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Biotech / Medical : Zonagen (zona) - good buy? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: RWReeves who wrote (6781)	5/14/1999 4:25:00 PM
From: Linda Kaplan	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 7041

You make some good points. The morning after pill and cyclamates are good examples. The thing is that Vasomax has been approved in Mexico for over a year now and they have no sales. Also, there has been no useful data, as far as we know. The lack of sales is the most important issue to me. If it were that good, the people who tried it in the first quarter would have reordered. They didn't! The first quarter had big sales, the next zero, the next a small negative in the form of returns and the fourth quarter again zero sales. So there is no repeat business. Brazil is a new approval. They have no other approvals, but UK is in process, FWIW. Viagra has had problems getting prescribed in the UK and I would expect it would not be easier for Vasomax there. Thalidomide is not really a good example of approval for labeling, since it's been approved for life-threatening ailments like leprosy. I would not think that the FDA would be likely to take chances for Vasomax where there are already more efficacious oral meds on the market. Still, Thalidomide is an example of a labeling approval. :) The problem is that their data was always questionable, very doubtful. They worked on it for a really long time before submitting. Now they are trying to find more data, but if it were there it might have been already found and submitted. They weeded patients on nitrates out of their studies before, and they don't have data on the subject yet that they are willing to talk about. The company has overstated what it has for a long time, so I doubt they have evidence that they have a better safety profile than Viagra. It seems to me, too, that they will need that, if the drug doesn't work as well as Viagra. Linda

To: RWReeves who wrote (6781)	5/14/1999 4:46:00 PM
From: Cacaito	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 7041

RW Reeves, Burning rate $20M a year. Do you think they care about Vasomax? The only thing they care is how to burn the next $40M to $47M at hand. Ligand with a huge pipeline of REAL science for more than 20 products, two approvals, one more in the making, burns about $40M. The Vasomax trial are quite inexpensive, mostly done at home and outpatient visits. How could they burn so much money? The business is not marketing phantolamine in Mexico (Zero sales, and as far I know Mexican dollars look like American ones), it is the salaries of the executives (hard work), the early investors (Ross) who got out soon after doubling all tripling, and the perks plus the very succesful last year Road Show with same analysts that now are surprised with FDA REJECTION are the same who previously organized the 2ry offering with a 7% usual fee for blue ships, this Zona thing probably higher, plus shares to dump, easily $3M to 10M,no wonder the "buys" and now the "holds" while they are dumping. Nothing ilegal if done with good faith, just the nature of the beastness. Look at Ergo. Only thing holding this is tha cash at hand, and it does not look that they care about holding it for Zonagen, but for "dividend" distribution. Other products? they are ZERO value. Vasofem is not better than Vaseline, ZonaVaccine is long abandoned, the Fertility business is a nice $1M to burn away, the combined phantolamine/phosphodiesterease aka Vasogold is a phanton concoction since they do not own any phosphodiesterase compound to begin with (ICOS does have one, they got $90M from Lilly). This is a cash burning machine, including the cash of whoever is long.