependence deserves the same recognition. It's a neurobiological condition rooted in how nicotine alters brain chemistry and creates physical dependence. It's a medical condition and it demands medical treatment. That's why we launched our Will Power awareness campaign in January. This is the beginning of us reframing the conversation to help people understand that quitting takes more than Will Power alone and an effective treatment exists. The bottom line is that Achieve is not quitting on people who smoke. The parallels between obesity and nicotine dependence are not lost on many investors. unmet medical needs, same physician call points, same cost to society. In summary, our science is strong. We're advancing through the regulatory review process with the FDA, working constructively towards approval. Our commercial infrastructure is taking shape with real progress in 2025, and we're actively building for launch. With that, let me turn it over to Dr. Mark Rubinstein, who will detail our regulatory progress and the data that continue to reinforce cytisinicline across patient populations.