BullFrog AI Holdings, Inc. 10-K

ITEM 7. MANAGEMENT’S DISCUSSION AND ANALYSIS OR PLAN OF OPERATION The following discussion and analysis of the results of operations and financial condition of Bullfrog AI Holdings, Inc. (“Bullfrog”) as of and for the years ended December 31, 2022 and 2021 should be read in conjunction with our consolidated financial statements and the notes to those consolidated financial statements that are included elsewhere in this Annual Report. References in this Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations to “us”, “we”, “our” and similar terms refer to the Company. This Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations contains statements that are forward-looking. These statements are based on current expectations and assumptions that are subject to risk, uncertainties and other factors. These statements are often identified by the use of words such as “may,” “will,” “expect,” “believe,” “anticipate,” “intend,” “could,” “estimate,” or “continue,” and similar expressions or variations. Actual results could differ materially because of the factors discussed in “Risk Factors” elsewhere in this Annual Report, and other factors that we may not know. OVERVIEW Bullfrog AI Holdings, Inc. was incorporated in the State of Nevada on February 6, 2020. Bullfrog AI Holdings, Inc. is the parent company of Bullfrog AI, Inc. and Bullfrog AI Management, LLC, which were incorporated in Delaware and Maryland, in 2017 and 2021, respectively. Operations are currently conducted through BullFrog AI Holdings, Inc., which began operations on February 6, 2020. We are a company focused specifically on advanced Artificial Intelligence / Machine Learning (AI/ML) analysis of complex data in the advancement of medicine. Our AI/ML platform (trade name: bfLEAP™) was created from technology originally developed at The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (JHU-APL). In February 2018, BullFrog AI Holdings secured the original exclusive, worldwide, royalty-bearing license from JHU-APL for the technology. The license covers three (3) issued patents, one (1) new provisional patent application, non-patent rights to proprietary libraries of algorithms and other trade secrets including modifications and improvements. We entered into a license agreement in July 2022 that provides the Company with new intellectual property and also encompasses most of the intellectual property from the February 2018 license. Our objective is to utilize our for a precision medicine approach toward drug development with biopharmaceutical collaborators, as well as our own internal clinical development programs. We believe the bfLEAP™ platform is ideally suited for evaluating pre-clinical and clinical trial data generated in translational research and clinical trial settings that lead to faster, less expensive drug approvals. Our aim is to improve the odds of success in each stage of developing medicine, ranging from early pre-clinical through late-stage clinical development. Our ultimate objective is to utilize bfLEAP™ to enable the success of ongoing clinical trials or rescue late-stage failed drugs (i.e., Phase 2 or Phase 3 clinical trial failures) for development and divestiture; although, we will also consider collaborations for earlier stage drugs. We hope to accomplish this through strategic acquisitions of current clinical stage and failed drugs for in-house development, or through strategic partnerships with biopharmaceutical industry companies. On July 8, 2022, the Company entered into an exclusive, worldwide, royalty-bearing license from JHU-APL for the additional technology. The new license provides additional intellectual property rights including patents, copyrights and knowhow to be utilized under the Company’s bfLEAP™ analytical AI/ML platform. In consideration of the new license, the Company issued to JHU-APL 39,879 shares of common stock. In September 2020 and October of 2021, the Company executed amendments to the original license which represents improvements and new advanced analytics capabilities. In consideration of the rights granted to the Company under the original License Agreement, the Company granted JHU 178,571 warrants exercisable to purchase shares of common stock at $2.10 per share. Under the terms of the new License Agreement, JHU will be entitled to eight (8%) percent of net sales for the services provided by the Company to other parties and 3% for internally development drug projects in which the JHU license was utilized. The new license also contains tiered sub licensing fees that start at 50% and reduce to 25% based on revenues. In addition, the Company is required to pay JHU an annual maintenance fee of $1,500. Minimum annual payments are set to be $30,000 for 2022, $80,000 for 2023, and $300,000 for 2024 and beyond, all of which are creditable by royalties. We will continue to evolve and improve bfLEAP™, either in-house or with development partners like JHU-APL. We plan to leverage our proprietary AI/ML platform developed over several years at one of the top innovation institutions in the world which has already been successfully applied in multiple sectors. 19 We have begun to ramp our business using funds from our initial public offer offering and through our partnerships and relationships. We currently have a strategic relationship with a leading rare disease non-profit organization for AI/ML analysis of late-stage clinical data. We have also acquired the rights to a series of preclinical and early clinical drug assets from universities, as well as a strategic collaboration with a world-renowned research institution to create a HSV1 viral therapeutic platform to engineer immunotherapies for a variety of diseases. We have signed exclusive worldwide License Agreements with JHU for a cancer drug that targets glioblastoma (brain cancer), pancreatic cancer, and others. We have also signed an exclusive worldwide license from George Washington University for another cancer drug that targets hepatoceullar carcinoma (liver cancer), and other liver diseases. Additionally, we intend to gain access to later-stage clinical assets through partnerships or the acquisition of rights to failed therapeutic candidates for drug rescue. In certain circumstances, we intend to conduct late-stage clinical trials in an effort to rescue therapeutic assets that previously failed. In these cases there will be a requirement for a drug supply and regulatory services to conduct clinical trials. The success of our clinical development programs will require finding partners to support the clinical development, adequate availability of raw materials and/or drug product for our R&D and clinical trials, and, in some cases, may also require establishment of third-party arrangements to obtain finished drug product that is manufactured appropriately under (GMP) industry-standard guidelines, and packaged for clinical use or sale. Since we are a company focused on using our AI technology to advance medicines, any clinical development programs will also require, in all cases, partners and the establishment of third-party relationships for execution and completion of clinical trials. Over the next 24 months, the Company expects to spend approximately $2.1 million on service offering products, preclinical IND enabling activities and on R&D to enable future clinical trials evaluating our drug assets for new disease indications. Our Strategy The Company has a unique strategy designed to reduce risk and increase the frequency of cash flow. The first part of the strategy is to generate revenues through strategic relationships with biopharma companies. These relationships will be structured as a combination of fees and intellectual property based on the specific scope of the engagement. The objective of these engagements will be to uncover valuable insights to reduce the risk and/or increase the speed of the drug development process which can be achieved through manual or automated integration into the client’s work flow or analysis of discrete data sets. In the future, the second part of our strategy involves acquiring the rights to clinical stage drugs, using our bfLEAP technology to design a precision medicine trial, conduct the trial with a partner, and sell the asset. This approach may also apply to earlier phases in the drug development process such as discovery and preclinical. In any case, the objective is to create near term value and exit and monetize as quickly as possible, preferably within approximately 30 months. Results of Operations For the years ended December 31, 2022 and 2021 In late 2022, the Company recognized its first service revenues of $10,000 related to an analysis contract with a small pharmaceutical company. The Company previously had not recorded any revenues. Through the end of 2022, the Company has an accumulated deficit of approximately $4,399,000. Net loss from operations in 2022 was approximately $2,455,000 versus $555,000 in 2021. The 2022 increase reflects the full year costs of engaging advisors and consultants and other costs associated with preparing the Company for its initial public offering including the costs related to auditing the Company’s past and current financial statements. Cash used in operations in 2022 was approximately $911,000 versus approximately $382,000 in 2021 and net cash inflows from financing activities in 2022 was approximately $967,000 versus approximately $387,000 in 2021. Liquidity and Capital Resources In 2021, we received net proceeds of approximately $387,000, primarily from the sale of a SAFE note ($150,000) and a convertible promissory note ($99,900) and three unsecured promissory notes ($49,000) to a related party. In addition, in July and December 2021, the Company sold convertible bridge notes to two unrelated parties and received net proceeds of approximately $88,000. In the period ended December 31, 2022 the Company received net proceeds from the sale of Convertible Bridge Notes of approximately $1,016,000 and repaid the unsecured promissory notes sold in 2021 in the amount of $49,000. Through 2021, the Company primarily operated with only one full time employee and a series of consultants. During this period, the primary activities included: technology evaluation, acquisition and validation, capital acquisition and business development activities which in general, have readied the Company for contract services while exploring strategic partnering and asset acquisition. The majority of this was paid to employees and consultants as compensation. In 2021, the Company used approximately $382,000 on operating activities including approximately $203,000 in salaries and approximately $150,000 on professional services and fees directly related to preparation for the intended IPO. The Company also made payments totaling $25,000 under two evaluation/option agreements for the two drug development programs licensed in 2022. In 2022, three consultants engaged by the Company became part time employees and the Company now has four employees. For the year ended December 31, 2022, the Company used approximately $911,000 on operating activities versus approximately $382,000 for the same period in 2021. The 2022 cash use included approximately $548,000 in salaries, approximately $634,000 in consulting and professional fees including legal, accounting and auditing fees as well as consulting fees for operational activities and approximately $609,000 in technology license fees, patent cost reimbursements and minimum annual royalties which has been recorded as a research & development expense. 20 Through December 31, 2022, the Company has an accumulated deficit of approximately $4,399,000 and funded its operations through the sale of common stock and debt. We anticipate that our expenses will increase in the future to support our service offerings, clinical and pre-clinical research and development activities associated with strategic partnering and collaborations as we well as acquired product candidates and the increased costs of operating as a public company. These increases will likely include increased costs related to the hiring of additional personnel and fees to outside consultants, lawyers and accountants, among other expenses. Additionally, we anticipate increased costs associated with being a public company including expenses related to services associated with maintaining compliance with exchange listing and Securities and Exchange Commission requirements, insurance, and investor relations costs. The Company’s current operations include BullFrog AI, Inc. and BullFrog Management, LLC, which are wholly owned subsidiaries of BullFrog AI Holdings, Inc., which is a holding company that depends upon the sale of its securities and cash generated through its subsidiaries to fund consolidated operations. Through December 31, 2022, the Company received net proceeds of approximately $1,016,000 from the sale of convertible promissory notes and warrants. On February 16, 2023, the Company completed its initial public offering of 1,297,318 units (each, a “Unit,” collectively, the “Units”) at a price of $6.50 per unit for a total of approximately $8.4 million of gross proceeds to the Company. Each Unit consists of one share of the Company’s common stock, one tradeable warrant (each, a “Tradeable Warrant,” collectively, the “Tradeable Warrants”) to purchase one share of common stock at an exercise price of $7.80 per share, and one non-tradeable warrant (each, a “Non-tradeable Warrant,” collectively, the “Non-tradeable Warrants”; together with the Tradeable Warrants, each, a “Warrant,” collectively, the “Warrants”) to purchase one share of the Company’s common stock at an exercise price of $8.125. The offering closed on February 16, 2023. In connection with and prior to the consummation of the initial public offering, the Company effected a reverse split of its outstanding shares of common stock at a ratio of 1:7 - 1 share of new common stock for 7 shares of then outstanding common stock. Also in connection with the initial public offering, a SAFE and convertible loan agreement held by a related party converted into 55,787 shares of post reverse split common stock. Additionally, all outstanding convertible bridge notes and accrued interest through November 30, 2022 were converted into 276,289 shares common stock and 276,289 warrants to purchase common stock (post reverse stock split) were issued to the Convertible Bridge Note holders at conversion. The convertible bridge note conversions and the warrant exercise pricing was determined using a $25 million dollar company valuation immediately before the initial public offering. Between April 5 and April 13, 2023, the holders of warrants exercised 436,533 (post reverse stock split) warrants for common stock at various exercise prices and the Company received proceeds of approximately $1,495,000. In the absence of revenues in 2023 management believes the company’s capital resources are sufficient to fund planned operations for substantially longer than 12 months from the date of this filing. Critical Accounting Policies In Footnote 2 of our Audited Financial Statements for the year ended December 31, 2022 found elsewhere in this filing, we included a discussion of the most critical accounting policies used in the preparation of our financial statements. There has been no material change in the policies and estimates used in the preparation of our financial statements since the completion of the 2022 audit. Off-Balance Sheet Arrangements We do not have any off-balance sheet arrangements, as such term is defined in Item 303(a)(4) of Regulation S-K. 21 Financial operations overview Revenue We generated our first revenues in late 2022 from our services provided to a pharmaceutical customer. We have service contracts with two organizations and currently have multiple discussions underway and anticipate, although there can be no assurance, entering into additional service agreements and business relationships in 2023. Operating Expenses We classify our operating expenses into two categories: research and development and general and administrative. Prior to 2022, most of our activities were related to: technology evaluation, acquisition and validation, capital acquisition and business development activities in general, which we believe have readied the Company for contract services while exploring strategic partnering and asset acquisition. These activities and related expenditures have been recorded and reported as General and Administrative in our Financial Statements. In 2022, we licensed two drug development programs from universities and also entered into a new license with JHU-APL for new IP and other enhancements used with our bfLEAP™ platform. In 2022, we expended appropriately $608,000 on license related payments for our bfLEAP™ AI/ML platform and our two drug development programs from universities. We expect that our research and development expenses will increase in 2023 as we initiate activities directed towards the development of service offering products, collaborations (JCVI) and preclinical IND enabling studies. Research and Development Costs and Expenses Research and development costs and expenses consist primarily of costs related to the acquisition of licensed technology and fees paid to external service providers. We anticipate our research and development costs could become significant as we execute on our business plan and begin conducting preclinical research and development activities directed at securing development partners and filing Investigational New Drug (IND) applications for our licensed drug development programs describes in this filing, as well as under strategic partnerships and for other drug development programs we may acquire. Research and development expenses are recorded in operating expenses in the period in which they are incurred. Estimates will be used in determining the expense liability of certain costs where services have been performed but not yet invoiced. We will monitor levels of performance under each significant contract for external services through communications with the service providers to reflect the actual amount expended. General and Administrative Expenses In anticipation of the initial public offering, a management team with deep industry experience was been identified and engaged as employees and consultants to assist the Company in preparing for the initial public offering and subsequently, to operate and function as a public company. Through 2021, the Company primarily operated with only one full time employee and a series of consultants. In 2022, three of the consultants became part time employees of the Company. During this period, the primary activities included: technology evaluation, acquisition and validation, capital acquisition and business development activities which in general, have readied the Company for contract services while exploring strategic partnering and asset acquisition as noted above. The Company’s financial statements reflect an accumulated deficit of approximately $4,400,000 as a result of these activities including the licensing costs for bfLEAP™. In 2022, the Statement of Operation reflects approximately $2,457,000 in operating expenses versus $555,000 in the 2021 period. The increase reflects the Company’s continued preparation for its IPO including legal and accounting costs related to the audit of the Company’s financial statements including those presented in the Company’s S-1 filed in connection with the Company’s IPO in February 2023. The Company also engaged the management team noted above which resulted in increased consulting and stock-based compensation expenses in 2021 and 2022. The 2022 Consolidated Statement of Operations reflects Salaries of approximately $548,000, Consulting and other professional fees of approximately $644,000 and Stock based compensation of $340,000. For the 2021 period, these amounts were approximately $203,000, $140,000 and $99,000. We anticipate that our general and administrative expenses will increase in the future to support our service offerings, clinical and pre-clinical research and development activities associated with strategic partnering and collaborations as well as any newly acquired product candidates and the increased costs of operating as a public company. These increases will likely include increased costs related to the hiring of additional personnel and fees to outside consultants, lawyers and accountants, among other expenses. Additionally, we anticipate increased costs associated with being a public company including expenses related to services associated with maintaining compliance with exchange listing and Securities and Exchange Commission requirements, insurance, and investor relations costs. ITEM 7A. QUANTITATIVE AND QUALITATIVE DISCLOSURES ABOUT MARKET RISK As a smaller reporting company, this disclosure is not required. ITEM 8. FINANCIAL STATEMENTS AND SUPPLEMENTARY DATA See “Index to Consolidated Financial Statements” which appears on page F-1 of this Annual Report on Form 10-K. ITEM 9. CHANGES IN AND DISAGREEMENTS WITH ACCOUNTANTS ON ACCOUNTING AND FINANCIAL DISCLOSURE None.