Commitments and contingencies

12 Months Ended

Dec. 31, 2022

Commitments and contingencies

Commitments and contingencies

11. Commitments and contingencies

Leases

On December 6, 2021 the Company entered into a lease of new office and laboratory space, in Cambridge, United Kingdom. The lease has a contractual period of 10 years, but may be cancelled by the Company on the fifth anniversary of the lease commencement date. The lease term is five years, representing the non-cancelable lease period, as it is not reasonably certain that the lease will not be cancelled. The Company has a contractual right to renew the lease for a further ten-year period, which also may be cancelled after five years. The annual rent is approximately $3.0 million, payable quarterly in advance beginning in June 2022, following a six-month rent-free period. There was no deposit paid in conjunction with the lease. The Company recorded a ROU asset of approximately $11.6 million and a lease liability of approximately $11.1 million at the lease commencement date, based on the present value of future lease payments, discounted at a 6.9%, the Company’s estimated incremental borrowing rate at the commencement of the lease, over the lease term. Rent expense is recognized on a straight-line basis over the five-year lease term, including the six-month rent-free period.

In October 2017, the Company entered into a lease agreement for office and laboratory space in Building 900, Babraham Research Campus, Cambridge, U.K. In March 2021, prior to the expiration of the lease, the Company concluded that it was reasonably certain that it would exercise its additional five-year lease renewal option, which was not included in the original lease term, and accounted for the change in lease term as a modification of the existing lease. The Company remeasured the ROU asset and lease liability by calculating the present value of expected lease payments, discounted at 7.70%, the Company’s estimated incremental borrowing rate at the date of the modification of the lease, over the remaining lease term. In December 2021, the lease was renewed. The annual rent for the new lease is approximately $0.6 million. Service charges are also payable based on floor area and are estimated to be approximately $0.2 million per year.

In September 2017, Bicycle Therapeutics Inc. entered into a lease agreement for office and laboratory space in Lexington, Massachusetts, which commenced on January 1, 2018. In conjunction with the lease agreement, Bicycle Therapeutics Inc. paid a security deposit of $0.2 million as well as prepaid rent of $0.1 million for the first month of the

third, fourth, and fifth year of the lease. The deposit is recorded in other assets in the consolidated balance sheets. In March 2022, Bicycle Therapeutics Inc. notified the landlord of its intent to exercise its option to extend the lease, originally set to expire on December 31, 2022, for a successive period through December 31, 2027, which successive period was not included in the original lease term. The Company accounted for the change in lease term as a modification of the existing lease and remeasured the ROU asset and lease liability by calculating the present value of lease payments, discounted at 7.0%, the Company’s incremental borrowing rate at the date of the modification of the lease, over the remaining lease term. In May 2022, the lease was extended. The payments for the extended lease are approximately $0.2 million remaining through December 31, 2022, $0.7 million in 2023, and increases annually pursuant to an escalation clause with the last year of the lease term having a per annum fixed rent obligation of $0.8 million.

The components of the Company’s lease expense are as follows (in thousands):

	Year Ended
	December 31,
	2022		2021		2020
Operating lease cost	$	3,790	$	1,224	$	896
Variable lease cost		1,643		612		662
Total lease cost	$	5,433	$	1,836	$	1,558

The weighted average remaining operating lease term was 4.2 years and 4.8 years as of December 31, 2022 and 2021, respectively, and the weighted average discount rate was 7.0% and 7.1% as of December 31, 2022 and 2021, respectively.

The following table summarizes the maturities of the Company’s operating leases as of December 31, 2022 (in thousands):

Year Ending December 31,
2023		3,972
2024		3,994
2025		4,016
2026		3,236
2027		821
Present value adjustment		(2,029)
Total lease liabilities		14,010
Less: current lease liabilities		(3,125)
Long term lease liabilities	$	10,885

The Company has entered into various agreements with contract research organizations to provide clinical trial services, contract manufacturing organizations to provide clinical trial materials and with vendors for preclinical research studies, synthetic chemistry and other services for operating purposes. These payments are not included in the table of operating lease payments above as the contracts are generally cancelable at any time upon less than 90 days’ prior written notice. The Company is not contractually able to terminate for convenience and avoid any and all future obligations to these vendors. In some cases, the Company is contractually obligated to make certain minimum payments to the vendors, based on the timing of the termination notification and the exact terms of the agreement.

Legal proceedings

From time to time, the Company or its subsidiaries may become involved in various legal proceedings and claims, either asserted or unasserted, which arise in the ordinary course of business. The Company is not currently subject to any material legal proceedings.

In September 2016, the Company’s subsidiary, BicycleRD, filed a complaint in the District Court of the Hague against Pepscan Systems B.V. and its affiliates (“Pepscan”) to contest the right of Pepscan to terminate a non-exclusive patent license agreement entered into with Pepscan in 2009 (“PLA”). On November 20, 2020, the Company entered into a settlement and license agreement with Pepscan regarding Bicycle’s use of Pepscan’s CLIPS peptide technology. The companies agreed to settle all intellectual property disputes worldwide. Under the terms of the settlement, Bicycle has been granted a license to use CLIPS peptide technology in the development of its product candidates BT1718 and THR-149. Bicycle paid €3 million in November 2020, paid €1 million on the first anniversary of the date of settlement, and will make additional future milestone payments upon the achievement of development, regulatory and commercial milestones, with an aggregate total value of $92.4 million. The Company recorded $4.7 million of expense related to the settlement and license agreement with Pepscan during the year ended December 31, 2020.

Founder Royalty arrangements

At the time BicycleRD Limited was organized, BicycleRD Limited entered into a royalty agreement with its founders and initial investors (the “Founder Royalty Agreement”). Pursuant to the Founder Royalty Agreement, as amended, the Company will pay a royalty rate in the low single digit percentages on net product sales under the collaborations with Oxurion and AstraZeneca to its founders and initial investors, for a period of 10 years from the first commercial sale on a country by country basis. No royalties have been earned or paid under Founder Royalty Agreement, as amended, to date.

Indemnification obligations

In the ordinary course of business, the Company may provide indemnification of varying scope and terms to vendors, lessors, business partners and other parties with respect to certain matters including, but not limited to, losses arising out of breach of such agreements or from intellectual property infringement claims made by third parties. In addition, the Company has indemnification obligations towards members of its board of directors and officers that will require the Company, among other things, to indemnify them against certain liabilities that may arise by reason of their status or service as directors or officers. The maximum potential amount of future payments the Company could be required to make under these indemnification arrangements is, in many cases, unlimited. To date, the Company has not incurred any material costs as a result of such indemnification obligations. The Company is not aware of any claims under indemnification arrangements, and therefore it has not accrued any liabilities related to such obligations in its consolidated financial statements as of December 31, 2022 and 2021.