NightHawk announces strategic shift to pure-play biomanufacturing CDMO

NightHawk Biosciences announced its strategic shift into a pure-play biomanufacturing Contract Development & Manufacturing Organization, as well as the divestiture of certain non-core assets, in order to focus on the growing sales within its Scorpius BioManufacturing subsidiary. The Company has booked contracts thus far in 2023, Scorpius’ first full year of operation, that are expected to generate over $20 million in revenue, a substantial portion of which will be recognized in 2024. To facilitate this strategic shift, the Company has divested its Elusys subsidiary and related assets, and has eliminated most of its R&D and associated expenses to focus its resources on growing and expanding Scorpius. The assets will be acquired by a private company established by Jeff Wolf, CEO of NightHawk, which will assume Elusys’ contracted financial commitments, currently estimated at over $40 million. Under the terms of the transaction, the private company will also provide an upfront payment of $500,000, a note for $2.25 million that is convertible into shares of NightHawk’s common stock subject to receipt of stockholder approval, and royalties of 3% on all of Elusys’ gross sales until June 30, 2031. The royalties are subject to a mandatory minimum payment of $5 million during the first five years of the royalty term. The divestiture of Elusys and R&D cuts are expected to reduce the Company’s annual operating expenses by over $13 million and fully eliminate the need for NightHawk to raise capital to support Elusys’ programs. Jeff Wolf, CEO of NightHawk and Elusys following the closing, commented, “Given the strength of our CDMO operations at Scorpius, we have made the strategic decision to refocus our efforts around those activities that hold the potential to generate meaningful cash flow while substantially reducing non-core costs and associated overhead. Scorpius booked $3 million in contracted sales in 2022, which has grown to over $20 million in contracted sales thus far in 2023. As contracted sales are generally recognized as revenue as work is performed, we expect to recognize substantial revenue on these booked contracts in 2024. We also have a very significant and growing sales pipeline, which includes contracts from premier pharma and biotech companies, as well as leading research institutes. We expect to close a number of new contracts before year-end and believe the growth in our sales pipeline is strong validation of the meaningful investments we have made in our Scorpius subsidiary. As we continue to grow our revenue and leverage our fixed costs, we expect our CDMO business to generate high margins and long-term profitability.”