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Commitments and Contingencies
9 Months Ended
Sep. 30, 2020
Commitments and Contingencies Disclosure [Abstract]  
Commitments and Contingencies

Note 8. Commitments and Contingencies


Contractual Obligations


The Company has commitments of approximately $450,000 as of September 30, 2020 for several licensing agreements with consultants and universities. Additionally, the Company has collaboration and license agreements, which upon clinical or commercialization success, may require the payment of milestones of up to $7.9 million and/or royalties up to 6% of net sales of covered products, if and when achieved. However, there can be no assurance that clinical or commercialization success will occur.


The Company currently leases approximately 6,200 square feet of office space at 29 Emmons Drive, Suite B-10 in Princeton, New Jersey pursuant to a lease that was amended in October 2017 and expired in October 2020. This office space currently serves as the Company’s corporate headquarters. Pursuant to an amendment on July 7, 2020, the lease has been extended from November 2020 to October 2022. The current rent of $11,883 per month, or approximately $23.00 per square foot will be reduced to $21.50 per square foot, making the monthly payment $11,108 starting in November 2020 for the remainder of the two year lease extension.


On September 3, 2014, the Company entered into an asset purchase agreement with Hy Biopharma, Inc. (“Hy Biopharma”) pursuant to which the Company acquired certain intangible assets, properties and rights of Hy Biopharma related to the development of Hy BioPharma’s synthetic hypericin product. As consideration for the assets acquired, the Company paid $275,000 in cash and issued 184,912 shares of common stock with a fair value based on the Company’s stock price on the date of grant of $3,750,000. These amounts were charged to research and development expense during the third quarter of 2014 as the assets will be used in the Company’s research and development activities and do not have alternative future use pursuant to generally accepted accounting principles in the U.S.


In March 2020, the Company filed a prospectus supplement covering the offer and sale of up to 1,956,182 shares of the Company’s common stock which were issued to Hy Biopharma. The Company was required to issue the shares to Hy Biopharma as payment following the achievement of a milestone under the asset purchase agreement, specifically, the Phase 3 clinical trial of SGX301 being successful in the treatment of CTCL. The number of shares of the Company’s common stock issued to Hy Biopharma was calculated using an effective price of $2.56 per share, based upon a formula set forth in the asset purchase agreement, for total expense of $5 million.


Provided all future success-oriented milestones are attained, the Company will be required to make additional payments of up to $5.0 million to Hy Biopharma, if and when achieved. Payments will be payable in restricted securities of the Company provided they do not exceed 19.9% ownership of the Company’s outstanding stock.


In January 2020, the Company’s Board of Directors authorized the amendment of Dr. Schaber’s employment agreement to increase the number of shares of the Company’s common stock from 5,000 to 500,000 issuable to Dr. Schaber immediately prior to the completion of a transaction, or series or a combination of related transactions, negotiated by its Board of Directors whereby, directly or indirectly, a majority of its capital stock or a majority of its assets are transferred from the Company and/or its stockholders to a third party. Dr. Schaber's employment agreement has been amended to include the Company's obligation to issue the increased number of shares if such event occurs.


As a result of the above agreements, the Company has the following contractual obligations:


Year  Research and Development   Property and Other Leases   Total 
October 1 through December 31, 2020  $50,000     36,236    $86,236  
2021   100,000     139,708     239,708  
2022   100,000     111,083     211,083  
2023   100,000     -     100,000  
2024   100,000     -     100,000  
Total  $450,000    $287,027    $737,027  

CARES Act Loan


On April 13, 2020, the Company was advised that one of its principal banks, JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A., had approved a $417,830 loan (the “Loan”) under the Paycheck Protection Program (“PPP”) pursuant to the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security Act that was signed into law on March 27, 2020.


As a U.S. small business, the Company qualified for the PPP, which allows businesses and nonprofits with fewer than 500 employees to obtain loans of up to $10 million to incentivize companies to maintain their workers as they manage the business disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. The PPP provides for loans for amounts up to 2.5 times of the average monthly payroll expenses of the qualifying business. The PPP loan proceeds may be used for eligible purposes, including payroll, benefits, rent and utilities.


The Loan, has a term of two years, is unsecured, and is guaranteed by the Small Business Administration. The short –term portion of the Loan is $255,341 and the long-term portion of the Loan is $162,489 with accrued interest expense of $1,706 as of September 30, 2020. The Loan bears interest at a fixed rate of 0.98% per annum, with the first six months of interest and principal deferred. Some or all of the Loan may be forgiven if at least 75% of the Loan proceeds are used by the Company to cover payroll costs, including benefits and if the Company maintains its employment and compensation within certain parameters during the eight-week or twenty-four-week period following the Loan origination date and complies with other relevant conditions. The Company has  used all proceeds for purposes consistent with the PPP and expects to meet the conditions for forgiveness of the Loan.


Contingencies


The Company follows subtopic 450-20 of the FASB Accounting Standards Codification to report accounting for contingencies. Certain conditions may exist as of the date the financial statements are issued, which may result in a loss to the Company but which will only be resolved when one or more future events occur or fail to occur. The Company assesses such contingent liabilities, and such assessment inherently involves an exercise of judgment. A liability is only recorded if management determines that it is both probable and reasonably estimable.

COVID-19

Based on the current outbreak of SARS-CoV-2, the pathogen responsible for COVID-19, which has already had an impact on financial markets, there could be additional repercussions to the Company’s operating business, including but not limited to, the sourcing of materials for product candidates, manufacture of supplies for preclinical and/or clinical studies, delays in clinical operations, which may include the availability or the continued availability of patients for trials due to such things as quarantines, conduct of patient monitoring and clinical trial data retrieval at investigational study sites.


The future impact of the outbreak is highly uncertain and cannot be predicted, and the Company cannot provide any assurance that the outbreak will not have a material adverse impact on the Company’s operations or future results or filings with regulatory health authorities. The extent of the impact to the Company, if any, will depend on future developments, including actions taken to contain the coronavirus.


Emergent BioSolutions Legal Proceedings

On July 1, 2020, the Company filed a demand for arbitration against Emergent BioSolutions, Inc. ("Emergent") and certain of its subsidiaries with the American Arbitration Association in Mercer County, New Jersey. The Company alleges in the arbitration various breaches of contracts and warranties as well as acts of fraud. Emergent has answered that demand for arbitration denying the allegations and asserting affirmative defenses. (see Part II, Item 1 – Legal Proceeding)


The Company is seeking to recover damages in excess of $19 million from Emergent. While the Company intends to vigorously pursue this arbitration, the Company cannot offer any assurances that it will recover any damages from Emergent. 

The Company has received invoices from Emergent related to the above matter. No accrual has been made for these invoices as management deems them invalid because Emergent failed to perform under the applicable contracts, and not probable of being required to pay them based on the numerous breaches sited in the pending arbitration. These invoices total approximately $331,000.