Post-effective amendment to a registration statement that is not immediately effective upon filing

Related Party Transactions

v3.23.3
Related Party Transactions
12 Months Ended
May 31, 2023
Related Party Transactions  
Related Party Transactions

Note 11. Related Party Transactions

The Board’s Audit Committee and the Board of Directors review and approve all related party transactions. The terms and amounts described below are not necessarily indicative of the terms and amounts that could have been incurred had comparable transactions been entered into with independent parties.

On February 13, 2023, Cyrus Arman, then the Company’s President, entered into a private placement with the Company in which he purchased approximately 0.4 million units consisting of one share of common stock and one warrant to purchase one share of common stock at an exercise price of $0.50. The terms and conditions of the investment totaling $0.1 million made by Mr. Arman were identical to those offered to other investors in a concurrent offering being conducted through a placement agent.

In 2021, the Company engaged the Center for Advanced Research & Education, LLC (“CARE”), owned by Dr. Christopher Recknor’s spouse, Julie Recknor, Ph.D., (and owned by Dr. Christopher Recknor, then the Company’s Chief Operating Officer, until March 11, 2021). CARE was one of several clinical locations for the Company’s NASH COVID-19 long-hauler clinical trials, and mild-to-moderate and severe-to-critical COVID-19 clinical trials. Dr. Julie Recknor serves as the Site Director of CARE and manages its day-to-day operations. The Company entered into a Clinical Trial Agreement (“CTA”) with CARE for each of the foregoing clinical trials. Each CTA was negotiated in the ordinary course of business by Amarex, then Company’s clinical research organization, prior to Dr. Christopher Recknor’s appointment as COO, and the operational and financial terms of the CTAs with CARE are comparable to the terms available to unrelated clinical locations. Dr. Christopher Recknor was not involved in the Company’s decision to choose CARE as a clinical location for its ongoing trials, and he is not involved in patient treatment at the CARE site. In July 2021, the Company entered into an amendment to the previously approved CTA with CARE, wherein such amendment provided for the additional recording of patient information thus giving rise to the additional contract value of less than $0.1 million. The Company made payments of approximately $0.2 million and $1.7 million to CARE during the fiscal years ended May 31, 2023 and May 31, 2022.

In September 2021, Jordan G. Naydenov, a then member of the Board, entered into a private warrant exchange in which he exercised warrants to purchase approximately 0.6 million shares of common stock, as well as approximately 0.6 million additional shares that were offered as an inducement to exercise his warrants, for a total of approximately 1.3 million shares of common stock. The terms and conditions of the investment totaling $0.7 million made by Mr. Naydenov were identical to those offered to other investors.