Thank you for joining us today. We're going to have a conversation with Dr. Zachary Karl, the VP of business development at Invizyne Technologies. And it's important you understand the genesis of this call came about very quickly as, uh, from feedback from investors like yourself, uh, interested in not just what the technology can do, but how does that translate into business development activities? So I think rightfully so. Uh, investors have asked, where do we see this tech actually move into commercialization? And Zach. Uh. No pressure. Uh, it's all resting on you to make these things happen. So wanted to welcome you. And, uh, thank you for agreeing to come into -the gantlet here. -Sure, sure. Thanks for having me, Lou. Yeah, absolutely. So, um, before we get into it, I do just want to cover because we're in the middle of an act of offering, marketing and offering to refer everyone to the forward looking statements and disclosures that you can find here on the screen. We will most likely be making forward looking disclosures today. We want to make sure that you understand the risks and uncertainties that come with those statements, as well as the risks and uncertainties that come with any offering. So for that, we encourage you to cure your insomnia and go to the sec.gov and read the risks and uncertainties that are included in the company's registration statement. Um, so now, with that out of the way, let me more formally introduce you to Zach as or if I call you -Zach or should we go by doc? -Zach is just fine. All right. Good. Well, listen, I think what makes me most interested in this call is you're in a unique position because you're not coming. Just as the closer and business development guy from Glengarry Glen Ross. You actually have a deep science background. So I wanted to give you an opportunity to share with everyone, just to contextualize before we get into the business development discussions. What's your background? Is your experience as an entrepreneur, but then also in Devon and this industry specifically? Yeah, sure. So I do have a technical background in nature. Um, so I do I do hold a PhD from Purdue, where I studied, um, enzymes, enzyme systems and how they could be applied to, um, industry, uh, various industries, um, for, for manufacturing various products. So, you know, the, the, the theory behind this technology is in this technology in general is not new. That was a decade ago that I was doing this right. Um, it was it was always the, uh, commercial viability aspect. Um, that is what this team has, has, you know, hit a home run. So, anyway, um, my background was studying these systems, so I'm very familiar with how they work, and that's allowed me to, um, you know, translate that value, uh, and communicate that, you know, to, to really any audience I can do it to, you know, somebody with a technical background, a hybrid technical business, or somebody who's who's superior to the business. So I can always convey that, that value to, to that individual. That's that's helped. Um, shortly after graduating, uh, wrap some IP around some of the findings, uh, during my, my dissertation and spun out a cell free company, um, from that, uh, within a year, uh, of proof of concept, we successfully exited. Um, so I thought that was easy, right? Entrepreneur Entrepreneurship. This is a this is easy. Um, but, uh, shortly after, um, exiting that company, I went and worked for the largest ethanol, uh, company out there. As enzyme, uh, were their main technology for converting sugars into, um, ethanol and sugars from various sources. Uh, whether it was one key, the corn starch or 2g, uh, the the corn stover. Um, so I was there in a hybrid R&D business development role where I led some of our strategic initiatives with, with, you know, some of the larger players out there. Um, you know, specifically the, the, uh, poet DSM, um, health and wellness industries as well. Um, started a few companies there. Got that, got them up and running and then dove back into large industry where I joined a biopharma company. I was doing something pretty phenomenal where they were, um, uh, they basically had had genetically engineered, uh, cows to produce fully human polyclonal antibodies for, for different bio therapies. But we focused on Covid oncology, uh, diabetes and influenza. Uh, so I was there building, uh, developing, scaling, um, their antigen production platform, uh, shortly after -that, um, or wow. -That was that, that was that SAB -correctly. -That was that SAB yes. Yes. You're right. That was, that would be biotherapeutics. Um, and so while I was there, uh, there was a gentleman on that had I had sat on the other side of the table from while I was at poet, who had been at Novozymes. Um, and, uh, he reached out and asked if I'd be interested in joining, um, Ginkgo Bioworks. Just given my background in, you know, the various sectors that that Ginkgo plays in, which is, which is ag industrial chemicals, pharma, um, and nutritional wellness. Uh, and I said, yes, I jumped at the opportunity. And so I spent a few years at Ginkgo, um, in a business development role, you know, playing across, you know, various verticals there, meeting a lot of a lot of industry players there. And that's when um, while I was there, uh, I met, uh, I met Invizyne didn't know Invizyne existed at the time. Uh, I feel they did. What what, you know, a company should do, which is, you know, build in, in somewhat stealth mode, get to a commercially viable state and then go out and talk about it. Um, and so that's, that's when they approached me is when they were starting to go out and really discuss it and talk about it. Um, and I jumped at the opportunity just knowing that cell free, you know, is the future. It was just you need it was always ten years away and you needed somebody to to take it to that commercially viable state. And so I jumped at the opportunity. So so let's go back a little bit here. I want to dig in on this because I think two things. One, you have the unique experience of being on both sides of the table. So you're as an operator entrepreneur bringing to market stuff, sitting across from people that want to do business deals and then also the leader of those biz dev deals. But you just made a statement about you jumped at the opportunity for Invizyne. I mean, you were arguably at the 800 pound gorilla in the industry. What was so different that it immediately clicked for you and your background, the science side, where you knew that this was something different? Uh, and then to your point that it was ready for commercialization. Yeah. So I just mentioned this. This is not a new idea. It was just it was always ten years away. Um, and I didn't know anybody had had figured out the secret sauce just yet, which is, you know, when you. So what Invizyne has done, you know, the big picture, uh, is, is they've, they've really, um, distilled it down to the, the necessary. Right. Um, so they've, they've basically taken the, the technology from within the cell, the technology that's actually doing the, the, the magic within the cell and freeing it, um, from the cell. Uh, so, so, you know, while I was at Ginkgo, I, I didn't, I didn't know anybody had had truly figured that out, you know, just yet. Um, and so that's the North Star. That's where everybody's pointing. That's that's what every industry is, is trying to do, is basically simplifying it down, um, to the, to the necessary or, or, you know, simplifying it down to, to, you know, what's exactly needed. And that's the next step in the iteration of symbiosis is going from the cell to what's actually in the cell doing the work. And that's all you need is what's in the cell doing the work. You don't need the cell. Um, and so that's why I jumped at the opportunity, because this is where everything was pointing in, in synthetic biology. Um, -so. -Yeah. And you said, I mean, so I'm going to play devil's advocate because I know investors will give me a hard time if I don't on this. You thought it was always ten years away. What gives you the confidence that it's still not ten years away? Right. You said this was the next step. Isolate the enzymatic pathways that are important. Um, maybe examples. I mean, how can you how do you see what Invizyne is doing in terms of molecules are producing that it proves to you, hey, this is this is something we can no now go strike deals with that can get to market. Yeah. So it all comes down to and this is, this is what uh, has, has plagued biotech in general is you get a lot of very smart people in a room and they create something and then they go out and they ask, you know who wants this? And, uh, and there's there's nobody who's raising their hands. Um, but this technology is a need, right? It's it's people have been saying they need this technology for for years and years and years now. And while I keep saying that it was it was always ten years away is because when you do take those enzymes outside of the cell, which is what my, my company was doing a decade ago. Um, it's it's very unsophisticated. They work for a little bit of time, you make a little bit of product and it's never going to be commercially viable. You're really you're really hoping that they either buy the assets from you, um, or, you know, there's some sort of a huge sustainable premium that you get on that product to make it some somehow feasible. I think what we've seen in the markets is that the consumer's not willing to pay for sustainability. And so what these folks have done is they've figured out those those, you know, um, those extra things from inside the cell, which is cofactors and things of that nature that you need to actually power the enzymes and make them, you know, last and work. Um, they've figured out how to actually do that in an economical fashion through some of the patented technology they have, which is balancing that that energy and that cofactor recycling and things of that nature. And that was always really the secret to getting it to a commercially viable state, because if you have to put all the enzymes in and it only works for a couple of hours and you're only getting a little bit of product out, it's never going to make economic sense. And so what they figured out how to do is, you know, get to cost parity with some of the more traditional manufacturing approaches out there. So we don't have to rely on sustainability wording or anything like that. It's just a plus that we have that this is a very sustainable method, and a lot of people are looking at this, but then they don't have to, you know, force that, that extra premium on their consumer. Then, um, we're actually making it in a more sustainable fashion, um, at, you know, at parity with, uh, with traditional manufacturing processes. So that's, that's like the golden -ticket right there. -Yeah. So the economics work finally. So therefore gives you the confidence to go out. So let's let's start talking a little bit in general. And then we'll try and get more specific on the biz dev side. Can you just characterize for for this stage again understanding that Amazon is still a new company? Uh, you're new to this role. The maturity of it is, you know, people you've been in stealth mode. What type of business development activity are you seeing right now? Is it and then characterize it? Is it accelerating? Um, just give us some generalities around that just to frame this conversation. Yeah. Just kind of heads down, uh, learn, learn everything we could about the company, about the the technology and whatnot so we could speak to it, you know, elegantly and things of that nature. And so we really hit the ground running, um, relatively recently, end of last year, early this year. Uh, and the. Correction has been substantial. Um, you know, I knew that. Well, folks, here we have technology is amazing when it works properly. I was worried that it was me that was cutting out. So just bear with us for a second. I just communicated with some of the team members here that it was Zach and, uh, that was cutting it out, so obviously. So we'll go back, we'll rewind. Um, I do want to encourage you in this lap while we wait for Zach to rejoin. If you do have questions, we're going to take that question and answer. Just please use the Q&A function that's built into zoom. There's a couple of questions that are already been submitted. Uh, as the conversations going on, it just helps for us to see those questions we can organically work them in. But then also that way we're not waiting at the end for questions to enter the queue. So I encourage you to do that. Uh, we will get into more specifics as soon as we get Zach back here. Um, but, uh, if there's any questions that we can answer in the interim right now, uh, while we're waiting for him. Um, you know, about the offering, about the proposed timing. Um, please do go ahead and enter them in as well. Um. All right. He's back. You just like to make me sweat and dance and, um, try and, you know, fill in the details for you. So sorry. -About that. Was that on my end? I'm sorry. -It was. I thought it was. I was on my end. So why don't we rewind a little bit? We were, um, you know, just talking about the trajectory of business development activity since you really were operating in stealth mode for a while. And then, uh, now just kind of have been, uh, going after it -meaningfully. -Yeah. Yeah. So the, you know, the traction has been, um, immense since I've, since I've got like I said, I understood that this was desired, wanted, needed. Um, But I didn't know, you know, who we would have to teach about this space and things of that nature. But it seems that it's been on everybody's radar for a long, long time now. And they were waiting for somebody to figure out that secret sauce. And we finally come around. So there's a lot of companies out there that are needing to de-risk their supply chain. So they're they're bringing, you know, technologies in-house to, to to be able to produce these ingredients themselves. And they're looking like they're looking to companies like ours and specifically ours to to help them do that. A lot of companies want to reduce their footprint, which, which our technology allows them to, to do as well. And there's also regulatory hurdles that are either in place or are on the horizon. And it's not just, you know, GMO cell based, a lot of chemical synthesis routes. um, in various parts of the world are also coming under scrutiny, or currently they're just not allowed to be put into practice. And we can circumvent all of those things with, uh, with our technology. But again, there's also a sustainability play here, um, where, you know, the the technology does have a sustainable nature to it. Um, you know, it's enzymes, it's bio based, uh, again, reduced footprint. But we're at that price parity where they don't have to again, move that, that high value onto their consumer and make them pay more. So they're kind of having their cake and eating it too. Um, but in terms of, of, of industries and whatnot, you know, we can play in, in various industries that a lot of these other technologies just simply can't play in. So, you know, the pharma industry is, is is one of those, uh, we can do some unique things there. You know, enzymes are our nature's kind of surgical tools. So we can do very precise things within that industry that even medicinal chemistry just just simply can't do or overcome. But then in the foods, flavors, fragrances, cosmetics, nutraceutical space from a business perspective and a technology perspective, um, you know, we've had a lot of interest from that, that sector, just because if you think about it, that sector, you know, a lot of those companies, their their total revenue is made up of hundreds of different products, right? Not just one blockbuster or things like that, but hundreds of different products. And so they can't, um, afford to, you know, pay somebody, um, you know, tens of millions of dollars and wait 2 to 3 years for one of those ingredients to to come back in a, in a synthetic biology manufacturing type of a process. And so, you know, our process lends itself to being very, very quick and development cycles, which gets the product to market incredibly fast. And then our development processes is, you know, orders of magnitude cheaper than what it would take to do some of the stuff in the cell. Um, and so it's, it's very alluring for, for that segment. But then also interestingly, we can also play in the industrial chemicals market, as I'm sure most of you know, of the Ice age. -Now. -Let's definitely get into that in a little bit. Those are some of the specifics. I want to go back because I had a conversation late last week, which we'll release as soon as we get approval with Tyler Kaufman, VP of research. But then also Janek Bumble, which is the scientist, the lead scientist that's working in collaboration from NREL, the National Renewable Energy Lab. And he made a statement just similar to what you said, that you're you're making now. The technology allows you to make things that other people can't. Um, and that's significant. He was really intrigued by that as well. So let me ask you this. How does how do you prove to potential partners that you're having conversations with that you can make these things? I mean, what have you made already as a company that gives you and then, more importantly, the potential partners confidence that you can make the, you know, molecules that are under -consideration. -Yeah, sure. So we have we have, you know, a plethora of case studies, right? A lot of our, our case studies or things that we've developed, um, have, have really been, uh, you know, um, Grant, you know, driven, if you will. So, so where the grants kind of take us to do. But, you know, every, every aspect, um, or every path that we've taken to, you know, all sorts of different products and development processes has all been successful. So these are really, you know, case studies that we can point towards, um, and give the customer, um, or the potential partner a lot of confidence that if we were to partner with them, um, we would also be successful in what we're doing. So, you know, three of our big ones are kids on the cannabinoids, um, and the ice of butanol. Um, and, you know, to your point, you know, on the, on the ice front, um, you know, one of the, the downfalls of, of, you know, anything cell based really is, is some of the toxicity hurdles. Um, and so, you know, we've, we've been able to overcome that, uh, simply because we're not using the cell. Right. The there's no cell. So there's there's really no toxicity issues to, uh, to overcome. So the example I like to point towards is, you know, there's a technology out there that was trying to use cells and, you know, they're getting to, you know, roughly 10g/l. Um, and, uh, you know, before the cells were, were dying, um, so that, you know, there's an expensive separation step to keep it going. And it was just not commercially viable. Um, you know, we're we're north of 300g/l, right? I mean, and we're keeping on going. So that's just. The that was the comparison. There was ten versus 300in terms. So when you say case study, I just want to be clear to everyone we're talking about actual in the lab you've built you've you've made these molecules. So terpenes flavors and fragrances cannabinoids which are multiple. How many cannabinoids has the company made? Now I know there's, what, roughly 140 cannabinoids in the endocannabinoid system that we're aware of. What are we focusing on? Um, you know, and then ISO butanol is obviously the sustainable fuel. So, you know, cannabinoids, how many, how many have we made and how big did that -market be. -Yeah. So you know, it's it's it's probably not about how many, but it's the, the types that we really differentiate ourselves on. And so we can do obviously some of the more common ones. Um, that market's fairly saturated. But the interesting thing with the more common ones is we can actually do things to those more common ones to make them more effective within the system, which a lot of, you know, larger companies are actually very interested in that technology. But where we really thrive is we can make, you know, a lot of the rare, uh, cannabinoids that you just you can't get, you know, from, from a natural extraction process or cell based process in any meaningful amount. Um, and we can make those, you know, in, you know, bulk, uh, and then new to nature is another interesting one where we can make compounds that have never been seen before, um, that, you know, uh, potentially can work better than, than some of the known cannabinoids out there. So those are kind of the three, you know, buckets we play in within cannabinoids. And we've made multiple cannabinoids in each of those. And we can point towards them. And again, you know, it gives customers just the confidence that that we can do other things that are similar right within the that that construct, if you will. So, you know, we can do different flavonoids and noise and things of that nature as well. So again, just a case study to point to. But it's a you know, it's a industry that the cannabis industry, um, that is, is garnering a lot of interest, just as you mentioned, it's it's the largest, you know, receptor system in our in our body, a lot of people are studying it and a lot of the, the, uh, um. A lot of the research and clinical data that's coming out of that. It's a it's a great therapeutic target for various, you know, different, different things out there. Um, so yes. And then and then did you what was your other question? There were, you know. I think you addressed it. Yeah. We'll we'll get to that in a little bit. Like I think now let's get into this could be a little bit more like uh PTI just more rapid fire type of questions. It should be easier, straightforward. Just help us understand how many you know. I think it was in one of the presentations, uh, was mentioned that you're under a number of NDAs. I mean, what can you share? Not names, obviously, but, uh, is it a couple dozen? Is it a handful of NDAs that you're in discussions with? Uh, what does that look like in terms of that stage? Yeah, yeah. So, you know, we are we are definitely more than a couple dozen, um, NDAs. Uh, and that just speaks to, again, the level of interest in, in this technology and what it's garnered since we've gone out and recently started talking about it. And like I said, this has been a lot of outbound, um, which is, you know, I call it fishing with a single hook, um, which is us going and talking to folks. You know, I have a lot of connections in the industry, various folks within Invisalign. I have a lot of connections within this industry. So we can go and talk to people that we know, um, and, uh, and whatnot. But, you know, we're starting to do a lot of inbound, which is, you know, getting out whitepapers, you know, hosting webinars, doing things like this, um, where people see us and we're not making the effort to, to go out and talk to them. But it's it's kind of fishing with a net. Um, and people see us. And so we're just starting that. But that's a very powerful tool. And so that that number is probably going to explode very, very soon. Yeah. So where is that at? I mean, so NDAs as uh, connotes or denotes getting to a certain level of conversation. What's the broad number of conversations that are going on right now at any phase? -Sure. -Um. It's it's north of of 100. Okay. So north of 100. That's amazing. Big numbers starting out. Then help us understand how you, as the head of Biz Dev, stratify those conversations. Are there different stages that you see? How would you know that you've defined stages for the progress and you know, at what stage does it go to NDA and, you know, can you categorize those stages? What defines each stage? Sure, sure. Um, you know, it's a it's a stage guided process. Uh, and that's really to make sure that we, we move only the most promising and valuable deals or, or partners or projects through through the funnel, if you will. And so, you know, you have the initial stage with which is outreach. And then the next stage under that stage one, which is the initial conversation, you know, typically if that goes well, that goes into, um, an NDA process, and then you get on to stage two, which is kind of technical alignment. Um, you know, stage three is starting to talk about terms and in terms of the deal, but also how a project or whatnot would look like stage four, uh, would be your, um, your term sheet. You know, you're actually doing that. And then stage five would, uh, would be your definitive agreement. Um, and we have a very nicely balanced pipeline right now where we're moving, you know, a lot of those those conversations, those initial conversations through that process. And so, you know, to your point, we do have a lot of folks under NDA, but we also have a lot of folks that are lower or further down in the in the funnel process. What we're starting to talk about, what, uh, you know, the terms would be of, uh, of working together. Okay. So let's get into that, because I think that's helpful to understand that these aren't just conversations, right? People think about biz dev and nothing's there until there's actual terms put on paper. So it sounds like that's happening. Um, what do you terms look like? And maybe at this point, again, we're going to talk generalities. I'll bring up the slide that's in the investor deck that separates out the kind of the four categories of potential partners. And it looks like, you know, it should be shooting fish in a barrel. There's so many. But that could also be a distraction. So let me bring that up. And then we can maybe go through each one and say in this category for, you know, uh, active pharmaceutical ingredients, the terms of a deal will look like X. And for, you know, sustainability energy, it would look like why, um, are you comfortable -doing that? -Yeah. Yeah. Sure. Okay. All right. So why don't we start while I'm pulling this up? If we talk through pharma and APIs, I know while you're you're during your time at Ginkgo, um, you know, your tenure. I happened to look that there were some major pharma deals done with the likes of, like, Merck and others that had, uh, what I would consider bio bulk deals, you know, uh, upfront payments, research payments, and then potential milestones that were in, you know, the hundreds of millions. Is that something we could think about here, too? Is it potentiality? Was that what you'd characterize in the pharma -space? -You know, you're always going to typically you're going to have three, like you mentioned, three buckets of of revenue, which is like you mentioned, the, uh, um, you know, the R&D upfront costs, the R&D fee. Um, you're going to have some sort of a licensing fee as well. Um, and then, you know, typically you're going to have some sort of downstream value share, whether that's, you know, commercial milestone payments, royalty attached to their revenue, what have you. You know, pharma is is a very long term play. Um, and it's it's risky. Um, it's a, it's a risky play, but the, the, the potential value there is enormous. Um, now you need to balance that, that value. How quickly it comes in. So, you know, if you're going to try to tie all of your value to the commercial milestone payments or something downstream, the value share, um, you're going to be making your shareholders, um, and stakeholders wait, uh, you know, a significant amount of time for a lot of that value to come in. So that's, you know, just broadly to your question, um, each and every deal is, is scrutinized for, you know, I mean, a lot of things there's a lot of criteria that goes into not just the opportunity, but the partner itself. Uh, we're going to be very selective in who we go with. But how we structure a deal is also going to be based on, again, that product. How quickly do we feel it could get to market? How quickly do we do we feel that that that partner could get it to market? How confident are we that they have the market presence to to make this successful? You know, what is the size of the market? All that goes into how we weight those three different buckets so that we do see value. You know, as as quickly as possible, but also, you know, intermediate and long term value as well coming from those things. So we don't want. So when you -when you look at. -That, like just to pull from a comment you made earlier in this conversation about the flavors, food and fragrances, right. These are known products that they need. They can't wait forever. The market is established, unlike a pharmaceutical or a nutraceutical where it's unproven might have a development timeline. How do you prioritize? Like is the the breakdown of number of conversations? Are you prioritizing the quick to market food, flavors, and fragrances while going down parallel paths, but understanding it's longer for pharma and energy transition? I mean, what's what's the balance as you lead this dev activities? Yeah, that's a great question actually. So, you know, it is the balance of immediate intermediate and long term value. And so I see pharma as a long term value type of play substantial. But it's certainly long term I see foods flavors and fragrances as, as more immediate. Um, as you mentioned, those those products are already in market. All they really have to do is switch out their their manufacturing process to our process. And it's the same molecule going into the market. So they're they're not they're not doing anything different. And so that's more immediate. And then the industrial chemicals is probably something that's a little bit more intermediate. That's between the foods flavors fragrances cosmetics nutraceuticals and the pharma. And so you know, we are we are very and as you can see from this picture, you know, there's, there's, you know, a substantially more amount of, of pharma and food flavors, fragrances companies. And there are the industrial chemicals right there. There are larger footprint there. Just they always come together and enjoying into single entities and things of that nature. And so the balance here is, you know, we're taking a an approach that a lot of our time and attention goes into pharma and APIs for the long term potential. But a substantial amount of our time and energy also goes into food, flavors and fragrances for more of that immediate. Um, and then the the industrial chemicals, you know, also has has some of our intent. For that, uh, for the energy 15 kind of a way where, you know, you're kind of 45% farm off, 40% foods, flavors, fragrances, and maybe 15%, uh, industrial chemicals. And that gives you that nice balance of revenue coming in. All right. Well that's a good understanding I appreciate that context. So let's kind of break it down a little bit more. Like if food flavors and fragrances is the near term, what types of revenues in a deal could we expect like in a typical again, I, I know I'm making gross generalizations here. I'm not asking you to get into a specific, but give us what would be a typical deal in food, flavors and fragrances in terms of revenue size when revenues would start. What that could look like. You know, given our, um, uh, deal cycles. So design build Tesla and uh, cycles is where we differentiate ourselves a lot from the cell based. Right? Cell based, uh, those cycles, you know, single cycle can be months. And so it takes them years to get to market hours, weeks. So it would take months to get to market. Uh, so in terms of, you know, in terms of getting to to revenue, we could we could sign a deal today, uh, you know, and start actually making or they're then licensing our technology or, you know, us bringing it to market together, whatever you know, they prefer or whatever makes the most sense. You know, we could do that within a year. Um, that's that's that's not an issue for this technology because of how quick we can do those development cycles. That's that's what it kind of comes down to. Um, in terms of revenue. What's really interesting about the foods, flavors and fragrances, uh, is that you are you know, it's not a one off deal for a single ingredient. And that's that's what I was saying before about how our technology aligns with these folks who have, you know, let's say, 200 or so different products that make up their billions in revenue. Right? And so we're going to have, you know, intentionally we're we're going to have, you know, ten to 15 to 20 deals for each ingredient with a single company. And that's the most efficient -thing you can do. -So like we use like a McCormick as an example. Right. They make everything from taco seasonings down. So whatever you can imagine. So you're saying the scope of a deal would encompass a molecule that's used across multiple product lines, so that the volumes for Invizyne and the revenue potential will be be significant. That or, um, you know, you actually have multiple target, you know, multiple product targets, um, you know, within a single company that that makes up a massive amount of, uh, of revenue. Um, if so, -then the. -Revenue model, is it a percent? Is it like a royalty based model like we see in semiconductor sales, or is it a volume based? I mean, what's how how would it work in the food flavors -and fragrances? -Yeah, same. Same as um, you know, what we were talking about before where there would be, you know, some sort of a development R&D type of a fee where, you know, we would do the work to develop this technology and they would pay us for that. Uh, and then they would they would typically license the technology from us. Right? It could be an exclusive, non-exclusive license that'll, you know, factor into, you know, how valuable that license is. Um, and then to your point, yes, there's a downstream value share that can be commercial milestone payments and upfront commercial, you know, payment. Or it can be, you know, royalty structure. And again, that's that all comes down to what makes the most sense in that situation. Okay. Now that's. Good. So it's helpful for us investors as we look at this for food flavors and fragrances. We could expect as you ink these deals, that there'd be some type of development fee and revenues that come relatively quickly. If this is a, you know, design build test process of weeks and months, not years, uh, a license fee once you prove it out and then, you know, milestone and royalty fees within sight of 12 months beginning. So that's a near term. Um, what about industrial chemicals? You typify those as being more intermediate term. How does a -deal structure look like there? -Yeah. With that, you know, there would be some scale up. And that's really where, you know, some of the timeline would extend. Um, is, is scaling, uh, the technology to meet just the large, large volumes that they have. So that would probably be a single type of a product, um, you know, high value. So the value would be high, but the margins will be low. Um, so there we would probably garner less of uh, um, a, you know, a percent royalty, uh, if you will, just because, you know, we can't take a lot of their, their margin because their margins are so thin. So it would be a lot more, you know, up front. But again, just due to that scale and timeline, which could be, you know, a year to two years, um, that's why it would be more intermediate before we see some of that, that value, uh, coming in from, from some of those upfront kind of kind of payments. Whereas the fruits, flavors and fragrances, we could see some of those royalties and things of that nature within a year, and they have higher margins. So we can capture a little bit more value from from those deals as well. Okay. And then I think, I think everyone understands. Why don't you give us the context for pharma. We talked about that. We understand the you know, there's upfront development and then milestone based payments that come down that always look great in the headlines. But as you said, take time for shareholders to recognize you got to get there. Um, I'm just trying to put on a timeline for investors. Fluid Flavors and Fragrances is here. It could be 6 to 12 months after signing a deal. Revenue starts. Uh, industrial Chemicals is, you know, call it 12 to 24, potentially. Does pharma and energy transition fall in the 24 to 36? I mean, what what does that look like as you pursue those? Is it is it closer in in some cases? Yeah. And it depends on the target. You know, if, if we do, you know, go with the cannabinoids. That can be a lot that can be a lot quicker because we've, we've developed that um, it's, it's ready to go. We do have some conversations going on. Um, that can be that can be very quick. So that can be, you know, within, you know, however long the clinical trials, you know, kind of take which is typically, you know, a year to two years, we can we can get somewhere very, very soon. Something new that we're doing with the with the partner development and whatnot. That's why you want to not have a one size fits all. You know, we're going to do the work at cost to bring people onto our platform. And then our licensing fee is this much, and we try to get a bulk of our value from downstream. That's why you don't want to do that with pharma. Um, because like you said, you don't want you don't want them to wait. Uh, and so, you know, even though the timelines in pharma are a little extended, saying like energy transition, you can do things to capture a lot of that value upfront. So, you know, maybe in pharma you're not going after a 10 to 15% royalty on the back end. Um, you know, you negotiate that down to a 6 to 7% and then move that value up front, uh, to the to the licensing, um, or the, the, the development fee. So there's things you can do to, to make sure that you do capture a lot of the value upfront and -not wait for it. -Yeah. No, that's really helpful context. We're getting a bunch of questions which I want to get to. I've got a, uh, two more from my side. I want to make sure we ask and they're and they're there ones pretty quick. The other one should be pretty straightforward too. I look at this table here. I see a lot of huge companies. Right. And, uh, I'm from the northeast. From Jersey. We got a guy for everything, right? Everything's about pick up my phone and being able to get in touch with the decision makers, whether it's for, you know, mundane routine stuff in everyday life or big things like this, I got to imagine that something similar in biz dev here. You've been in an industry for a while. Do you have that 1 to 1 where you can pick up the phone and talk to the top from top to top at a at a broad spattering of these? How many -guys do you got? In other words? -I don't know if the term Rolodex is still is still a thing, but, uh, my, uh, my Rolodex is pretty vast. Just from having been in all of these industries. Um, before. I know a lot of these folks. And to your point, you know, I know a lot of the stakeholders and a lot of these companies, which is you can talk to companies, but a lot of times you're not talking to the right person at the company. Um, and that's that's one of the things that I have have going is I can either already, you know, I already either know the right person to talk to or I can get to that person, and I know who that person is. Um, yeah. So yes. Look, and. It's important and I encourage, uh, you got a lot of guys, and I want to encourage the investors on this call to go ahead and, uh, go to Gencos website and their press releases and just look at the number of press releases about strategic partnerships, collaborations during Zac's tenure there. Uh, and I think that'll be a testament to, uh, just just the proof point behind what he's saying, that there's this relationship. We all know that. And then it's converting on those relationships with a good technology and in this case a superior one. So last question for me. And then we got about a bunch of questions, uh, from other people, uh, that I want to get to is just you haven't done a business development deal yet. That's not a criticism. It's more leading into how do you select the first one. Right. What does that quadrant look like? The decision matrix to find the best first -deal. -Yeah, that's a great question. Um, you know, it's, uh, finding that that first deal. Uh, you know, we want it to be very valuable, but we also, you know, want to balance that with with speed. Um, and, you know, we want value to, to come in, you know, as, as, as quick as possible. And you see a lot of those, those deals like, as you, as you were pointing out, um, press releases of deals and things of that nature. Um, and that's fine. That that does drive more eyes to you. Um, but sometimes what happens is if you don't, uh, if you don't succeed in those, um, it can have a slippery slope effect, an avalanche effect of people talking to people, people talking to, uh, investors, uh, and things of that nature. And so, you know, we are definitely going to be very selective, uh, based on what we know we can do, what we know, the value that that we can, you know, instill to our, our, our customer. And then, you know, our, our assessment of, you know, what does it look like on their end as well for, for how they can network, influence what their customer base is, what their market access is, things of that nature. So, you know, it's it's going to be a balance there. And that's, that's it's it's an ambiguous, you know, answer. But it's, it's going to be what's best for our company but also the shareholders. -So it's going to be a balance there. -I think you answered it right at the end. It's the balance between company and shareholders. You're going to get peppered with when's the first deal coming. So until the first one happens, it'll be one as it, as it. And uh everyone's going to expect yesterday. So no pressure never any pressure. But sure. Um, let me let me go. Here, let me just take a quick pause. If anyone's got any questions, please go ahead and submit them. We've got a bunch here that I want to go through. There's some overlapping, so let me just scan them quickly, uh, and make sure that we get them addressed. Um, first, let's just start with, um, you know, from your estimation, who's your competitors when you walk into a room now? And I know this is a loaded question, just because we've seen so many synthetic biologies that are self cell based approaches. Uh, flameout. Um, do you see that there are real competitors to what you're doing? All right. It appears Zach froze up again, so he'll rejoin here. I can answer now. You're back. There you go. Yeah. Okay. Okay. All right. I don't know what's going on. Sorry about that. Uh, yeah. It's a it's an interesting question. Um, so during my time at Ginkgo, again, um, you know, that that was all about the the number of deals, right? The KPIs were all tied to to number of deals. And there's, there's a whole host of reasons why that might not be the best route to go. And I think we can see that in the, uh, in the stock value right now. Um, but that allowed me, uh, you know, inherently to, you know, uncover, you know, just about every company out there that was in our space and some some sort of fashion. So we overturn every rock, right. And I can confidently say, this is a you don't want to, you know, say that you have no competition because there's definitely competition. There's there's people who are doing things that are similar to us. Right? But there's there's nobody out there. And I know this confidently. There's nobody out there that's doing what we're doing. So in terms of, um, again, simplifying it down to the necessary, where we're taking complete enzymatic pathways from the beginning input to the desired output. Um, there's, there's nobody doing that because nobody's figured out that secret sauce. And nobody can do that unless they license the the patents from us to do that now. Um, and so there are some companies that are using a hybrid approach. You know, they're doing cell based, um, and then they're taking that chemical intermediate to something that they call self free because they're adding, you know, 2 to 3 enzymes to that chemical intermediate now and creating a final product. And I call that a hybrid approach. But you're still you're still bound to some of those inefficiencies of that first part of the process where you are using a cell based molecule and that really drives it towards uneconomic. Um, and so they're they're definitely not where we are. And then there's folks who, you know, again, call themselves cell free. And they're more cell free tools providers where they're making some incredible tools that that will help us potentially in the future. Um, but, uh, but they're not quite, you know, a cell free company doing, doing what we're doing. So, you know, it's it's a, it's a hard question to answer or it's not a great answer because we're making it sound like we're the only ones doing this, but it is truly we are the only ones who are doing this and can do this because of the patented technology that we have. So the nearest competitors would be cell based, but again, for a plethora of reasons. Um, you know, I could go through for, for half an hour. Um, this technology just out competes that, you know, every, every step of the process from beginning to intermediate to end. So no, look, and I appreciate that. And I encourage any investors that want to get into more detail. We can connect you with Zach and the rest of the team. I just finished the conversation on Friday where basically Yannick, the head scientist and researcher from NREL, was saying the same thing that there's not anyone that's using a cell free approach that can do this. So when you hear us on the the front line of the banking side saying that Invizyne is truly unique, you're now hearing it credibly from multiple sources, that it's true. Um, there are competition. Obviously, there's always going to be competition. Uh, let me go through a few here. Uh, I think there's a question here. What? Our sources of revenue. And when does revenue begin, and how quickly can it ramp? I think you effectively answered that before that the sources of revenue come from multitude development fee, licensing fee, royalty, uh, sales of enzymes, those ramp as the products depending on the market actually get into in -into market. Would that be accurate? -That's accurate. Yep. Okay. Um let's see. Uh, I'm gonna I have to ask so that people know that I asked, um, with over 30 NDAs currently, when would we actually see partnerships announce and accounts moving into commercialization? So if you can give us an exact date time of the day, that would be awesome. Now, um, let me check. Let's do it in general. Yeah, I know, check your calendar real quick. Generalities here obviously. You know, is it weeks, months? Quarters? I mean, what as you look at this conservatively, uh, and I'll disclaim that because whatever you put out here, no one will ever forget. So don't say weeks if it's not, unless it's going to be -tomorrow. -Yeah. No, it's, uh. So, summer, um, we had a lot of traction, you know, winter through spring. Um, summer. There's a little bit of a slowdown. Just just in general. That's that's how business goes, because everybody goes on vacation. So, you know, a conversation's become, you know, weeks to to a month apart. And so moving those conversations through the pipeline becomes, becomes a little bit slower. But now we're picking up the pace again. And so, you know, in terms of putting a definitive time on when the first ones are coming in, there's a lot of next conversations that I think are going to elucidate. You know, some of those more clearly. Uh, but I can say that that, you know, a handful of those conversations are moving substantially quickly, um, to the point where, you know, it could be as, as, you know, early as again, to your point, although I don't want to put any timelines on this, but but, you know, next year would be a good, a good target for, um, you know, the first deals to certainly come in. And again, it's not going to be the number of deals that, that we're going after because there's a slippery slope. You're going to have a, uh, a you're going to have a, you know, failure added into that, that model. And, and those failures are then talked about and it's a slippery slope downhill from there. Um, and so we're going to make sure that, that each and every deal is something that's that substantial and valuable for not only us, but for the shareholders as well. So next year, uh, certainly is is doable. Yeah. As we head into next year. Okay. So let me ask this is one that goes along with that. And this is I think it's a smart question how much staffing up is required once we get past the IPO to to enable some of these deals that you're considering, is there a big role, you know, ramp up in staffing or is this something that with the potential partners you're in discussions with, it could easily roll out with the the existing staff? -This is. -Existing. This is existing. Okay. You know I think we're taking the, uh, um, the view that, you know, until we actually truly sorry. Am I still here? It says my connections. You're here? -Yeah. You're good man. -Um. I don't know what's going on, but, uh, until we're until we actually need it. Um, you know, we're not going to be one of those companies that's going to, you know, outgrow our skis here. Um, you know, we're we're going to add as, as needed, um, and sustainably. Right. And so if we bring on, um, 3 or 4, you know, different partners, and we need more management of those partners, that's fine. But in terms of the outreach and the conversations and whatnot, it's not something we can't handle ourselves right now. Um, and, you know, to to to lose point, you know, we're in active conversations with, with over 100. But we've identified, you know, over 300 potential partners. So we're still going after many, many, many more -different partners out there. So you. -Know, yeah. Let's get into this. This comes up in a couple ways just about how you protect basically your unique evolution in synthetic biology. So let's talk about from your vantage point, as you sit there as the head of dev, how do you protect IP protection versus trade secrets. And then how do you protect that advantage as you get into actual, actual working with partners? Um, you know, you mentioned before exclusive, non-exclusive. How do you prevent what is unique to Invizyne from from going to -customers and the competition? -Yeah. What's interesting, and I think the team here has has done a great job. I'm sure Tyler and Paul could probably talk to this a little bit more eloquently. But you know, they've they've put out patents. You know, there's there's some trade secrets. Um, but they themselves have kept a lot of the secret sauce from, from even me. Right. So I can't go out and and say anything that I'm not supposed to do. And that's, that's how it should be. Um, there should be folks within the organization that hold the the secret to the Coca-Cola recipe, if you will. Um, and, uh, and we'll never let that out of the out of the vault. Um, and so there's, you know, they they truly can't do it without that, uh, that little tidbit of, uh, of of information. Um, and so when we do work together, we're going to make sure that the, the definitive agreements are truly ironclad. Um, in a way where, you know, it's if there's exclusivity. Um, you know, it's written a certain way, and if it's non-exclusive, it's it's also, you know, written a certain way, but we're going to make sure that that secret sauce never gets out, um, in a way that could harm the company. Yeah. So question maybe this goes part and parcel with that in terms of the enzymes are key to these processes. Any partnership deals right. It's an enzymatic pathway that produces something. Uh, we're getting a couple of questions here on how do you source, uh, is Amazon going to source those enzymes or create those enzymes and sell them or source them from somewhere else? Uh, and, you know, if you do it and do you have the capacity to do that for initial -deals? -Sure. And so that plays into, you know, what we're talking about with, with immediate intermediate and long term. And so why the, the, um, you know, industrial chemical space might be pushed out a little bit further is because they need such a substantial amount of enzymes that a contract manufacturer is going to be needed. And so we do have we're in active conversations with those entities. Um, and, you know, they're excited for for working with us and bringing some of those enzymes to, uh, to our process and whatnot. But you need such a substantial amount of enzymes, um, for that industry that that's, you know, it elongates that, that scale up process a little bit. But there's there's a plethora of CMOs out there that'll do it for us. Now in terms of the food's flavor and fragrances of pharma, you only need such a small, you know, amount of, of, of enzyme, um, that, that we can actually produce, you know, substantial quantities of those enzymes ourselves to, to feed those markets. Um, and if we that's a. Low volume, high value and fully capable of doing that. Yeah. And so we're capable of, of, of servicing those industries ourselves. Okay. No that's that's good perspective. Uh, a couple other things here. Where do nutraceuticals, non-regulated additives fit into the mix? Is that under foods, flavors and fragrances or is a mix between that -and pharma? -Yeah. So foods flavors of fragrances would cover nutraceuticals, cosmetics, um, you know, basically anything within that, that kind of bubble that's that's not pharma. Now there's there's a gray area with some nutraceuticals where they're taken through, you know, some some clinical trials, if you will. Um, and, you know, we'll address those as they come up. And we're working with some folks there because, again, some folks want to take some of the more, you know, nutraceutical ingredients, um, that have been, uh, you know, classified as, as, as, you know, magic, if you will, um, or snake oil. And they want to show that, that it actually works and things of that nature. So you have to take it through some of those, those trials. And so when that comes up, you know, we'll do that. But that nutraceutical space, it kind of tows that line between pharma and foods, flavors and fragrances. Yeah. All right. I think that rounds it up. But I got a couple related to the offering. I'm just going to answer quick, give you a breather and then I'll give you a chance to just make some closing remarks and anything else you want to share that we didn't get into today. So a couple questions here. Status and timing of the offering. Indications are due by Monday. That's the deadline that we've put out. And we're looking to go, uh, begin trading on or before August 15th. Um, the question here is any lockup period apply to investors? No, there's not a lock up. Um, but we strongly discourage people that aren't longer term investors from from participating. We've never been, uh, a trading shop and IPO shop where we're looking to have an impact with all the technologies we bring to market. Uh, another good question here Does QBs or section 1202 apply here? Yes, it does for the IPO. Um, these shares would qualify for the section 1202 exclusions on capital gains, which is either ten the greater of 10 million or 10 times your investment. If you have questions on that, we can provide some information. But we're not tax advisors ultimately. So we ask that you speak with your tax advisor. Um, question here. Have we gotten a commitment from any potential customer? No. Not yet. That's what Zach's going to leave and go get done right after we get off this call. Uh, and then questions about the burn rate. That's. I don't want to put Zach on the spot for, uh, CFO, uh, questions. He did elucidate that there isn't a ramp up required for him to go out and sign deals, so that's not a limiting factor. We can answer those questions separately. Um, last one here is Zach. Let's see, I think is relevant. And maybe wrap up your final comments here. There's been a lot of quote unquote failures in this space and missed expectations. How do you overcome this perception and what can you point to prove the difference as you're having conversations with potential partners? Yeah, first and foremost, you know your point to the technology. Anybody who understands the the technology differences between us and the synthetic biology players out there. And again, this this comes back to my background where I can convey some of these differences in the value in these differences to, to just about any audience successfully. But it comes it comes down to the technology and what Tyler and Paul and the team have, have built. We're so vastly different and there's so many. There's again, every part of the process from beginning to middle to end. Um, you know, we're we're we're different and we're better. Um, and so, you know, you can you can point that out, but also business models, right? Um, or business strategies, if you will, when people try to compare us to other companies, um, who have gone after the amount of deals and not, not, not not necessarily the best deals. Um, and how slippery of a slope that is and what you're seeing in the, in the markets right now. Um, you know, we can point to as well, but, you know, all of these things on top of some of the proof of concepts in the case studies that we have, you know, all of that combined into that picture, um, really separates us from from a lot of these, uh, a lot of these other entities and some of the skepticism that's going on. I always tell the team, you know, it's a it's not a race against ourselves, uh, in terms of getting to market and things of that nature. We know we're good. Um, and we know we can overcome, you know, any, any challenges that kind of come our way. Um, but to to the, to the, you know, questionnaires point, um, every company in this space that that fails. Um, you know, as a black guy on the, on the industry and it's up to us to, to differentiate ourselves and convey that value, um, to, you know, whatever potential partner we're having. So there's a lot of. Someone close the door on the front. We are not another cell based technology and we're not using this type of cell. We're using this type. So I mean, we're cell free. We're truly different. It's a 180. Um, and so that difference gets us that foot in the door to have that conversation. And it's been working so well. -That's good to hear. -Well, one, I want to thank you. And then just share. I mean, obviously I think you've, uh, stepped up to the task and the difficult task of answering a lot of the questions that we've asked them. And you shared that you've got over dozens of NDAs that are in place, that over 100 conversations, that some of these conversations have moved to talking and discussing terms, which I believe is stage two. Stage three, in your business development pipeline, uh, and that you're entering really a seasonally strong period for interest, right? Coming out of the summer, I believe you got a bunch of conferences coming up. So the trajectory, the tone and tenor of the conversations, there's inbound as well as outbound. You're enthusiastic. But what I really appreciated about, and I think it's self-evident to anyone here, is that you're really thoughtful about what's going on. You recognize the difference and unique opportunity in design has, but then also the risk of doing the wrong deal first. Um, you're there's a real responsibility both to shareholders, the company and the industry. And I think that just lends Zach to your experience both at Gingko and then as being a scientist first as well. So as a, as a shareholder with a vested interest in this as well. I thank you for that thoughtful approach, and thank you for making the time today on limited notice. Congratulations on your new baby boy or girl? -Girl, girl, girl. -I've got the boy, you. -Got the girl. -So everyone just understand that he's a new dad and made time for all of us and just really appreciate it. And if anyone has additional questions, you know how to get in touch with us. We're obviously more than willing to answer and get you in touch with the right people to drill down into further details. So again, thank you, Zach. Thank you everyone else, for listening today. And we'll put a replay up shortly and look forward to hearing from you. Thanks again.