Filed Pursuant to Rule 424(b)(4)

Registration No. 333-299393

9,375,000 Shares

Common Stock

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This is the initial public offering of shares of common stock by Aspen Neuroscience, Inc. We are offering 9,375,000 shares of our common stock. The initial public offering price is $15.00 per share.

Prior to this offering, there has been no public market for our common stock. Our common stock has been approved for listing on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the symbol “ASPE.”

We are an “emerging growth company” and a “smaller reporting company” under applicable Securities and Exchange Commission rules and have elected to comply with certain reduced public company reporting requirements for this prospectus and future filings.

Investing in our common stock involves a high degree of risk. See the section titled “Risk Factors” beginning on page 14 to read about factors you should consider before deciding to invest in shares of our common stock.

Neither the Securities and Exchange Commission nor any state securities commission has approved or disapproved of these securities or determined if this prospectus is truthful or complete. Any representation to the contrary is a criminal offense.

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(1) See the section titled “Underwriting” for additional information regarding compensation payable to the underwriters.

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We have granted the underwriters an option for a period of 30 days to purchase up to 1,406,250 additional shares of common stock from us at the initial public offering price, less the underwriting discounts and commissions.

The underwriters expect to deliver the shares of common stock to purchasers on November 2, 2026, through the book-entry facilities of The Depository Trust Company.

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Prospectus dated October 29, 2026

TABLE OF CONTENTS

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Neither we nor the underwriters have authorized anyone to provide you with information other than that contained in this prospectus or any free writing prospectus prepared by or on behalf of us or to which we have referred you. We and the underwriters take no responsibility for, and can provide no assurance as to the reliability of, any other information that others may give you. We and the underwriters are offering to sell, and seeking offers to buy, shares of our common stock only in jurisdictions where offers and sales are permitted. The information contained in this prospectus or any free writing prospectus is accurate only as of its date, regardless of its time of delivery or of any sale of shares of our common stock. Our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects may have changed since that date.

For investors outside of the United States: we have not, and the underwriters have not, done anything that would permit this offering or possession or distribution of this prospectus in any jurisdiction where action for that purpose is required, other than in the United States. Persons outside of the United States who come into possession of this prospectus must inform themselves about, and observe any restrictions relating to, the offering of the shares of our common stock and the distribution of this prospectus outside of the United States.

RISK FACTORS

Investing in our common stock involves a high degree of risk. You should consider carefully the risks and uncertainties described below, together with all of the other information in this prospectus, including our financial statements and related notes included elsewhere in this prospectus and in the section titled “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations” before making an investment decision. Please also see the section titled “Special Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements.” If any of the following risks are realized, our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects could be materially and adversely affected. In that event, the price of our common stock could decline, and you could lose part or all of your investment. The risks and uncertainties described below are not the only ones we face. Our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects could also be harmed by additional risks and uncertainties that we are presently unaware of, or that we currently believe are not material.

Risks Related to Our Limited Operating History, Financial Position and Capital Requirements

We are a clinical-stage regenerative medicine biotechnology company with a limited operating history and no history of commercializing products, which may make it difficult to evaluate our approach to the discovery and development of product candidates and the prospects for our future viability.

We are a clinical-stage regenerative medicine biotechnology company with a limited operating history. We commenced operations in 2018, have no products approved for commercial sale, and have not generated any revenue from the sale of our products. Our operations to date have been limited to performing research and development activities, raising capital, recruiting management, technical and business development staff to support our operations, and conducting preclinical studies and clinical trials for our product candidates.

Our approach to the discovery and development of product candidates is unproven, and we do not know whether we will be able to develop any product candidates that succeed in clinical development or products of commercial value. In addition, only sasineprocel is in early clinical development, and our microglia programs remain in the preclinical stage. Consequently, any predictions made about our future success or viability may not be as accurate as they could be if we had a history of successfully developing and commercializing biotechnology products.

Moreover, as an organization, we have not yet demonstrated an ability to complete late-stage or pivotal clinical trials, obtain regulatory approvals, manufacture a commercial-scale product or arrange for a third party to do so on our behalf, conduct sales and marketing activities necessary for successful product commercialization or generate revenue. We may encounter unforeseen expenses, difficulties, complications, delays and other known or unknown factors in achieving our business objectives. Accordingly, you should consider our prospects in light of the costs, uncertainties, delays and difficulties frequently encountered by companies in clinical development, especially clinical-stage biotechnology companies such as ours. If we are successful in achieving regulatory approval for our product candidates, we will eventually need to transition from a company with a development focus to a company capable of supporting commercial activities. If we do not adequately address these risks and difficulties or successfully make such a transition, our business will suffer.

We have incurred substantial operating losses since our inception and expect to incur substantial losses for the foreseeable future. We may never generate any revenue or become profitable or, if we achieve profitability, we may not be able to sustain it.

Investment in biotechnology product development is highly speculative because development efforts entail substantial upfront capital expenditures and significant risk that any potential product candidate will fail to demonstrate adequate efficacy or an acceptable safety profile, gain regulatory approval and become commercially viable. We have no products approved for commercial sale and have not generated any revenue from product sales to date. As a result, we are not profitable, have incurred substantial losses in each period since our inception and expect to incur significant losses for the foreseeable future. If we are unable to successfully develop, obtain requisite approval for and commercialize sasineprocel or other product candidates, we may never generate revenue.

Our net losses were $62.1 million and $48.6 million for the years ended December 31, 2025 and 2024, respectively. Our net losses for the six months ended June 30, 2026 and 2025 were $36.5 million and $31.8 million, respectively. As of June 30, 2026, we had an accumulated deficit of $264.9 million. Substantially all of our losses have resulted from expenses incurred in connection with our research and development programs and from general and administrative costs associated with our operations. All of our programs will require substantial additional development time and resources before we would be able to apply for or receive regulatory approvals and begin generating revenue from product sales. We expect to continue to incur significant losses for the foreseeable future, and we expect these losses to increase substantially if, and as, we:

To become and remain profitable, we must succeed in discovering, developing, obtaining regulatory approvals for, and eventually commercializing products that generate significant revenue. This will require us to be successful in a range of challenging activities, including advancing our in-house manufacturing capacity, completing clinical trials of sasineprocel and preclinical studies of other product candidates, discovering additional product candidates, obtaining regulatory approval for these products, and manufacturing, marketing, and selling any products for which we may obtain regulatory approval. We are only in the preliminary stages of these activities. We may never succeed in these activities and, even if we do, may never generate revenue that is significant enough to achieve profitability. In addition, we have not yet demonstrated an ability to successfully overcome many of the risks and uncertainties frequently encountered by companies in new and rapidly evolving fields, particularly in the biotechnological industry. Because of the numerous risks and uncertainties associated with biotechnological product development, we are unable to accurately predict the timing or amount of increased expenses or when, or if, we will be able to achieve profitability. Even if we do achieve profitability, we may not be able to sustain or increase profitability on a quarterly or annual basis. Our failure to become and remain profitable may have an adverse effect on the value of our company and could impair our ability to raise capital, expand our business, maintain our research and development efforts, develop new product candidates, achieve our strategic objectives, or even continue our operations. A decline in the value of our company could also cause you to lose all or part of your investment.

Our financial condition raises substantial doubt as to our ability to continue as a going concern.

We have incurred net losses and negative cash flows from operating activities since inception and have an accumulated deficit of $264.9 million as of June 30, 2026. As of June 30, 2026, the Company had cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities of $72.4 million. Based on our current operating plan and without giving effect to any proceeds from any financing transaction, we believe that our existing cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities will not be sufficient to fund our operations for the 12 months following the date of issuance of our unaudited

financial statements contained elsewhere in this prospectus. Accordingly, we have concluded that substantial doubt exists about our ability to continue as a going concern.

If we are unable to raise additional capital as and when needed, our business, financial condition and results of operations will be materially and adversely affected, and we may be forced to delay our development efforts, limit our activities and reduce research and development costs. If we are unable to continue as a going concern, we may have to liquidate our assets, and the values we receive for our assets in liquidation or dissolution could be significantly lower than the values reflected in our financial statements. The reaction of investors to the inclusion of a going concern statement in our unaudited financial statements and the potential inability to continue as a going concern may materially adversely affect our ability to raise capital.

Even if this offering is successful, we will require substantial additional capital to finance our operations, and failure to obtain additional capital when needed, or on acceptable terms, could cause us to delay, limit, reduce, or terminate product development programs, commercialization efforts or other operations.

The development of biotechnological product candidates, including conducting preclinical studies and clinical trials, is a very time-consuming, capital-intensive, and uncertain process. Our operations have consumed substantial amounts of cash since inception. We expect our expenses to substantially increase in connection with our ongoing activities, particularly as we conduct our ongoing and planned clinical trials and preclinical studies and potentially seek regulatory approval for our current product candidates and any future product candidates we may develop. If we obtain regulatory approval for any of our product candidates, we also expect to incur significant commercialization expenses related to product manufacturing, marketing, sales, and distribution. Because the outcome of any clinical trial or preclinical study is highly uncertain, we cannot reliably estimate the actual amount of capital necessary to successfully complete the development and commercialization of our product candidates. Furthermore, following the completion of this offering, we expect to incur additional costs associated with operating as a public company.

Based on our current operating plans, we believe that the net proceeds from this offering, together with our existing cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities, will be sufficient to fund our operations into the second half of 2028. In particular, we expect that the net proceeds from this offering and our existing cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities will allow us to continue to fund the Phase 1/2a ASPIRO trial evaluating sasineprocel in patients with sporadic and genetic PD, to continue to fund the development of sasineprocel in PD patients, including initiating a Phase 3 trial, and to continue to fund the development of our microglia programs through the initiation of IND-enabling studies, and the remainder for working capital and other general purposes. We have based these estimates on assumptions that may prove to be wrong, and we could use our capital resources sooner than we currently expect. Our operating plans and other demands on our cash resources may change as a result of many factors currently unknown to us, and we may need to seek additional funds sooner than planned. The net proceeds of this offering, together with our existing cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities, will not be sufficient to complete the Phase 1/2a ASPIRO trial, the Phase 3 trial for sasineprocel, which we intend to initiate prior to the completion of the Phase 1/2a ASPIRO trial, or the development of sasineprocel or any other current or future product candidates. After this offering, we will require additional capital in order to advance our current and future product candidates through clinical trials, regulatory approval, and commercialization. Accordingly, we will need to obtain substantial additional funding in connection with our continuing operations. Our ability to raise additional funds may be adversely impacted by global economic conditions, disruptions to, and volatility in, the credit and financial markets in the United States and worldwide, and diminished liquidity and credit availability. If the equity and credit markets deteriorate, it may make any necessary debt or equity financing more difficult, more costly, and more dilutive. If we are unable to raise capital when needed or on attractive terms, we could be forced to delay, reduce, or eliminate our research and development programs or any future commercialization efforts, or even cease operations. We expect to finance our cash needs through public or private equity or debt financings or other capital sources, including potential collaborations, licenses, royalty financing and other similar arrangements. In addition, we may seek additional capital due to favorable market conditions or strategic considerations even if we believe we have sufficient funds for our current or future operating plans. Attempting to secure additional financing may divert our management from our day-to-day activities, which may adversely affect our ability to develop our product candidates.

Our future capital requirements will depend on many factors, including, but not limited to:

Because we do not expect product revenue for many years, if at all, we will need to continue to rely on additional financing to achieve our business objectives. Adequate additional financing may not be available to us on acceptable terms, or at all, including as a result of financial and credit market deterioration or instability, market-wide liquidity shortages, geopolitical events, or otherwise.

Raising additional capital may cause dilution to our stockholders, including purchasers of common stock in this offering, restrict our operations or require us to relinquish rights to our technologies or programs.

Until such time, if ever, as we can generate substantial product revenue, we expect to finance our cash needs through equity offerings, debt financings, or other capital sources, including potential collaborations, licenses, and other similar arrangements. We do not have any committed external source of funds. To the extent that we raise additional capital through the sale of equity or convertible debt securities, your ownership interest may be diluted, and the terms of these securities may include liquidation or other preferences that adversely affect your rights as a common stockholder. Debt financing and preferred equity financing, if available, may involve agreements that include covenants limiting or restricting our ability to take specific actions, such as incurring additional debt, making capital expenditures, or declaring dividends. Such restrictions could adversely impact our ability to conduct our operations and execute our business plan.

If we raise additional funds through future collaborations, licenses, and other similar arrangements, we may be required to relinquish valuable rights to our future revenue streams, sasineprocel and our other programs, our platform, research programs, intellectual property, or proprietary technology, or grant licenses on terms that may not be

favorable to us and/or that may reduce the value of our common stock. If we are unable to raise additional funds through equity or debt financings or other arrangements when needed or on terms acceptable to us, we would be required to delay, limit, reduce, or terminate our product development or future commercialization efforts, or grant rights to develop and market sasineprocel and our other programs that we might otherwise prefer to develop and market ourselves, or on less favorable terms than we would otherwise choose. Additionally, these circumstances could require that we undertake workforce reductions or restructuring activities in the future. Any of the above events could materially and adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospectsand cause the price of our common stock to decline.

Risks Related to the Discovery, Development, and Regulatory Approval of Our Product Candidates

We currently depend on the success of sasineprocel, which is our lead product candidate. If we are unable to advancesasineprocel in clinical development, obtain regulatory approval for and ultimately commercialize sasineprocel or experience significant delays in doing so, our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects will be materially and adversely affected.

Our lead product candidate, sasineprocel, is in early clinical development. Our business presently depends on our ability to successfully develop, obtain regulatory approval for, and commercialize sasineprocel in a timely manner. This may make an investment in our company riskier than similar companies that have multiple product candidates in active clinical development and may be able to better sustain the delay or failure of a lead product candidate. The success of sasineprocel will depend on several factors, including the following:

If we are unable to develop, obtain regulatory approval for, or if approved, successfully manufacture and commercialize sasineprocel, or if we experience delays as a result of any of the above factors or otherwise, our business would be materially harmed.

Sasineprocel is a novel approach to treat PD, which makes it difficult to predict the time and cost of product candidate development and to obtain regulatory approval, if at all.

We have concentrated our research and development efforts on sasineprocel, and our future success largely depends on the successful development of the autologous iPSC-based therapy approach underlying this product candidate. In particular, sasineprocel is designed to replace a patient’s lost DA neurons with DANPCs. Although we believe sasineprocel has the potential to, if approved, be disease-modifying, there has never been a disease-modifying FDA-approved therapy that stops the neurodegeneration associated with PD and there is no guarantee sasineprocel will be successful at slowing or halting PD progression or addressing both the motor and non-motor symptoms of PD.

We expect the novel nature of sasineprocel to create further challenges in obtaining regulatory approval. Few stem-cell derived cell replacement therapies have been approved globally or by the FDA to date, and regulatory agencies have reviewed relatively few cell replacement therapy product candidates such as sasineprocel. In addition, we rely on stereotactic brain surgery for the administration of sasineprocel which carries risks, including infection, bleeding, stroke and brain swelling. This may lengthen the regulatory review process, increase our development costs and delay or prevent commercialization of our product candidates. Further, any autologous cell therapies that are approved may be subject to extensive post-approval regulatory requirements, including requirements pertaining to manufacturing, distribution and promotion. We may need to devote significant time and resources to compliance with these requirements.

In addition, the FDA, comparable foreign regulatory authorities and other public health authorities, have established specific requirements for the manufacture and handling of autologous cell therapy products, including requirements relating to donor eligibility, cell collection, processing, storage, and administration, which could establish additional hurdles for the development, manufacture or use of sasineprocel. These hurdles may lead to delays in the conduct of clinical trials or in obtaining regulatory approvals for further development, manufacturing or commercialization of our product candidates. We may also experience delays in transferring our process to commercial partners, which may prevent us from completing our clinical trials or commercializing our product candidates on a timely or profitable basis, if at all.

Clinical and preclinical drug development involves a lengthy and expensive process with uncertain timelines and outcomes, and the results of preclinical studies and early clinical trials are not necessarily predictive of future results. Our current or future product candidates may not achieve favorable results in clinical trials or preclinical studies or receive regulatory approval on a timely basis, if at all.

Drug development is expensive and can take many years to complete, and its outcome is inherently uncertain. We cannot guarantee that any clinical trials or preclinical studies will be conducted as planned, including whether we are able to meet expected timeframes for data readouts, or completed on schedule, if at all, and failure can occur at any time during the trial or study process, including due to factors that are beyond our control. Despite promising preclinical or clinical results, our current or future product candidates, including sasineprocel, can unexpectedly fail at any stage of clinical or preclinical development. The historical failure rate for product candidates in our industry is high.

The results from preclinical studies or clinical trials of our current or future product candidates, or a competitor’s product candidate in the same class may not predict the results of later clinical trials of any product candidate, and interim, topline or preliminary results of a clinical trial are not necessarily indicative of final results. A product candidate in later stages of clinical trials may fail to show the desired characteristics despite having progressed through preclinical studies and initial clinical trials. For example, while we have conducted preclinical studies of sasineprocel and have reported interim data from our ongoing Phase 1/2a ASPIRO trial, we do not know whether sasineprocel will demonstrate comparable results in current or future clinical trials. The positive results we have observed for our product candidates in preclinical animal models and the ASPIRO trial may not be predictive of future results in our ongoing or future clinical trials. It is not uncommon to observe results in clinical trials that are unexpected based on preclinical studies and early clinical trials, and many product candidates fail in clinical trials despite very promising early results. Moreover, if unexpected observations or toxicities are observed in our preclinical studies, such results may delay or prevent the initiation of clinical trials for such program.

Additionally, our ongoing Phase 1/2a ASPIRO trial is an open-label trial and does not include a placebo or control cohort. The results of the ASPIRO trial or any other open-label trial that we may conduct may not be predictive of future clinical trial results when studied in a controlled environment with a placebo or active control. An “open-label” clinical trial is one where both the patient and investigator know whether the patient is receiving the investigational product candidate or either an existing approved drug or placebo. Open-label clinical trials are subject to various limitations that may exaggerate any observed therapeutic effect as patients in open-label clinical trials are aware that they are receiving an experimental treatment. Open-label clinical trials may be subject to a “patient bias” where patients perceive their symptoms to have improved merely due to their awareness of receiving an experimental treatment. In addition, open-label clinical trials may be subject to an “investigator bias” where those assessing and reviewing the physiological outcomes of the clinical trials are aware of which patients have received treatment and may interpret the information of the treated group more favorably given this knowledge. If the limitations of our open-label clinical trial design cause us to overestimate the therapeutic effects of sasineprocel, we may experience setbacks in later-stage clinical development, which could delay or prevent regulatory approval. We expect to include a control group in our planned Phase 3 trial, which may include a sham surgery. In trials utilizing a sham control or surgical intervention, maintaining appropriate blinding presents substantial operational, clinical and logistical challenges compared to conventional placebo-controlled drug trials, and an inability to maintain a robust blinding protocol may undermine the results of any such trial. Further, even if we observe positive results in a controlled Phase 3 trial, there can be no assurance that such results will be sufficient to obtain regulatory approval.

Moreover, preclinical and clinical data may be susceptible to varying interpretations and analyses. A number of companies in the biopharmaceutical and biotechnology industries have suffered significant setbacks in clinical development even after achieving promising results in earlier studies. Such setbacks have occurred and may occur for many reasons, including, but not limited to: clinical sites and investigators may deviate from clinical trial protocols, whether due to lack of training or otherwise, and we may fail to detect any such deviations in a timely manner; patients may fail to adhere to any required clinical trial procedures, including any requirements for post-treatment follow-up; our product candidates may fail to demonstrate safety, purity or potency (or efficacy) in certain patient populations, which has not been observed in earlier trials due to limited sample size, lack of analysis or otherwise; or our clinical trials may not adequately represent the patient populations we intend to treat, whether due to limitations in our trial designs or otherwise, such as where one patient subgroup is overrepresented in the clinical trial. There can be no assurance that we will not suffer similar setbacks despite the data we observed in earlier or ongoing studies. Based upon negative or inconclusive results, we or any future collaborator may decide, or regulators may require us, to conduct additional preclinical studies or clinical trials, which would cause us to incur additional operating expenses and delays and may not be sufficient to support regulatory approval on a timely basis or at all.

As a result, we cannot be certain that our ongoing and planned clinical trials or preclinical studies will be successful. Any safety concerns observed in any one of our clinical trials in our targeted indications could limit the prospects for regulatory approval of sasineprocel in those and other indications, which could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

We have concentrated our research and development efforts on the treatment of disorders of the CNS, a field that faces certain challenges in drug development.

We have focused our research and development efforts on addressing disorders of the CNS, such as PD. Efforts by biotechnology and biopharmaceutical companies in this field have faced certain challenges in drug development historically. In particular, these indications are often subject to a placebo effect, which may make it more challenging to isolate the beneficial effects of our product candidates. In particular, we are developing sasineprocel for the treatment of PD, and our ongoing Phase 1/2a ASPIRO trial relies on, and any future trial will rely on, subjective patient-reported outcomes as key endpoints which makes the results more difficult to evaluate than indications with more objective endpoints. Further, these subjective assessments can change significantly over time, complicate clinical trial design, adversely impact the ability of a study to show a statistically significant improvement, and generally adversely impact a clinical development program by introducing additional uncertainties. There can be no guarantee that we will successfully overcome these challenges with our product candidates or that we will not encounter other challenges in the development of our product candidates.

Any difficulties or delays in the commencement or completion, or the termination or suspension, of our current, planned or potential future clinical trials or preclinical studies could result in increased costs to us, delay or limit our ability to generate revenue or adversely affect our commercial prospects.

Before obtaining approval from regulatory authorities for the sale of sasineprocel or any other current or future product candidate, we must conduct extensive clinical trials to demonstrate the safety, purity and potency (or efficacy) of the product candidates in humans. In addition, before we can initiate clinical trials for any product candidate, we must submit the results of preclinical studies to the FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authorities along with other information, including information about product candidate chemistry, manufacturing and controls (CMC) and our proposed clinical trial protocol, as part of an IND or similar regulatory submission, and we are also required to submit comparable applications to foreign regulatory authorities for clinical trials outside of the United States. The FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authorities may require us to conduct additional preclinical studies for any product candidate before it allows us to initiate clinical trials under any IND or similar regulatory submission, which may lead to delays and increase the costs of developing our preclinical development programs.

Moreover, even if we commence clinical trials, issues may arise that could cause regulatory authorities to suspend or terminate such clinical trials. Any delays in the commencement or completion, or the termination or suspension, of our ongoing, planned, or potential future clinical trials or preclinical studies for our current or future product candidates could significantly affect our product development timelines and product development costs.

We do not know whether our planned clinical trials or preclinical studies will begin on time or if our ongoing or future trials or studies will be completed on schedule, if at all. The commencement, data readouts and completion of clinical trials and preclinical studies can be delayed for a number of reasons, including delays related to:

Clinical trials must be conducted in accordance with the FDA and other applicable regulatory authorities’ legal requirements, regulations or guidelines, and are subject to oversight by these governmental agencies and ECs or IRBs at the medical institutions where the clinical trials are conducted. We could also encounter delays if a clinical trial is suspended or terminated by us, by the IRBs of the institutions in which such trials are being conducted, by a data safety monitoring board for such trial or by the FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authorities. Such authorities may impose such a suspension, including a clinical hold, or termination due to a number of factors, including, among other reasons, failure to conduct the clinical trial in accordance with GCP and other regulatory requirements or our clinical protocols, inspection of the clinical trial operations or trial site by the FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authorities resulting in the imposition of a clinical hold, unforeseen safety issues or adverse side effects, failure to demonstrate a benefit from using a drug, changes in governmental regulations or administrative actions or lack of adequate funding to continue the clinical trial. In addition, changes in regulatory requirements and policies may occur, and we may need to amend clinical trial protocols to comply with these changes. Amendments may require us to resubmit our clinical trial protocols to IRBs for reexamination, which may impact the costs, timing or successful completion of a clinical trial.

Further, we and any future collaborators may in the future conduct clinical trials in foreign countries, which presents additional risks that may delay completion of our clinical trials. These risks include the failure of enrolled patients in foreign countries to adhere to clinical protocols as a result of differences in healthcare services or cultural customs, managing additional administrative burdens associated with foreign regulatory schemes, and political and economic risks, including war, relevant to such foreign countries.

Moreover, principal investigators for our clinical trials may in the future serve as scientific advisors or consultants to us from time to time and receive compensation in connection with such services. Under certain circumstances, we may be required to report some of these relationships to the FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authorities. The FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authority may conclude that a financial relationship between us and a principal investigator has created a conflict of interest or otherwise affected interpretation of the study. The FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authority may therefore question the integrity of the data generated at the applicable clinical trial site and the utility of the clinical trial itself may be jeopardized. This could result in a delay in approval, or rejection, of our marketing applications by the FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authority, as the case may be, and may ultimately lead to the denial of regulatory approval of sasineprocel or any other current or future product candidates.

Many of the factors that cause, or lead to, the termination or suspension of, or a delay in the commencement or completion of, clinical trials may also ultimately lead to the denial of regulatory approval of a product candidate. Any delays to our clinical trials that occur as a result could shorten any period during which we may have the exclusive right to commercialize sasineprocel or our other current or future product candidates. In such cases, our competitors may be able to bring products to market before we do, and the commercial viability of our product candidate could be significantly reduced. Any of these occurrences may harm our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

We may find it difficult to enroll patients in our clinical trials. If we encounter difficulties or delays enrolling patients in our clinical trials, our clinical development activities could be delayed or otherwise adversely affected.

Successful and timely completion of clinical trials will require that we identify and enroll a specified number of patients for each of our clinical trials. We may not be able to initiate or continue certain clinical trials for sasineprocel or any other current or future product candidates if we are unable to identify and enroll a sufficient number of eligible patients to participate in these trials as required by the FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authorities.

Patient enrollment, a significant factor in the timing of clinical trials, is affected by many factors, including:

We will be required to identify and enroll a sufficient number of patients for each of our clinical trials and monitor such patients adequately during and after treatment. Potential patients for any planned clinical trials may not be adequately diagnosed or identified with sporadic PD, genetic PD, or the other conditions or diseases we intend to evaluate, which could adversely impact the timing and outcomes of our trials. Potential patients for any planned clinical trials may also not meet the entry criteria for such trials.

Additionally, we may face challenges in recruiting and fully enrolling our clinical trials. The timing of our clinical trials depends, in part, on the speed at which we can recruit patients to participate in our trials, our ability to retain patients during the period after the biopsy and before surgical administration during the sasineprocel manufacturing process, as well as completion of required follow-up periods. The eligibility criteria of our clinical trials, once established, may further limit the pool of available trial participants. If patients are unwilling or unable to participate in our trials for any reason, including the existence of concurrent clinical trials for similar target populations, the availability of approved therapies, or the fact that enrolling in our trials may prevent patients from taking a different product, or we otherwise have difficulty enrolling a sufficient number of patients, the timeline for recruiting patients, conducting trials and obtaining regulatory approval of our product candidates may be delayed. Our inability to enroll and retain a sufficient number of patients for any of our future clinical trials would result in significant delays or may require us to abandon one or more clinical trials altogether.

In addition, we rely on, and will continue to rely on, CROs and clinical trial sites to ensure proper and timely conduct of our clinical trials and preclinical studies. Though we have entered into agreements governing their services, we have limited influence over their actual performance. We cannot be certain that our assumptions used in determining expected clinical trial timelines are correct or that we will not experience delays or difficulties in

enrollment, or be required by the FDA or other regulatory authority to increase our enrollment, which would result in the delay of completion of such trials beyond our expected timelines.

Use of our current or future product candidates could be associated with side effects, adverse events or other properties or safety risks, which could delay or preclude regulatory approval, cause us to suspend or discontinue clinical trials, abandon the product candidate, limit the commercial profile of an approved label or result in other significant negative consequences that could severely harm our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

As is the case with biopharmaceuticals generally, it is likely that there may be side effects and adverse events associated with use of sasineprocel or any other current or future product candidates’ use. Results of our or any future collaborators’ clinical trials could reveal a high and unacceptable severity and prevalence of expected or unexpected side effects or unexpected characteristics. Undesirable side effects caused by our product candidates when used alone or in combination with approved or investigational devices or drugs could cause us or regulatory authorities to interrupt, delay, or halt clinical trials and could result in a more restrictive label, or lead to the delay or denial of regulatory approval by the FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authorities. The drug-related side effects could affect patient recruitment or the ability of enrolled patients to complete the trial or result in potential product liability claims. Any of these occurrences may harm our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects significantly.

Moreover, if any of our product candidates are associated with undesirable side effects in clinical trials or demonstrate characteristics that are unexpected, we may elect to abandon their development or limit their development to more narrow uses or subpopulations in which the undesirable side effects or other characteristics are less prevalent, less severe, or more acceptable from a risk-benefit perspective, which may limit the commercial expectations for such product candidate if approved. Unacceptable enhancement of certain toxicities may be seen when product candidates are combined with standard of care therapies, or when they are used as single agents. We may also be required to modify our development and clinical trial plans based on findings in our ongoing clinical trials.

It is possible that as we or any future collaborators test sasineprocel or any other current or future product candidates in larger, longer, and more extensive clinical trials, including with different dosing regimens, or as the use of these product candidates becomes more widespread following any regulatory approval, more illnesses, injuries, discomforts, and other adverse events than were observed in earlier trials, as well as new conditions that did not occur or went undetected in previous trials, may be discovered. If such side effects become known later in development or upon approval, if any, such findings may harm our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects significantly.

In addition, if sasineprocel or any other current or future product candidate receives regulatory approval, and we or others later identify undesirable side effects caused by such product, a number of potentially significant negative consequences could result, including:

Any of these events could prevent us from achieving or maintaining market acceptance and/or physician adoption of the particular product candidate, if approved, and could significantly harm our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

Surgical administration of sasineprocel could cause patient harm and adversely affect our clinical development, prospects for regulatory approval and ability to commercialize.

We use cannula‑based delivery to targeted brain regions to administer sasineprocel. Despite reliance on well-understood standard of care stereotactic neurosurgical techniques for the administration of sasineprocel, stereotactic brain surgery under anesthesia carries risks, including infection, bleeding, stroke and brain swelling. Safe cannula-based administration depends on accurate cannula placement and controlled infusion. Cannula obstruction, kinking, misplacement, malfunction, or reflux/off‑target distribution could cause suboptimal dosing, non‑target exposure, acute complications, or irreversible injury, even with imaging guidance and standardized procedures. Further, because sasineprocel is thawed immediately prior to surgery, handling deviations in thawing, preparation, timing, or sterility may affect cell viability, potency, or distribution, increasing the risk of adverse events, reducing potential benefit, or creating variability across patients or sites. Inconsistent execution of the thaw‑and‑inject workflow could adversely affect development and approval prospects.

Procedure‑ or device‑related adverse events could lead to regulatory actions and operational impacts, which could impair or prevent approval of sasineprocel and, even if approved, reduce commercial uptake of sasineprocel, materially harming our business, financial condition, and results of operations.

In addition, standard of care surgical administration requires highly trained clinicians and specialized facilities, which could limit use of sasineprocel to select healthcare centers and reduce physician willingness to adopt sasineprocel or other product candidates. Third party payors may also be reluctant to adequately reimburse therapies that require a costly stereotactic neurosurgery, which could adversely affect commercial uptake and revenue potential for sasineprocel or other product candidates.

We have not as an organization completed clinical trials or submitted a BLA, and we may be unable to do so for sasineprocel or other product candidates.

We are currently conducting the open-label Phase 1/2a ASPIRO trial of a single dose of sasineprocel in PD patients, and plan to advance sasineprocel into a Phase 3 trial following feedback from the FDA. We have not yet completed any later-stage or pivotal clinical trials for sasineprocel or any other product candidate. Carrying out later-stage clinical trials and the submission of a successful BLA or other comparable foreign regulatory submission is a complicated process. We also have limited experience as a company in preparing and submitting marketing applications and have not previously submitted a BLA or other comparable foreign regulatory submission for any product candidate. In addition, we have had limited interactions with the FDA and cannot be certain how many additional clinical trials of sasineprocel or any other product candidate will be required or how such additional trials should be designed. Consequently, we may be unable to successfully and efficiently execute and complete necessary clinical trials in a way that leads to submission of a BLA and regulatory approval of any of our product candidates. We may require more time and incur greater costs than our competitors and may not succeed in obtaining regulatory approvals of product candidates that we develop. Failure to commence or complete, or delays in, our ongoing or planned clinical trials could prevent us from or delay us in submitting BLAs or other comparable foreign regulatory submissions for and commercializing our product candidates.

Additional time may be required to obtain marketing authorizations for any of our product candidates that we develop as combination products.

We are developing certain of our product candidates, including sasineprocel, to be administered through drug delivery devices. Accordingly, we expect that sasineprocel will be regulated as a combination product by the FDA and other regulatory authorities. Combination products require coordination within the FDA and within comparable regulatory agencies for review of the biologic product and device components. For example, the FDA’s review of a marketing application for sasineprocel may include the participation of both the FDA’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research and the FDA’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health. Although the FDA and comparable foreign agencies have or may have systems in place for the review and approval of combination products, we may experience additional delays in the development and commercialization of such product candidates due to regulatory timing constraints and uncertainties in the product development and approval process. Moreover, although we anticipate that the device component of any combination product candidates we develop will be reviewed within the usual time frames expected for the underlying biologic component application, and that no separate marketing application for the device components of such product candidates will be required in the United States, the FDA or comparable regulatory authorities may delay approval or require us to conduct additional studies with the device which may delay the approval of the combination product.

Negative developments in the field of regenerative medicine and, in particular, stem cell-based therapies, could damage public perception of sasineprocel or our other product candidates and negatively affect our business.

The commercial success of our product candidates will depend in part on general public acceptance of the use of stem cell-based therapy for the prevention or treatment of human diseases. The use of embryonic cells and fetal tissue for research and stem cell therapy has been the subject of substantial national and international debate regarding related ethical, legal, and social issues. In the U.S., for example, until March 2009, federal government funding of embryonic stem cell research was limited to specifically identified cell lines and was not otherwise available. We do not use embryonic stem cells or fetal tissue, but the public may not be able to, or may fail to, differentiate our use of induced pluripotent stem cells from the use of embryonic stem cells or fetal tissue by others. This could result in a negative perception of us or our products or product candidates, thereby reducing demand, which could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects.

Adverse events in clinical trials of sasineprocel or any other cell replacement therapy product candidates which we may develop, or in clinical trials of other biopharmaceutical companies developing similar products and the resulting publicity, as well as any other negative developments in the field of regenerative medicine that may occur in the future, including in connection with competitor therapies, could result in a decrease in demand for sasineprocel or any other stem cell-based product candidates that we may develop. These events could also result in the suspension, discontinuation, or clinical hold of or modification to our clinical trials. If public perception is influenced by claims that the use of cell replacement therapy is unsafe, whether related to our therapies or those of our competitors, our product candidates may not be accepted by the general public or the medical community and potential clinical trial subjects may be discouraged from enrolling in our, our collaborators’, or any future collaborators’ clinical trials. In addition, responses by national or state governments to negative public perception may result in new legislation or regulations that could limit our ability to develop or commercialize any product candidates, obtain or maintain regulatory approval or otherwise achieve profitability. More restrictive statutory regimes, government regulations or negative public opinion would have an adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects and may delay or impair the development and commercialization of our product candidates or demand for any products we may develop. As a result, we may not be able to continue or may be delayed in conducting our development programs.

Adverse developments in clinical trials of other cell replacement products based on stem cells may result in a disproportionately negative effect for sasineprocel or other product candidates as compared to other products in the field of regenerative medicine not based on stem cells. Future negative developments in the biotechnological or biopharmaceutical industries could also result in greater governmental regulation, stricter labeling requirements, and potential regulatory delays in the testing or approvals of sasineprocel or other product candidates. Any increased scrutiny could delay or increase the costs of obtaining marketing approval for our product candidates.

The regulatory approval processes of the FDA and comparable foreign authorities are lengthy, time consuming and inherently unpredictable, and if we are ultimately unable to obtain regulatory approval for our product candidates, our business will be substantially harmed.

The clinical development, manufacturing, labeling, storage, record-keeping, advertising, promotion, import, export, marketing and distribution of our product candidates are subject to extensive regulation by the FDA in the United States and by comparable foreign regulatory authorities in foreign markets. In the United States, we are not permitted to market our product candidates in the United States until we receive regulatory approval of a BLA from the FDA. The process of obtaining such regulatory approval is expensive, often takes many years following the commencement of clinical trials and can vary substantially based upon the type, complexity and novelty of the product candidates involved, as well as the target indications and patient population. Approval policies or regulations may change, and the FDA and comparable regulatory authorities have substantial discretion in the approval process, including the ability to delay, limit or deny approval of a product candidate for many reasons. Despite the time and expense invested in clinical development of product candidates, regulatory approval of a product candidate is never guaranteed. Of the large number of drugs in development, only a small percentage successfully complete the FDA or foreign regulatory approval processes and are commercialized.

Prior to obtaining approval to commercialize a product candidate in the United States or abroad, we must demonstrate with substantial evidence from adequate and well-controlled clinical trials, and to the satisfaction of the FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authorities, that such product candidates are safe and effective for their intended uses, and in the case of biological products in the United States, that such product candidates are safe, pure and potent for their intended uses. Results from nonclinical studies and clinical trials can be interpreted in different ways. Even if we believe available nonclinical or clinical data support the safety, purity, and potency (or efficacy) of our product candidates, such data may not be sufficient to obtain approval from the FDA and comparable foreign regulatory authorities. The FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authorities, as the case may be, may also require us to conduct additional preclinical studies or clinical trials for our product candidates.

The FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authorities can delay, limit or deny approval of a product candidate for many reasons, including:

With respect to foreign markets, approval procedures vary among countries and, in addition to the foregoing risks, may involve additional product testing, administrative review periods and agreements with pricing authorities.

Even if we eventually complete clinical trials and receive approval of a BLA or comparable foreign marketing application for our product candidates, the FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authority may grant approval contingent on the performance of costly additional clinical trials and/or the implementation of a REMS, which may be required because the FDA believes it is necessary to ensure safe use of the product after approval. Any delay in obtaining, or inability to obtain, applicable regulatory approval would delay or prevent commercialization of that product candidate and would materially adversely impact our business and prospects.

We may not be successful in our efforts to investigate sasineprocel in additional indications. We may expend our limited resources to pursue a new product candidate or a particular indication for sasineprocel and fail to capitalize on product candidates or indications that may be more profitable or for which there is a greater likelihood of success.

We are currently conducting the open-label Phase 1/2a ASPIRO trial evaluating sasineprocel in patients with sporadic PD and we have begun enrolling genetic PD patients. Because we have limited financial and managerial resources, we focus on the development of sasineprocel for specific indications. We may fail to generate additional clinical development opportunities for sasineprocel for a number of reasons, including that sasineprocel may, in indications we are seeking or may seek in the future, be shown to have harmful side effects, limited to no efficacy or other characteristics that suggest it is unlikely to receive marketing approval and/or achieve market acceptance in such potential indications. Our resource allocation and other decisions may cause us to fail to identify and capitalize on viable potential product candidates or additional indications for sasineprocel. Our spending on current and future research and development programs for new product candidates or additional target indications for sasineprocel may not yield any commercially viable product candidates or target indications. If we do not accurately evaluate the commercial potential or target market for a particular indication or product candidate, we may fail to develop such product candidate or target indication, or relinquish valuable rights to that product candidate through collaborations, license agreements and other similar arrangements in cases where it would have been more advantageous for us to retain sole development and commercialization rights to such indication or product candidate, or negotiate less advantageous terms for any such arrangements than is optimal.

Additionally, we may pursue in-licenses or acquisitions of development-stage assets or programs, which entails additional risk to us. Identifying, selecting and acquiring promising product candidates requires substantial technical, financial and human resources expertise. Efforts to do so may not result in the actual acquisition or license of a particular product candidate, potentially resulting in a diversion of our management’s time and the expenditure of our resources with no resulting benefit. For example, if we are unable to identify programs that ultimately result in approved products, we may spend material amounts of our capital and other resources evaluating, acquiring and developing products that ultimately do not provide a return on our investment.

We may in the future seek to engage in strategic transactions to acquire or in-license additional products, product candidates or technologies. If we are unable to realize the benefits from such transactions, it may adversely affect our ability to develop and commercialize an expanded pipeline of product candidates, negatively impact our cash position, increase our expenses and present significant distractions to our management.

From time to time, we may consider strategic transactions, such as additional collaborations, acquisitions of companies, asset purchases, joint ventures and in-licensing of new products, product candidates or technologies that we believe will complement or augment our existing business. We may not be able to find suitable partners or acquisition candidates, and we may not be able to complete such transactions on favorable terms, if at all. If we acquire assets with promising markets or technologies, we may not be able to realize the benefit of acquiring such assets if we are not able to successfully integrate them with our existing technologies. We may encounter numerous difficulties in

developing, testing, manufacturing and marketing any new products resulting from a strategic acquisition that delay or prevent us from realizing their expected benefits or enhancing our business.

Following any such strategic transaction, we may not achieve any expected synergies to justify the transaction. For example, such transactions may require us to incur non-recurring or other charges, increase our near-term and long-term expenditures, experience significant integration or implementation challenges or disrupt our management or business. These transactions would entail numerous operational and financial risks, including exposure to unknown liabilities; disruption of our business and diversion of our management’s time and attention in order to manage a collaboration or develop acquired products, product candidates or technologies; incurrence of substantial debt or dilutive issuances of equity securities to pay transaction consideration or costs; higher-than-expected acquisition or integration costs, write-downs of assets or goodwill or impairment charges; increased amortization expenses; difficulty and cost in facilitating the transaction or combining the operations and personnel of any acquired business; impairment of relationships with key suppliers, manufacturers or customers of any acquired business due to changes in management and ownership; and the inability to retain key employees of any acquired business.

Accordingly, although there can be no assurance that we will undertake or successfully complete any transactions of the nature described above, any transactions that we do complete may be subject to the foregoing or other risks and could have a material and adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects. Conversely, any failure to enter any strategic transaction that would be beneficial to us could delay the development and potential commercialization of our product candidates and could have a negative impact on the competitiveness of any product candidate that reaches market.

We may in the future conduct certain of our clinical trials for our product candidates outside of the United States. However, the FDA and other foreign equivalents may not accept data from such trials, in which case our development plans will be delayed, which could materially harm our business.

We or any future collaborators may in the future conduct one or more of our clinical trials for our product candidates outside the United States. The acceptance of study data from clinical trials conducted outside the United States or another jurisdiction by the FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authority may be subject to certain conditions or may not be accepted at all. For example, in cases where data from foreign clinical trials are intended to serve as the sole basis for regulatory approval in the United States, regardless of whether the applicable clinical trials were conducted under an IND, the FDA will generally not approve the application unless the data are applicable to the U.S. population and U.S. medical practice; the trials were performed by clinical investigators of recognized competence and pursuant to GCP regulations; and the data may be considered valid without the need for an on-site inspection by the FDA, or if the FDA considers such inspection to be necessary, the FDA is able to validate the data through an on-site inspection or other appropriate means. In addition, even where the foreign study data are not intended to serve as the sole basis for approval, if the relevant study was not conducted pursuant to an IND, the FDA will not accept the data as support for a marketing application unless the study was conducted in accordance with GCP requirements and the FDA is able to validate the data from the study through an onsite inspection if deemed necessary. Many foreign regulatory authorities have similar requirements for clinical data gathered outside of their respective jurisdictions. There can be no assurance that the FDA or any comparable foreign regulatory authority will accept data from trials conducted outside of the United States or the applicable jurisdiction. If the FDA or any comparable foreign regulatory authority does not accept such data from our clinical trials of sasineprocel or another product candidate, it would likely result in the need for additional clinical trials, which would be costly and time-consuming and delay or permanently halt our development of such product candidate.

Conducting clinical trials outside the United States also exposes us to additional risks, including risks associated with:

Interim, topline, and preliminary data from our clinical trials and preclinical studies that we announce or publish from time to time may change as more patient data become available and are subject to audit and verification procedures that could result in material changes in the final data.

From time to time, we may publicly disclose interim, topline, or preliminary data from our clinical trials and preclinical studies, which is based on a preliminary analysis of then-available data, and the results and related findings and conclusions are subject to change following a more comprehensive review of the data related to the particular study or trial. We also make assumptions, estimations, calculations, and conclusions as part of our analyses of data, and we may not have received or had the opportunity to fully and carefully evaluate all data. As a result, the interim, topline, or preliminary results that we report may differ from future results of the same studies or trials, or different conclusions or considerations may qualify such results once additional data have been received and fully evaluated. Topline and preliminary data also remain subject to audit and verification procedures that may result in the final data being materially different from the topline or preliminary data we previously published. As a result, topline and preliminary data should be viewed with caution until the final data are available. Interim data from clinical trials that we may complete are further subject to the risk that one or more of the clinical outcomes may materially change as patient enrollment continues and more patient data become available. Adverse differences between interim, topline or preliminary data and final data could significantly harm our business prospects. Further, disclosure of interim data by us or by our competitors could result in volatility in the price of our common stock.

In addition, others, including regulatory authorities, may not accept or agree with our assumptions, estimates, calculations, conclusions or analyses or may interpret or weigh the importance of data differently, which could impact the value of the particular program, the approvability or commercialization of the particular product candidate or product and our company in general. Moreover, the information we choose to publicly disclose regarding a particular study or clinical trial is based on what is typically extensive information, and you or others may not agree with what we determine is material or otherwise appropriate information to include in our disclosure, and any information we determine not to disclose may ultimately be deemed significant with respect to future decisions, conclusions, views, activities or otherwise regarding a particular drug, product candidate or our business. If the interim, topline or preliminary data that we report differ from actual results, or if others, including regulatory authorities, disagree with the conclusions reached, our ability to obtain approval for, and commercialize a product candidate may be harmed, which could harm our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

Fast Track designation by the FDA for sasineprocel, and other expedited designations if granted in the future, may not lead to a faster development or regulatory review or approval process, and do not increase the likelihood that sasineprocel or any other product candidate which may receive such designations will receive regulatory approval.

The FDA has granted Fast Track designation for sasineprocel for the treatment of PD to improve motor function, and we may seek Fast Track designations for other indications or other product candidates. The Fast Track programs are intended to expedite or facilitate the process for reviewing product candidates that meet certain criteria. Biologics are eligible for Fast Track designation if they are intended, alone or in combination with one or more drugs or biologics, to treat a serious or life-threatening disease or condition and demonstrate the potential to address unmet medical needs for the disease or condition. Fast Track designation applies to the combination of the product candidate and the specific indication for which it is being studied. The sponsor of a Fast Track product candidate has opportunities for more frequent interactions with the applicable FDA review team during product development and, once a BLA is submitted, the application may be eligible for priority review. A BLA submitted for a Fast Track product candidate may also be eligible for rolling review, where the FDA may consider for review sections of the BLA on a rolling basis before the complete application is submitted, if the sponsor provides a schedule for the submission of the sections of the BLA, the FDA agrees to accept sections of the BLA and determines that the schedule is acceptable, and the Sponsor pays any required user fees upon submission of the first section of the BLA.

The FDA has broad discretion whether or not to grant this designation. Even if we believe a particular product candidate or development program is eligible for this designation, we cannot assure you that the FDA would decide to grant it. Although we have received Fast Track designation for sasineprocel for the treatment of PD to improve motor function, and even if we receive additional Fast Track designations for other indications or any future product candidates, such product candidates may not experience a faster development process, review or approval compared to conventional FDA procedures. In addition, the FDA may withdraw a Fast Track designation if it believes that the designation is no longer supported by data from our clinical development program. Furthermore, such a designation does not increase the likelihood that sasineprocel or any other product candidate that may be granted Fast Track designation will receive marketing approval in the United States. Many product candidates that have received Fast Track designation have ultimately failed to obtain approval. Access to an expedited program may expedite the development or approval process, but it does not change the standards for approval.

Furthermore, although we may pursue additional opportunities to accelerate the development of certain of our future product candidates through one or more of the FDA’s expedited program designations, we cannot be assured that any of our product candidates will qualify for such programs. The FDA may determine that our proposed target indication or other aspects of our clinical development plans do not qualify for such expedited program.

A Regenerative Medicine Advanced Therapy, or RMAT, designation from the FDA, even if granted for any of our product candidates, may not lead to a faster development or regulatory review or approval process, and does not increase the likelihood that our product candidates will receive FDA approval.

The FDA has granted RMAT designation for sasineprocel for the treatment of levodopa-responsive PD, and may seek additional RMAT designations for sasineprocel or for our other product candidates. A biological product candidate is eligible for RMAT designation if: it meets the definition of a regenerative medicine therapy, which the FDA defines as a cell therapy, therapeutic tissue engineering product, human cell and tissue product, or any combination product using such therapies or products, with limited exceptions; the candidate is intended to treat, modify, reverse, or cure a serious disease or condition, and; preliminary clinical evidence indicates that the candidate has the potential to address unmet medical needs for such disease or condition. RMAT designation provides potential benefits that include more frequent meetings with FDA to discuss the development plan for the product candidate, and eligibility for rolling review and priority review of BLAs. Product candidates granted RMAT designation may also be eligible for accelerated approval on the basis of a surrogate or intermediate endpoint reasonably likely to predict long-term clinical benefit, or through reliance upon data obtained from a meaningful number of sites, including through expansion to a sufficient number sites, as appropriate. RMAT-designated product candidates that receive accelerated approval may, as appropriate, be able to fulfill their post-approval requirements through the submission of clinical evidence, clinical studies, patient registries, or other sources of real-world evidence, through the collection of larger confirmatory data sets, or via post-approval monitoring of all patients treated with such therapy prior to approval of the therapy. RMAT designation is within the sole discretion of the FDA. Accordingly, even if we believe one of our product candidates meets the criteria for RMAT designation, the FDA may disagree and instead determine not to make such designation. RMAT designation does not change the standards for product approval, and there is no assurance that such designation or eligibility for such designation will result in expedited review or approval or that the approved indication will not be narrower than the indication covered by the RMAT designation. Additionally, RMAT designation can be revoked if the product candidate fails to meet the qualifications as clinical data continue to emerge.

We may attempt to secure approval from the FDA through the use of the accelerated approval pathway. If we are unable to obtain such approval, we may be required to conduct additional clinical trials beyond those that we contemplate, which could increase the expense of obtaining, and delay the receipt of, necessary regulatory approvals. Even if we receive accelerated approval from the FDA, if our confirmatory trials do not verify clinical benefit, or if we do not comply with rigorous post-marketing requirements, the FDA may seek to withdraw any accelerated approval we have obtained.

We may in the future seek an accelerated approval for sasineprocel or other current or future product candidates. Under the accelerated approval program, the FDA may grant accelerated approval to a product candidate designed to treat a serious or life-threatening condition that provides meaningful therapeutic benefit over available therapies upon a determination that such product candidate has an effect on a surrogate endpoint or intermediate clinical endpoint that is reasonably likely to predict clinical benefit. The FDA considers a clinical benefit to be a positive therapeutic effect that is clinically meaningful in the context of a given disease, such as irreversible morbidity or mortality. For

the purposes of accelerated approval, a surrogate endpoint is a marker, such as a laboratory measurement, radiographic image, physical sign or other measure that is thought to predict clinical benefit, but is not itself a measure of clinical benefit. An intermediate clinical endpoint is a clinical endpoint that can be measured earlier than an effect on irreversible morbidity or mortality that is reasonably likely to predict an effect on irreversible morbidity or mortality or other clinical benefit.

The accelerated approval pathway may be used in cases in which the advantage of a new drug over available therapy may not be a direct therapeutic advantage, but is a clinically important improvement from a patient and public health perspective. If granted, accelerated approval is usually contingent on the sponsor’s agreement to conduct, in a diligent manner, additional post-approval confirmatory studies to verify and describe the drug’s clinical benefit. If such confirmatory studies fail to confirm the drug’s clinical benefit or are not completed in a timely manner, the FDA may withdraw its approval of the drug on an expedited basis. In addition, in December 2022, the Food and Drug Omnibus Reform Act of 2022, among other things, provided the FDA statutory authority to mitigate potential risks to patients from continued marketing of ineffective drugs previously granted accelerated approval and additional oversight over confirmatory trials. Under these provisions, the FDA may, among other things, require a sponsor of a product seeking accelerated approval to have a confirmatory trial underway prior to such approval being granted.

Prior to seeking approval for sasineprocel or any other current or future product candidate, we intend to seek feedback from the FDA and will otherwise evaluate our ability to seek and receive accelerated approval. There can be no assurance that after our evaluation of the feedback and other factors we will decide to pursue or submit a BLA for accelerated approval or obtain any other form of expedited development, review, or approval. Furthermore, if we decide to submit an application for accelerated approval for sasineprocel or any other current or future product candidate, there can be no assurance that such submission or application will be accepted or that any expedited development, review, or approval will be granted on a timely basis, or at all. The FDA could also require us to conduct further studies prior to considering our application or granting approval of any type. A failure to obtain accelerated approval or any other form of expedited development, review, or approval for sasineprocel or any other current or future product candidate would result in a longer time period to commercialization of such product candidate, if any, could increase the cost of development of such product candidate, and could harm our competitive position in the marketplace.

Disruptions at the FDA and other government agencies caused by funding shortages, staffing limitations or policy changes could hinder their ability to hire, retain or deploy key leadership and other personnel, or otherwise prevent new or modified products from being developed, reviewed, approved or commercialized in a timely manner or at all, which could negatively impact our business.

The ability of the FDA and foreign regulatory authorities to review and approve new products can be affected by a variety of factors, including government budget and funding levels, statutory, regulatory and policy changes, the FDA’s or foreign regulatory authorities’ ability to hire and retain key personnel and accept the payment of user fees, and other events that may otherwise affect the FDA’s or foreign regulatory authorities’ ability to perform routine functions. Average review times at the FDA and foreign regulatory authorities have fluctuated in recent years as a result. In addition, government funding of other government agencies that fund research and development activities is subject to the political process, which is inherently fluid and unpredictable. Disruptions at the FDA and other agencies may also slow the time necessary for new biologics or modifications to approved or licensed biologics to be reviewed and/or approved by necessary government agencies, which would adversely affect our business. For example, in recent years, the U.S. government has shut down several times and certain regulatory agencies, such as the FDA, have had to furlough critical FDA employees and stop critical activities. In addition, the current U.S. Presidential administration has issued certain policies and Executive Orders directed towards reducing the employee headcount and costs associated with U.S. administrative agencies, including the FDA, which have led to substantial personnel changes, and it remains unclear the degree to which these efforts may limit or otherwise adversely affect the FDA’s ability to conduct routine activities.

If any future prolonged government shutdown occurs, or if funding shortages, staffing limitations, policy changes or similar factors hinder or prevent the FDA or other regulatory authorities from conducting their regular inspections, reviews, or other regulatory activities, such events could significantly impact the ability of the FDA or other regulatory authorities to timely review and process our regulatory submissions, which could have a material adverse effect on our business.

We and any of our third-party suppliers may use potent chemical agents and hazardous materials, and any claims relating to improper handling, storage, or disposal of these materials could be time-consuming or costly.

We and any of our third-party suppliers and potential future collaborators may use biological materials, potent chemical agents, and hazardous materials, including chemicals and biological agents and compounds that could be dangerous to human health and safety of the environment. Our operations and the operations of our third-party suppliers also produce hazardous waste products. Federal, state, and local laws and regulations govern the use, generation, manufacture, storage, handling, and disposal of these materials and wastes. Compliance with applicable environmental laws and regulations may be expensive, and current or future environmental laws and regulations may impair our product development efforts. In addition, neither we nor our third-party suppliers can eliminate the risk of accidental injury or contamination from these materials or waste. We do not carry specific biological or hazardous waste insurance coverage, and our property, casualty and general liability insurance policies specifically exclude coverage for damages and fines arising from biological or hazardous waste exposure or contamination. In the event of contamination or injury at our or our suppliers’ sites, we could be held liable for damages or be penalized with fines in an amount exceeding our resources, and our clinical trials or regulatory approvals could be suspended. Although we maintain workers’ compensation insurance for certain costs and expenses we may incur due to injuries to our employees resulting from work-related injuries, this insurance may not provide adequate coverage against potential liabilities. We do not maintain insurance for toxic tort claims that may be asserted against us in connection with the storage or disposal of biologic, hazardous, or radioactive materials.

In addition, we may incur substantial costs in order to comply with current or future environmental, health, and safety laws and regulations, which have tended to become more stringent over time. These current or future laws and regulations may impair our research, development, or production efforts. Failure to comply with these laws and regulations also may result in substantial fines, penalties or other sanctions or liabilities, which could materially adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects.

Our development timelines depend on numerous interdependent activities across our organization and third parties, and any failure of these activities to align as planned could delay, disrupt, or prevent development, regulatory approval or commercialization of our current and future product candidates.

Our ability to meet projected milestones for our current and future product candidates depends on the timely, coordinated execution of multiple, interdependent workstreams, including, but not limited to, manufacturing scale‑up; third-party vendor performance; patient identification and enrollment; regulatory interactions; procurement of critical materials and components; and the various events and requirements discussed in the risks set forth in this prospectus. Disruptions in any one area can materially affect overall program timing, cost and the likelihood of regulatory approval and commercialization.

Because these activities are interdependent, a setback in one workstream can require re‑sequencing, extend timelines, add unplanned costs and cause us to miss internal or publicly communicated milestones. If we cannot align manufacturing readiness, third‑party performance, patient enrollment, regulatory expectations and supply reliability when needed, we may have to delay, limit, suspend or terminate studies or trials, modify development plans, or raise additional capital on unfavorable terms, materially harming our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

Risks Related to Manufacturing of Our Product Candidates

Our manufacturing process is novel and complex, and we may encounter difficulties in production, or difficulties with internal manufacturing, which would delay or prevent our ability to provide a sufficient supply of our product candidates for clinical trials or our products for patients, if approved.

The manufacture and supply of cell therapy product candidates, including sasineprocel, are generally more complex and costly than those required, for example, for small molecule or antibody-based drugs and accordingly present significant challenges. Our autologous cell therapy product candidates, including sasineprocel, are engineered human cells, and the process of manufacturing such product candidates is complex, highly regulated and subject to numerous risks. Manufacturing our product candidates involves isolating dermal fibroblast cells from a patient’s skin punch biopsy, expanding the fibroblast cells, testing for correct cell type identity, harvesting and formulating the fibroblast cells, converting the fibroblasts into iPSCs through cellular reprogramming, differentiating the iPSCs into DANPCs, harvesting and finishing the DANPCs, cryopreservation, storage and eventually shipment. Our ability to consistently and reliably manufacture autologous cell therapy product candidates is essential to our success, and there are risks associated with scaling to the level required for advanced clinical trials or commercialization, including cost overruns, potential problems with sourcing of materials, quality control, inter-patient variability, stability issues, consistency and timely availability of raw materials.

Our manufacturing process will be susceptible to product loss or failure, or product variation that may negatively impact patient outcomes, due to logistical issues associated with autologous cell therapies, including the collection of patient cells, conversion and differentiation of cells, processing and quality control testing, shipping the final product to the clinical trial recipient, preparing the product for administration, manufacturing issues or different product characteristics resulting from the differences in donor starting materials, variations between reagent lots, interruptions in the manufacturing process, contamination, equipment or reagent failure, improper installation or operation of equipment, vendor error, inconsistency in cell growth and variability in product characteristics. Cells must maintain viability and quality throughout this process, and any disruption—including transportation delays, temperature excursions, cryopreservation failures, or mix-ups in autologous materials—could result in product loss or compromise product quality. Even minor deviations from normal manufacturing processes could result in reduced production yields, product defects and other supply disruptions. If we lose, destroy or otherwise impair the patient materials at any point, the manufacturing process for that patient may need to be restarted, for example if sufficient starting materials are still available; the resulting delay may adversely affect that patient’s outcome due to the risk of disease progression. If microbial, viral or other contaminations are discovered in our product candidates or in any of the manufacturing facilities in which products or other materials are made, such manufacturing facilities may need to be closed for an extended period of time to investigate and remedy the contamination. Any failure in the manufacturing processes could render a batch of product unusable, could impact supply and delay the progress of our clinical trials, could affect the regulatory approval of such product candidate, could cause us to incur fines or penalties or could harm our reputation and that of our product candidates.

Our manufactured product candidates may fail to meet the required specifications for any of a variety of reasons, including variability in starting material, deviations from normal manufacturing process, or insufficient optimization of specific process steps. This failure to meet specifications could result in supply shortages, or delays related to obtaining additional regulatory, site and patient approvals to continue dosing the clinical trial for sasineprocel. If the required additional approvals cannot be obtained, additional delays may occur as manufacturing would need to be restarted and/or the patient may be unable to remain in the study. Any delay in the clinical development or commercialization of sasineprocel or our other product candidates could materially adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and growth prospects.

We are still developing an optimized, automated manufacturing process for Phase 3 clinical and commercial-scale manufacturing of sasineprocel, and we may make changes to our manufacturing process at various points during development, and even after commercialization, for various reasons, such as to control costs, achieve scale, enhance automation, decrease processing time, increase manufacturing success rate, address intellectual property considerations, or for other reasons. Changes to our manufacturing process carry the risk that they will not achieve their intended objectives, and any of these changes could cause our product candidates to perform differently and affect the results of our ongoing clinical trials, or the performance of the product once commercialized. Changes to our process made during the course of clinical development could require us to show the comparability of the product candidate used in earlier clinical phases or at earlier portions of a trial to the product candidate used in later clinical

phases or later portions of the trial. For example, we are currently transitioning to an automated manufacturing process for our Phase 3 study from the manual process used in our Phase 1/2a ASPIRO trial, and this transition has required manufacturing process changes. Prior to the start of manufacturing for our Phase 3 study, we must establish comparability of our automated manufacturing process with the manual process used in the Phase 1/2 ASPIRO trial. It is difficult to establish comparability of autologous cell therapy products, and this may complicate efforts to verify process changes during scale up. Other changes to our manufacturing process made before or after commercialization could require us to show the comparability of the resulting product to the product candidate used in the clinical trials using earlier processes. Such showings could require us to collect additional nonclinical or clinical data from any modified process prior to obtaining marketing approval for the product candidate produced with such modified process. If such data are not ultimately comparable to that seen in the earlier trials or earlier in the same trial in terms of safety or efficacy, or if regulatory authorities do not agree that comparability has been established, we may be required to make further changes to our process and/or undertake additional clinical testing, either of which could significantly delay the clinical development or commercialization of the associated product candidate, which would materially adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and growth prospects.

Although we manufacture sasineprocel in our own internal manufacturing facility for the Phase 1/2a ASPIRO trial, and plan to manufacture other product candidates in our internal manufacturing facilities in the future, we may encounter problems with the internal production of our product candidates. We believe our current clinical GMP manufacturing facility will supply our anticipated clinical trial needs, but if the dose and number of cycles needed increases, our current manufacturing process may not be able to support the enrollment of trials which could lead to delays until we scale up the manufacturing. While we believe that we have a manufacturing facility with capabilities to meet increased production needs, it would still require an increase in staff and significant internal resources. We may face challenges in scaling our manufacturing operations to meet demand, as autologous manufacturing is inherently more difficult to scale than traditional biologic manufacturing, requiring individualized production runs for each patient rather than large batch production.

Further, our manufacturing facilities will be subject to compliance with regulatory requirements, which we may struggle to meet. We may encounter problems with properly staffing our internal manufacturing facilities due to hiring challenges or other issues. For example, factors such as public health pandemics or epidemics (such as the COVID-19 pandemic) and related restrictions could impact our ability to properly staff production of our product candidates. Current inflationary pressures are negatively affecting and could continue to negatively affect the costs of constructing our commercial-scale manufacturing facility. Global supply chain disruptions, including procurement delays and long lead times on certain materials, have adversely impacted and could continue to adversely impact the scheduled completion and/or costs of constructing our commercial-scale manufacturing facility. We may also encounter problems with training the staff we have to effectively manage and control the complex manufacturing process required to produce our product candidates and comply with all necessary regulations. We may also find it difficult to properly manage supply chain issues critical to the manufacturing process. If we are unable to build, maintain, and properly staff our manufacturing facilities, manage and control the manufacturing process, manufacture sasineprocel and other product candidates at sufficient scale or quality, and comply with regulations, the clinical development or commercialization of our product candidates could be significantly delayed, which would materially adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and growth prospects.

The manufacture of sasineprocel as an autologous cell therapy involves significant variability that may result in manufacturing failures, treatment delays, or inconsistent product quality, any of which could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, and results of operations.

Sasineprocel is an autologous cell therapy manufactured using cells derived from each individual patient. Unlike conventional biologic products or allogeneic cell therapies that are manufactured from standardized cell lines or donor-derived materials, the starting materials for sasineprocel are inherently variable because they depend on the unique biological characteristics of each patient. This patient-to-patient variability presents significant manufacturing challenges that could adversely affect our ability to develop and commercialize sasineprocel.

Because the quality and characteristics of each patient’s cells may differ based on factors including age, disease state, prior treatments, genetic background, and overall health, the manufacturing process for sasineprocel may yield products with variable characteristics, even when the same manufacturing protocols are followed. Some patients’ cells may fail to proliferate, differentiate, or otherwise meet release specifications during the manufacturing process, resulting in manufacturing failures that could prevent those patients from receiving treatment. If we experience a high rate of manufacturing failures, we may be unable to treat a meaningful proportion of patients enrolled in our clinical trials or, if sasineprocel is approved, patients who are prescribed our product, which could delay or prevent regulatory approval, harm our reputation, and limit revenue.

In addition, we rely on the treating physician performing the skin punch biopsy to collect the initial patient sample. Although we train treating physicians to ensure correct biopsy collection, we cannot guarantee that all physicians will have the necessary skills or experience to consistently perform such procedures that yield material suitable for manufacturing. For example, during our Phase 1/2a ASPIRO trial, several patients experienced biopsy failures, requiring re-collection of patient material, which delayed or necessitated a restart of the manufacturing process for those patients. Similar failures in the future, including any unexpected failures due to the characteristics of genetic PD patients, could result in manufacturing delays, supply disruptions, or the inability to manufacture a suitable product for a particular patient, any of which could adversely affect our clinical trials and, if our product candidates are approved, our ability to supply product to patients, and could materially adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and growth prospects.

We are highly dependent on our San Diego, California manufacturing facility and any failure to maintain the use of this facility would have a material and adverse effect on our business.

We currently manufacture our product candidates at our manufacturing facility in San Diego, California, where we lease approximately 22,000 square feet of GMP cleanrooms, warehouse, QC laboratory, and office space. We are currently conducting technology transfer and implementation of our automated manufacturing process in the second phase clean rooms of our San Diego facility, and we have not completed implementation of our automated manufacturing process that we intend to utilize in our planned Phase 3 trial. We are entirely reliant on our manufacturing facility to manufacture our product candidates, including sasineprocel, and any failure to maintain the use of this facility would have a material and adverse effect on our business.

Our reliance on our manufacturing facility exposes us to a number of risks, including:

We rely on highly specialized third-party suppliers and automation platforms for critical aspects of our manufacturing process, and any disruption, failure, or inability to scale these systems could adversely affect our ability to produce our product candidates in a timely and cost-effective manner.

Our manufacturing processes for sasineprocel incorporate highly specialized automated systems supplied by third parties, including the Cell X platform, also known as the Celligent system, potentially used across all stages of production and scale-up, and the Mytos device used during differentiation in stage 3 of our production process. These systems integrate robotics, liquid handling, optical machine vision and proprietary algorithms to evaluate and process patient-derived cells. We also depend on Cell X and other third parties for instruments and consumables under supply and license arrangements, and our Cell X and The Cleveland Clinic Foundation (CCF) licenses require milestone payments upon achievement of specified development and regulatory milestones. Any delay, disruption, quality or performance issue affecting these third-party platforms or supplies—including equipment malfunction, software or algorithm errors, supplier capacity constraints, delivery delays, component shortages, discontinuations, business interruptions or financial distress—could delay or halt manufacturing runs, increase our costs, reduce yields, or result in product quality issues, which could delay our preclinical and clinical development, regulatory submissions and, if approved, commercialization.

Because our automation initiatives are ongoing and certain steps remain manual in our current GMP process, we may not complete or scale automation as planned, our automated processes may not perform as expected, and we may be required to revert to less automated workflows. If we need to change or replace suppliers, platforms, or materials, we could be required to conduct additional qualification, validation, technology transfer and regulatory comparability studies, which are time-consuming, costly and uncertain. Our reliance on third parties also exposes us to risks related to single- or limited-source suppliers, export controls and logistics, and the need to identify, audit and qualify alternate vendors, any of which could adversely affect our ability to meet timelines or scale production.

In addition, failures in our automated data capture, analytics and in-process controls, or errors in the machine-vision or algorithmic selection of cells, could lead to batch failures, inconsistent product quality, loss of patient-specific material, patient segregation issues or regulatory non-compliance. If we are unable to secure, maintain or scale access to the Cell X platform, Mytos devices, or other critical systems on commercially reasonable terms, or if these systems do not operate as intended within our modular manufacturing template, we may be unable to achieve the throughput, costs or consistency necessary to support later-stage development or potential commercialization. Any of the foregoing could materially and adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

Changes in methods of the manufacturing or formulation of sasineprocel or other product candidates may result in additional costs or delay.

As sasineprocel and any of our other current or future product candidates progress through clinical trials to regulatory approval and commercialization, it is common that various aspects of the development program, such as manufacturing methods and formulation, are altered along the way in an effort to optimize safety, efficacy, yield and manufacturing batch size, minimize costs and achieve consistent quality and results, or address intellectual property considerations. There can be no assurance that any future manufacturing or formulation changes we may make will achieve their intended objectives, and such changes may also cause sasineprocel or any future product candidates to perform differently and affect the results of future clinical trials conducted with the altered materials. Such changes or related unfavorable clinical trial results or changes in the CMOs we use to manufacture components and consumables for sasineprocel or other product candidates could delay initiation or completion of clinical trials, require the conduct of bridging studies or additional clinical trials or the repetition of one or more studies or clinical trials, increase development costs, delay or prevent potential regulatory approval and jeopardize our ability to commercialize sasineprocel or other product candidates, if approved, and generate revenue.

Certain of our product candidates require specific shipping, storage, handling and administration, which in some cases, may require cold-chain logistics and subject our product candidates to risk of loss or damage if failures occur.

Certain of our product candidates are sensitive to temperature, storage and handling conditions. They must be stored at very low temperatures in specialized freezers or specialized shipping containers until immediately prior to

use. The handling and administration of our product candidates may need to be performed according to specific instructions and in some steps within specific time periods. Failure to correctly handle our product candidates could negatively impact the efficacy and/or safety of our product candidates, or cause a loss of product candidates. In addition, because it is necessary to ship our product candidates and other materials globally from manufacturing sites to clinical sites, our product candidates will need to be frozen using specialized equipment and maintained following specific procedures in order to be shipped and stored without damage in a cost-efficient manner and without degradation. For administration, the cryopreserved product container must be carefully removed from storage, and rapidly thawed under controlled temperature conditions in an area proximal to the patient’s bedside and administered into the patient. The handling, thawing and administration of the cryopreserved therapy product must be performed according to specific instructions, typically using specific disposables, specific bags and in some steps within specific time periods. Failure to correctly handle our product candidates, including the potential breakage of the cryopreservation bags or to follow the instructions for thawing and administration and or failure to administer our product candidates within the specified period post-thaw could negatively impact the efficacy and/or safety of our product candidates, or cause a loss of our clinical supply.

If any of our product candidates are approved, we will need to scale-up a cost-effective and reliable cold-chain distribution and logistics network, which we may be unable to accomplish. Failure to effectively scale-up our cold-chain supply logistics, by us or third-parties, could in the future lead to additional manufacturing costs and delays in our ability to supply required quantities for our commercial supply, if approved. For these and other reasons, we may not be able to manufacture our current or future product candidates at commercial scale or in a cost-effective manner. Even if we are able to manufacture and distribute the products, if our products require specific procedures to maintain and use them, we may be limited in commercial opportunity.

Risks Related to Our Reliance on Third Parties

We rely, and expect to continue to rely, on third parties to conduct our clinical trials and preclinical studies. If these third parties do not successfully carry out their contractual duties, comply with applicable regulatory requirements, or meet expected deadlines, our product development programs and our ability to seek or obtain regulatory approval for or commercialize our products may be delayed.

We are dependent on third parties to conduct our clinical trials and preclinical studies. Specifically, we rely on, and intend to continue to rely on, medical institutions, clinical investigators, CROs, and consultants to conduct our preclinical studies and clinical trials in accordance with our clinical protocols and regulatory requirements. These CROs, investigators, and other third parties play a significant role in the conduct and timing of these trials and subsequent collection and analysis of data. While we have and will have agreements governing the activities of our third-party contractors, we have limited influence over their actual performance. Nevertheless, we are responsible for ensuring that each of our clinical trials is conducted in accordance with the applicable protocol and legal, regulatory, and scientific standards and requirements, and our reliance on our CROs and other third parties does not relieve us of our regulatory responsibilities. In addition, we and our CROs are required to comply with Good Laboratory Practice (GLP) requirements for certain preclinical studies, as well as GCP requirements, which are regulations and guidelines enforced by the FDA and comparable foreign regulatory authorities for clinical trials of all of our product candidates. Regulatory authorities enforce these GCPs through periodic inspections of trial sponsors, principal investigators, and trial sites. If we or any of our CROs or trial sites fail to comply with applicable GLP or GCP or other requirements, the clinical data generated in our preclinical studies or clinical trials may be deemed unreliable, and the FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authorities may require us to perform additional preclinical studies or clinical trials before approving our marketing applications, if ever. Further, our clinical trials must be conducted with products produced in accordance with cGMP regulations. Failure to comply with these regulations may require us to repeat clinical trials, which would delay the regulatory approval process.

There is no guarantee that any of our CROs, investigators, or other third parties will devote adequate time and resources to such trials or studies or perform as contractually required. If any of these third parties fail to meet expected deadlines, adhere to our clinical protocols, or meet regulatory requirements, or otherwise perform in a substandard manner, our clinical trials may be extended, delayed, or terminated. In addition, many of the third parties with whom we contract may also have relationships with other commercial entities, including our competitors, for whom they may also be conducting clinical trials or other development activities that could harm our competitive position.

Our CROs have the right to terminate their agreements with us in the event of an uncured material breach and under other specified circumstances. If any of our relationships with these third parties terminate, we may not be able to enter into arrangements with alternative third parties on commercially reasonable terms, in a timely manner or at all. Switching or adding additional CROs, investigators, and other third parties involves additional cost and requires our management’s time and focus. In addition, there is a natural transition period when a new CRO commences work. As a result, delays occur, which can materially impact our ability to meet our desired clinical development timelines. Though we work to carefully manage our relationships with our CROs, investigators and other third parties, there can be no assurance that we will not encounter challenges or delays in the future or that these delays or challenges will not have a material adverse impact on our business, financial condition, and prospects.

We rely on third parties for certain manufacturing systems, materials and components for our product candidates and expect to continue to do so for the foreseeable future. This reliance on third parties increases the risk that we will not be able to manufacture sufficient quantities of our products or such quantities at an acceptable cost, which could delay, prevent, or impair, our development or commercialization efforts.

We rely on certain third-party suppliers and manufacturing partners for systems, components and consumables for manufacturing sasineprocel and other product candidates. For example, with respect to sasineprocel, we have a collaboration agreement with Cell X for the development of a GMP capable cell processing system, a services agreement with Mytos for the supply of the iDEM platform, and a supply agreement and master development agreement with ClearPoint Neuro for its SmartFlow cannula used as part of the drug delivery system. A third party’s failure to execute on our supply requirements on commercially reasonable terms, in a timely manner and in compliance with regulatory requirements could adversely affect our business in a number of ways, including:

We do not have long-term commitments with most of our third-party suppliers. Although there have not been recent disruptions or terminations of relationships with our key suppliers or manufacturing partners and we expect such agreements to be renewed on existing terms, we may face potential termination of such agreements or renewal on terms that are unacceptable to us, if at all, increasing the risk of failing to timely manufacture sufficient quantities of our product candidates or such quantities at an acceptable cost. Even if we are able to renew agreements or establish long-term commitments with third-party suppliers or manufacturing partners, reliance on such third parties entails additional risks, including:

A performance failure on the part of our existing or future suppliers could delay clinical development or regulatory approval, and related remedial measures may be costly or time consuming to implement. For example, we previously experienced a material delay in patient dosing during our Phase 1/2a ASPIRO trial due to issues with syringe design. We worked with the supplier to design and validate a new syringe design. We do not currently have arrangements in place for redundant supply or a second source for all required materials and components used in the manufacture of our product candidates. If our existing or future third-party suppliers or manufacturing partners cannot

perform as agreed, we may be required to replace such suppliers or partners and we may be unable to replace them on a timely basis or at all.

We rely on third-party suppliers for critical raw materials, reagents, and manufacturing platforms, and any disruption, delay, quality issue, capacity constraint, price increase, or termination of these supply or license relationships could materially and adversely affect our development timelines, manufacturing plans, and commercial prospects.

Our manufacturing processes depend on specialized raw materials, reagents, consumables, and equipment, some of which we currently obtain from sole or single sources. While we procure a number of cell culture reagents from multiple vendors, including Bio-Techne, Thermo Fisher, StemCell Technologies, Akron Biotech and ClearPoint Neuro, some of these materials may require supplier‑specific specifications, release testing, and process compatibility, and not all items, such as the Sendai virus supplied by Thermo Fisher, are readily substitutable on short notice. In addition, in some circumstances we rely on sole source suppliers, including for iPSC reprogramming kits and for certain automated manufacturing systems, such as the Cell X and Mytos systems. Our use of such technology is licensed directly from a sole source and our supplier’s ability to supply these kits is subject to its own upstream license arrangements. We also rely on sole‑sourced manufacturing platforms.

Because our product candidates and processes are highly specialized, qualifying additional or alternative suppliers is time‑consuming, costly, and uncertain. Even where technically feasible, we may need to undertake bridging studies, comparability analyses, new stability programs, and process validations to support the use of a new source. For clinical‑stage product candidates such as sasineprocel, changes to our suppliers, components, or equipment may require prior regulatory notification or approval, additional CMC updates, or amended investigational submissions, and regulators may not agree that data generated using materials from an alternate supplier are comparable.

Our reliance on sole source suppliers for the iPSC reprogramming kit and key manufacturing platforms heightens these risks. If any of these parties elects to cease supplying us, fails to perform its obligations, experiences shortages, allocates supply to other customers, increases prices, encounters quality or compliance issues, becomes insolvent, experiences labor disputes or geopolitical or logistics disruptions, or otherwise cannot or will not meet our requirements, we may be unable to obtain sufficient quantities of critical inputs on a timely basis, on acceptable terms, or at all. We may also be unable to source functionally equivalent materials or equipment without significant development work or license rights we do not currently possess. If we are required to switch to a new supplier or platform, we could face substantial delays to our ongoing and planned clinical trials, including our planned Phase 3 activities, increased costs, and a need to resubmit CMC information, conduct additional preclinical testing or clinical bridging, or repeat manufacturing validations. These outcomes could delay, prevent, or limit regulatory approval and, if approved, impair our ability to commercialize our product candidates.

Our licenses and supply or service agreements may be subject to termination or non‑renewal under various circumstances, including our breach, insolvency events, or at‑will termination after notice periods. While we intend to qualify additional suppliers for certain critical reagents during our Phase 3 preparations, we may not be successful in doing so on our anticipated timelines, if at all. Any inability to secure, maintain, or expand our license rights or supply arrangements on commercially reasonable terms could force us to modify our manufacturing processes or product specifications, which may require extensive analytical work, new regulatory submissions, or additional clinical studies.

Further, our dependence on single or sole sources concentrates quality and compliance risk. If a supplier fails to comply with applicable cGMP standards or experiences an adverse regulatory inspection outcome, we could be forced to quarantine or discard materials, suspend manufacturing runs, or delay clinical dosing while issues are remediated or an alternative source is qualified. Even if a compliant alternative source exists, supply chain transitions can lead to variability in critical quality attributes, process performance, or yields, which could necessitate further

development work or regulatory engagement. Any of these events could materially harm our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects.

If any of the foregoing risks materialize, our clinical development could be significantly delayed or halted, our regulatory submissions could be delayed or denied, and, if our product candidates are approved, our ability to launch and commercialize any of our product candidates could be impaired, which would adversely affect our business and prospects.

Our reliance on third parties requires us to share our trade secrets, which increases the possibility that a competitor or other third party will discover them or that our trade secrets will be misappropriated or disclosed.

Because we rely on certain third-party suppliers and other service providers, we must, at times, share our proprietary technology and confidential information, including trade secrets, with them. We seek to protect our proprietary technology, in part, by entering into confidentiality agreements, and, if applicable, material transfer agreements, collaborative research agreements, consulting agreements, or other similar agreements with our collaborators, advisors, employees, and consultants prior to beginning research or disclosing proprietary information. These agreements typically limit the rights of the third parties to use or disclose our confidential information. Despite the contractual provisions employed when working with third parties, the need to share trade secrets and other confidential information increases the risk that such trade secrets become known by our competitors or other third parties, are intentionally or inadvertently incorporated into the technology of others, or are disclosed or used in violation of these agreements. Given that our proprietary position is based, in part, on our know-how and trade secrets and despite our efforts to protect our trade secrets, a competitor’s or other third party’s discovery of our proprietary technology and confidential information or other unauthorized use or disclosure of such technology or information would impair our competitive position and may have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects.

We may seek to enter into collaborations, licenses, and other similar arrangements and may not be successful in doing so, and even if we are, we may relinquish valuable rights and may not realize the benefits of such relationships.

We may seek to enter into collaborations, joint ventures, licenses, and other similar arrangements for the development or commercialization of our product candidates, if approved, due to capital costs required to develop or commercialize the product candidates or manufacturing constraints. We may not be successful in our efforts to establish or maintain such collaborations for our product candidates because our research and development pipeline may be insufficient, our product candidates may be deemed to be at too early of a stage of development for collaborative effort, or third parties may not view our product candidates as having the requisite potential to demonstrate safety and efficacy or significant commercial opportunity. In addition, we face significant competition in seeking appropriate strategic partners, and the negotiation process can be time-consuming and complex. Even if we are successful in our efforts to establish such collaborations, the terms that we agree upon may not be favorable to us. For example, we may need to relinquish valuable rights to our future revenue streams, research programs, intellectual property, product candidates, or grant licenses on terms that may not be favorable to us, as part of any such arrangement, and such arrangements may restrict us from entering into additional agreements with other potential collaborators. In addition, if we enter into such collaborations, we will have limited control over the amount and timing of resources that our collaborators will dedicate to the development or commercialization of our product candidates. Our ability to generate revenue from these arrangements will depend on any future collaborators’ abilities to successfully perform the functions assigned to them in these arrangements. We cannot be certain that, following a collaboration, license, or strategic transaction, we will achieve an economic benefit that justifies such transaction, and such transaction may not yield additional development or product candidates for our pipeline. Furthermore, we may not be able to maintain such collaborations if, for example, the development or approval of a product candidate is delayed, the safety of a product candidate is questioned, or the sales of an approved product candidate are unsatisfactory.

In addition, any potential future collaborations may be terminable by our strategic partners, and we may not be able to adequately protect our rights under these agreements. Furthermore, strategic partners may negotiate for certain rights to control decisions regarding the development and commercialization of our product candidates, if approved, and may not conduct those activities in the same manner as we do. Any termination of collaborations we enter into in

the future, or any delay in entering into collaborations related to our product candidates, could delay the development and commercialization of our product candidates, if approved, and reduce their competitiveness if they reach the market, which could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects.

Risks Related to Commercialization of Our Product Candidates

Even if we receive regulatory approval for any product candidate, we will be subject to ongoing regulatory obligations and continued regulatory review, which may result in significant additional expense.

Any regulatory approvals that we may receive for our product candidates will require the submission of reports to regulatory authorities, subject us to surveillance to monitor the safety and efficacy of the product, may contain significant limitations related to use restrictions for specified age groups, warnings, precautions, or contraindications, and may include burdensome post-approval study or risk management requirements. For example, the FDA may require a REMS as a condition of approval of our product candidates, which could include requirements for a medication guide, physician communication plans, or additional elements to ensure safe use, such as restricted distribution methods, patient registries, and other risk minimization tools.

In addition, if the FDA or a comparable foreign regulatory authority approves our product candidates, the manufacturing processes, labeling, packaging, distribution, adverse event reporting, storage, advertising, promotion, import, export, and recordkeeping for our products will be subject to extensive and ongoing regulatory requirements. These requirements include submissions of safety and other post-marketing information and reports, registration, as well as continued compliance with cGMPs and GCP requirements for any clinical trials that we conduct post-approval. Manufacturers of approved products and their facilities are subject to continual review and periodic, unannounced inspections by the FDA and other regulatory authorities for compliance with cGMP regulations and standards. Failure to comply with regulatory requirements or later discovery of previously unknown problems with our products, including adverse events of unanticipated severity or frequency, or with our third-party manufacturers or manufacturing processes, may result in, among other things:

The occurrence of any event or penalty described above may inhibit our ability to commercialize our product candidates and generate revenue and could require us to expend significant time and resources in response and could generate negative publicity.

The FDA’s and other regulatory authorities’ policies may change, and additional government regulations may be promulgated that could prevent, limit, or delay marketing authorization of any product candidate. We also cannot predict the likelihood, nature, or extent of government regulation that may arise from future legislation or administrative action, either in the United States or abroad. If we are slow or unable to adapt to changes in existing requirements or the adoption of new requirements or policies, or if we are not able to maintain regulatory compliance, we may be subject to enforcement action and we may not achieve or sustain profitability.

The FDA and other regulatory agencies actively enforce the laws and regulations prohibiting the promotion of off-label uses.

The FDA and other regulatory agencies strictly regulate the promotional claims that may be made about prescription products, such as sasineprocel, if approved. In particular, a product may not be promoted for uses that are not approved by the FDA or such other regulatory agencies as reflected in the product’s approved labeling. If we receive regulatory approval for a product candidate, physicians may nevertheless prescribe it to their patients in a manner that is inconsistent with the approved label. If we are found to have promoted such off-label uses, we may become subject to significant liability. The FDA and other regulatory agencies actively enforce the laws and regulations prohibiting the promotion of off-label uses. These restrictions also apply to communications made prior to regulatory approval, meaning that we are prohibited from promoting or making claims about our product candidates before they receive marketing authorization. Any dissemination of information that could be viewed as promotional prior to approval may result in enforcement action, delay or denial of approval, or other regulatory consequences. The U.S. federal government has levied large civil and criminal fines against companies for alleged improper promotion of off-label use and has enjoined several companies from engaging in off-label promotion. The government has also required companies to enter into consent decrees or imposed permanent injunctions under which specified promotional conduct is changed or curtailed. If we cannot successfully manage the promotion of our product candidates, if approved, we could become subject to significant liability, which would materially adversely affect our business and financial condition.

Any product candidates for which we intend to seek approval as biological products may face competition sooner than anticipated.

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA), signed into law on March 23, 2010, includes a subtitle called the Biologics Price Competition and Innovation Act of 2009 (BPCIA), which created an abbreviated approval pathway for biological products that are biosimilar to or interchangeable with an FDA-licensed reference biological product. Under the BPCIA, an application for a biosimilar product may not be submitted to the FDA until four years following the date that the reference product was first licensed by the FDA. In addition, the approval of a biosimilar product may not be made effective by the FDA until 12 years from the date on which the reference product was first licensed. During this 12-year period of exclusivity, another company may still market a competing version of the reference product if the FDA approves a full BLA for the competing product containing the sponsor’s own preclinical data and data from adequate and well-controlled clinical trials to demonstrate the safety, purity and potency of its product.

We believe that any of our product candidates, if approved as a biological product under a BLA, should qualify for the 12-year period of exclusivity. However, there is a risk that this exclusivity could be shortened due to Congressional action or otherwise, or that the FDA will not consider our product candidates to be reference products for competing products, potentially creating the opportunity for generic competition sooner than anticipated. Moreover, the extent to which a biosimilar, once approved, could be substituted for any one of our reference products in a way that is similar to traditional generic substitution for non-biological products will depend on a number of marketplace and regulatory factors.

The commercial success of sasineprocel and other product candidates will depend upon the degree of market acceptance of such product by physicians, patients, healthcare payors, and others in the medical community.

Our product candidates, including sasineprocel, may not be commercially successful. Even if any of our product candidates receive regulatory approval, they may not gain market acceptance among physicians and other healthcare practitioners, patients, healthcare payors, or the medical community. The commercial success of any of our current or future product candidates will depend significantly on the broad adoption and use of the resulting product by these individuals and organizations for approved indications. The degree of market acceptance of our products will depend on a number of factors, including:

If any product candidate, including sasineprocel, is approved but does not achieve an adequate level of acceptance by physicians and other healthcare practitioners, hospitals, healthcare payors, or patients, we may not generate sufficient revenue from that product and may not become or remain profitable. Our efforts to educate the medical community and third-party payors regarding the benefits of our products may require significant resources and may never be successful.

The successful commercialization of our product candidates, if approved, will depend in part on the extent to which governmental authorities and health insurers establish coverage, adequate reimbursement levels, and favorable pricing policies. Failure to obtain or maintain coverage and adequate reimbursement for our product candidates could limit our ability to market those products and decrease our ability to generate revenue.

The availability of coverage and the adequacy of reimbursement by governmental healthcare programs (e.g., Medicare and Medicaid), private health insurers, and other third-party payors are essential for most patients to be able to afford prescription medications such as our product candidates, including sasineprocel, if approved. Our ability to achieve coverage and acceptable levels of reimbursement for our product candidates by third-party payors will have an effect on our ability to successfully commercialize those product candidates. Accordingly, we will need to successfully implement a coverage and reimbursement strategy for any approved product candidate, including for the surgical procedure required to administer sasineprocel or other product candidates. Even if we obtain coverage for a given product candidate by a third-party payor, the resulting reimbursement payment rates may not be adequate or may require co-payments that patients find unacceptably high.

Third-party payors increasingly are challenging prices charged for biopharmaceutical products and services, and many third-party payors may refuse to provide coverage and reimbursement for particular drugs when an equivalent generic drug or a less expensive therapy is available. It is possible that a third-party payor may consider our product candidates as substitutable and offer to reimburse patients only for the less expensive product. Even if we are successful in demonstrating improved efficacy or improved convenience of administration with our product candidates, pricing of existing drugs may limit the amount we will be able to charge for our products. These payors may deny or revoke the reimbursement status of a given product or establish prices for new or existing marketed products at levels that are too low to enable us to realize an appropriate return on our investment in product candidate development. If reimbursement is not available or is available only at limited levels, we may not be able to successfully commercialize our product candidates and may not be able to obtain a satisfactory financial return on product candidates that we may develop.

There is significant uncertainty related to third-party payor coverage and reimbursement of newly approved products. In the United States, third-party payors, including private and governmental payors, such as the Medicare and Medicaid programs, play an important role in determining the extent to which new drugs will be covered. Some third-party payors may require pre-approval of coverage for new or innovative devices or drug therapies before they will reimburse healthcare providers who use such therapies. It is difficult to predict at this time what third-party payors will decide with respect to the coverage and reimbursement for our products.

If we participate in the Medicaid Drug Rebate Program or other governmental pricing programs (which may be required for our products to be covered by Medicaid and Medicare), in certain circumstances, our product candidates would be subject to ceiling prices set by such programs, which could reduce the revenue we may generate from any such product candidate. Participation in such programs would also expose us to the risk of significant civil monetary penalties, sanctions, and fines should we be found to be in violation of any applicable obligations thereunder.

Obtaining and maintaining reimbursement status is time-consuming, costly, and uncertain. The Medicare and Medicaid programs increasingly are used as models for how private payors and other governmental payors develop their coverage and reimbursement policies for drugs. However, no uniform policy for coverage and reimbursement for products exists among third-party payors in the United States. Therefore, coverage and reimbursement for products can differ significantly from payor to payor. As a result, the coverage determination process is often a time consuming and costly process that will require us to provide scientific and clinical support for the use of our products to each payor separately, with no assurance that coverage and adequate reimbursement will be applied consistently or obtained in the first instance. Furthermore, rules and regulations regarding reimbursement change frequently, and, in some cases, at short notice, and we believe that changes in these rules and regulations are likely. For products administered under the supervision of a physician, obtaining coverage and adequate reimbursement may be particularly difficult because of the higher prices often associated with such drugs. Additionally, separate reimbursement for the product itself or the treatment or procedure in which the product is used may not be available, which may impact physician utilization.

Outside the United States, international operations are generally subject to extensive governmental price controls and other market regulations, and we believe the increasing emphasis on cost-containment initiatives in Europe and other countries has and will continue to put pressure on the pricing and usage of our products, if approved in these jurisdictions. In many countries, the prices of medical products are subject to varying price control mechanisms as part of national health systems. Other countries allow companies to fix their own prices for medical products but monitor and control company profits. Additional foreign price controls or other changes in pricing regulation could restrict the amount that we are able to charge for our products. Accordingly, in markets outside the United States, the reimbursement for our products may be reduced compared with the United States and may be insufficient to generate commercially reasonable revenue and profits.

Moreover, increasing efforts by governmental and third-party payors in the United States and abroad to cap or reduce healthcare costs may cause such organizations to limit both coverage and the level of reimbursement for newly approved products and, as a result, they may not cover or provide adequate payment for our products. We expect to experience pricing pressures in connection with the sale of any of our products due to the trend toward managed healthcare, the increasing influence of managed care organizations on pricing and value-based care models, and additional legislative changes. The downward pressure on healthcare costs in general, and prescription drugs, surgical procedures, and other treatments in particular, has become very intense. As a result, increasingly high barriers are being erected to the entry of new products. See the section titled “Risk Factors—Risks Related to Our Business Operations and Industry—Current and future healthcare reform legislation or regulation may increase the difficulty and cost for us to obtain coverage for and commercialize our product candidates and may adversely affect the prices we may set” for additional related information.

We face significant competition from entities that have developed or may develop product candidates for PD, including companies developing novel treatments and technology platforms. If our competitors develop and commercialize their product candidates more rapidly than we do, or their technologies or their product candidates are more effective, safer, or less expensive than our products, our business and our ability to develop and successfully commercialize product candidates may be adversely affected.

The biotechnological industry is characterized by rapid technological advancement, intense competition, and a strong emphasis on proprietary and novel products and product candidates. Our competitors have developed, are developing, or may develop products, product candidates, and processes competitive with our product candidates. Any product candidate that we successfully develop and commercialize will compete with existing therapies and new therapies that may become available in the future. We believe that a significant number of products are currently under development, and may become commercially available in the future, for the treatment of PD. While we believe that our platform and our knowledge, experience and scientific resources provide us with competitive advantages, we face competition from major pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, among others. We anticipate that we will continue to face increasing competition as new therapies, technologies and data emerge within the field of neurodegenerative disease and, more specifically, for the treatment of PD.

We expect to compete with commercially available advanced therapies used in patients with motor fluctuations despite optimization of L‑dopa, including DBS devices such as Infinity and Liberta RC (both marketed by Abbott), Vercise (marketed by Boston Scientific), and Percept (marketed by Medtronic), as well as Focused Ultrasound (FUS) technologies such as Exablate Neuro (marketed by Insightec). We anticipate that there will continue to be improvements in DBS and FUS technologies. We are aware of cell and gene therapy candidates in clinical development that target sporadic, genetic, or all forms of PD. This includes autologous cell therapies in development by Hope Bio, Oryon, and others; allogeneic therapies from BlueRock Therapeutics (BlueRock)/Bayer, Sumitomo (AMCHEPRY, approved in Japan), Cellular Intelligence, Kenai Therapeutics, iRegene, S.Biomedics, Xellsmart and others; and gene therapies from AskBio/Bayer, MeiraGTx, Prevail Therapeutics, and other earlier-stage competitors. We are also developing autologous microglia cell replacement therapies for a number of leukodystrophies. In this area, we expect to compete with commercially available therapies such as bone marrow transplant and Skysona (Genetix Biotherapeutics). We are also aware of small molecules, antibodies, and advanced therapies that are in development for leukodystrophies including a PPARg agonist in development by Minoryx Therapeutics, a thyroid receptor-b agonist in development by Viking Therapeutics, and an AMPK activator and a deuterium-modified thiazolidinedione both in development by Poxel SA and other earlier-stage competitors.

Many of our current or potential competitors, either alone or with their collaboration partners, have greater financial, technical, manufacturing, supply, marketing and sales, and resources than we do, as well as equal or greater experience in the discovery and development of product candidates, obtaining FDA and other regulatory approvals of products and the commercialization of those products. These competitors also compete with us in recruiting and retaining qualified scientific and management personnel and establishing clinical trial sites and subject registration for clinical trials, as well as in acquiring technologies complementary to, or necessary for, our programs. Mergers and acquisitions in the biotechnological and biopharmaceutical industries may result in even more resources being concentrated among a smaller number of our competitors. Smaller or early-stage companies may also prove to be significant competitors, particularly through collaborative arrangements with large and established companies.

Our commercial opportunity could be reduced or eliminated if our competitors develop and commercialize products that have fewer or less severe side effects, are more potent, are more convenient, are less expensive or are sold more effectively than any products that we may develop. Our competitors also may obtain FDA or other applicable regulatory authority approval for their product candidates more rapidly than we may obtain approval for ours, which could result in our competitors establishing a strong market position before we are able to enter the market. In addition, our ability to compete may be affected in many cases by insurers or other third-party payors seeking to encourage the use of established products, such as DBS. If our product candidates are approved, we expect that they will be priced at a significant premium over existing products. Competitive products may make any products we develop obsolete or noncompetitive before we recover the expense of developing and commercializing our product candidates. If we are unable to compete effectively, our opportunity to generate revenue from the sale of any product candidate we may develop, if approved, could be adversely affected.

We currently have no marketing and sales organization and have no experience as a company in commercializing products, and we may need to invest significant resources to develop these capabilities. If we are unable to establish marketing and sales capabilities or enter into agreements with third parties to market and sell our products, we may not be able to generate product revenue.

We have no internal sales, marketing, or distribution capabilities, nor have we ever commercialized a product. If any of our product candidates ultimately receives regulatory approval, we must build a marketing and sales organization with technical expertise and supporting distribution capabilities to commercialize each such product in major markets, which will be expensive and time consuming, or collaborate with third parties that have direct sales forces and established distribution systems, either to augment our own sales force and distribution systems or in lieu of our own sales force and distribution systems. We have no prior experience as a company with the marketing, sale, or distribution of biopharmaceutical products, and there are significant risks involved in the building and managing of a sales organization, including our ability to hire, retain, and incentivize qualified individuals, generate sufficient sales leads, provide adequate training to sales and marketing personnel, and effectively manage a geographically dispersed sales and marketing team. Any failure or delay in the development of our internal sales, marketing, and distribution capabilities would adversely impact the commercialization of these products. We may not be able to enter into collaborations or hire consultants or external service providers to assist us in sales, marketing, and distribution functions on acceptable financial terms, or at all. In addition, our revenue from our product candidates and our profitability, if any, may be lower if we rely on third parties for these functions than if we were to market, sell, and distribute any product candidate that we develop ourselves. We likely will have little control over such third parties, and any of them may fail to devote the necessary resources and attention to sell and market our product candidates effectively. If we are not successful in commercializing our product candidates, either on our own or through arrangements with one or more third parties, we may not be able to generate any future revenue from product candidates and we would incur significant additional losses.

Even if we obtain FDA approval of any of our product candidates in the United States, we may never obtain approval for or commercialize any of them in any other jurisdiction, which would limit our ability to realize their full market potential.

Approval by the FDA in the United States does not ensure approval by regulatory authorities in other countries or jurisdictions; however, the failure to obtain approval in one jurisdiction may negatively impact our ability to obtain approval elsewhere. In addition, clinical trials conducted in one country may not be accepted by regulatory authorities in other countries and regulatory approval in one country does not guarantee regulatory approval in any other country.

We do not have any product candidates approved for sale in any jurisdiction, including in international markets, and we do not have experience in obtaining regulatory approval in international markets. If we fail to comply with regulatory requirements in international markets or to obtain and maintain required approvals, or if regulatory approvals in international markets are delayed, our target market will be reduced and our ability to realize the full market potential of any product we develop will be unrealized.

Our future growth may depend, in part, on our ability to operate in foreign markets, where we would be subject to additional regulatory burdens and other risks and uncertainties.

Our future growth may depend, in part, on our ability to develop and commercialize our product candidates in foreign markets. We are not permitted to market or promote any of our product candidates before we receive regulatory approval from applicable regulatory authorities in foreign markets, and we may never receive such regulatory approvals for any of our product candidates.

To obtain separate regulatory approval in many other countries we must comply with numerous and varying regulatory requirements regarding safety and efficacy and governing, among other things, clinical trials, commercial sales, pricing, and distribution of our product candidates. Regulatory requirements can vary widely from country to country and could delay or prevent the introduction of our products in those countries. Approval procedures may be more onerous than those in the United States and may require that we conduct additional preclinical studies or clinical trials.

If we obtain regulatory approval of our product candidates and ultimately commercialize our product candidates in foreign markets, we would be subject to additional risks and uncertainties, including:

Risks Related to Our Business Operations and Industry

Our operating results may fluctuate significantly, which makes our future operating results difficult to predict and could cause our operating results to fall below expectations or any guidance we may provide.

Our quarterly and annual operating results may fluctuate significantly, which makes it difficult for us to predict our future operating results. These fluctuations may occur due to a variety of factors, many of which are outside of our control, including, but not limited to:

coverage and reimbursement policies with respect to our product candidates, if approved, and potential future drugs that compete with our product candidates;

The cumulative effects of these factors could result in large fluctuations and unpredictability in our quarterly and annual operating results. As a result, comparing our operating results on a period-to-period basis may not be meaningful. Investors should not rely on our past results as an indication of our future performance.

This variability and unpredictability could also result in our failing to meet the expectations of industry or financial analysts or investors for any period. If our revenue or operating results fall below the expectations of analysts or investors or below any forecasts we may provide to the market, or if the forecasts we provide to the market are below the expectations of analysts or investors, the price of our common stock could decline substantially. Such a stock price decline could occur even when we have met any previously publicly stated revenue or earnings guidance we may provide.

Our success is dependent on our ability to attract and retain highly qualified management and other clinical and scientific personnel.

Our success depends in part on our continued ability to attract, recruit, retain, manage, and motivate highly qualified management, clinical, and scientific personnel, and we face significant competition for experienced personnel. We are highly dependent upon the management, clinical, research and development, manufacturing, regulatory, financial and business development expertise of our senior management, particularly Damien McDevitt, Ph.D., our President and Chief Executive Officer, Lisa Johnson-Pratt, M.D., our Sasineprocel Development Lead and Chief Commercial Officer, and Kim Raineri, our Chief Technology Officer, as well as our senior scientists and other members of our management team. The loss of services of any of these individuals could delay or prevent the successful development of our product pipeline, initiation or completion of our clinical trials and preclinical studies, regulatory approvals, or the commercialization of our product candidates. Although we have executed employment agreements or offer letters with each member of our senior management team, these agreements are terminable at will with or without notice and, therefore, we may not be able to retain their services as expected. We do not currently maintain “key person” life insurance on the lives of our executives or any of our employees. This lack of insurance means that we may not have adequate compensation for the loss of the services of these individuals.

In addition, employment candidates and existing employees often consider the value of the stock awards they receive in connection with their employment. If the perceived benefits of our stock awards decline, either because we are a public company or for other reasons, it may harm our ability to recruit and retain highly skilled employees. Our employees may be more likely to leave us if the shares they own have significantly appreciated in value relative to the original purchase prices of the shares, or if the exercise prices of the options that they hold are significantly below the market price of our common stock, particularly after the expiration of the lock-up agreements described herein.

We will need to expand and effectively manage our managerial, operational, financial, and other resources in order to successfully pursue our clinical development and commercialization efforts. We may not be successful in maintaining our unique company culture and continuing to attract or retain qualified management, clinical, and scientific personnel in the future due to the intense competition for qualified personnel among biopharmaceutical, biotechnology, and other businesses. Our industry has experienced a high rate of turnover of management personnel in recent years. If we are unable to attract, integrate, retain, and motivate necessary personnel to accomplish our business objectives, we may experience constraints that will significantly impede the achievement of our development objectives, our ability to raise additional capital, and our ability to implement our business strategy, and our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects could be materially and adversely affected.

We expect to expand our clinical development, manufacturing and regulatory capabilities and potentially implement sales, marketing and distribution capabilities, and as a result, we may encounter difficulties in managing our growth and expanding our operations successfully.

As of June 30, 2026, we had 120 full-time employees and three part-time employees. As we continue development and pursue the potential commercialization of our product candidates, as well as transition to functioning as a public company, we will need to expand our financial, development, regulatory, manufacturing, information technology, marketing, and sales capabilities or contract with third parties to provide these capabilities for us. As our operations expand, we expect that we will need to manage additional relationships with various strategic partners, suppliers, and other third parties, and we may not be successful in doing so. Our future financial performance and our ability to develop and commercialize our product candidates and to compete effectively will depend, in part, on our ability to manage any future growth effectively. Due to our limited financial resources and the limited experience of our management team in managing a company with such anticipated growth, we may not be able to effectively manage the expansion of our operations or recruit and train additional qualified personnel. The expansion of our operations may lead to significant costs and may divert our management and business development resources. Any inability to manage growth could delay the execution of our business plans or disrupt our operations.

We are subject to various U.S. federal, state, and foreign healthcare laws and regulations, which could increase compliance costs, and our failure to comply with these laws and regulations could harm our reputation, subject us to significant fines and liability, or otherwise adversely affect our business.

Our business operations and current and future arrangements with investigators, healthcare professionals, consultants, third-party payors, patient organizations, and customers expose us to broadly applicable foreign, federal, and state fraud and abuse and other healthcare laws and regulations. These laws may constrain the business or financial arrangements and relationships through which we conduct our operations, including how we research, market, sell, and distribute any products for which we obtain regulatory approval. Such laws include:

Efforts to ensure that our current and future business arrangements with third parties will comply with applicable healthcare and privacy laws and regulations will involve ongoing substantial costs. It is possible that governmental authorities will conclude that our business practices, including certain consulting agreements and advisory board agreements involving investment or financial arrangements with physicians may not comply with current or future statutes, regulations or case law involving applicable fraud and abuse or other healthcare laws and regulations. Due to the breadth of these laws, the narrowness of statutory exceptions and regulatory safe harbors available, and the range of interpretations to which they are subject, it is possible that some of our current or future practices might be challenged under one or more of these laws. If our operations are found to be in violation of any of these laws or any other governmental regulations that may apply to us, we may be subject to significant penalties, including civil, criminal, and administrative penalties, damages, fines, disgorgement, imprisonment, exclusion from participation in government-funded healthcare programs, such as Medicare and Medicaid, suspension or debarment from federal contracts, integrity oversight and reporting obligations, contractual damages, reputational harm, diminished profits and future earnings, and the curtailment or restructuring of our operations. Defending against any such actions can be costly and time-consuming and may require significant financial and personnel resources. Therefore, even if we are successful in defending against any such actions that may be brought against us, our business may be impaired. Further, if any of the physicians or other healthcare providers or entities with whom we expect to do business are found not to be in compliance with applicable laws or regulations, they may be subject to significant criminal, civil, or administrative sanctions, including exclusions from government-funded healthcare programs.

Current and future healthcare reform legislation or regulation may increase the difficulty and cost for us to obtain coverage for and commercialize our product candidates and may adversely affect the prices we may set.

In the United States and some foreign jurisdictions, there have been, and we expect there will continue to be, a number of legislative and regulatory changes to the healthcare system, including cost-containment measures that may reduce or limit coverage and reimbursement for newly approved drugs and affect our ability to profitably sell any product candidate for which we obtain regulatory approval. In particular, there have been and continue to be a number of initiatives at the U.S. federal and state levels that seek to reduce healthcare costs and improve the quality of healthcare.

For example, the ACA was enacted in the United States in 2010. Among the provisions of the ACA of importance to our potential product candidates, the ACA established an annual, nondeductible fee on any entity that manufactures or imports specified branded prescription drugs and biologic agents; extended manufacturers’ Medicaid rebate liability to covered drugs dispensed to individuals who are enrolled in Medicaid managed care organizations; expanded eligibility criteria for Medicaid programs; expanded the entities eligible for discounts under the 340B drug pricing program; increased the statutory minimum rebates a manufacturer must pay under the Medicaid Drug Rebate Program; established a new Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute to oversee, identify priorities in, and conduct comparative clinical effectiveness research, along with funding for such research; and established a Center for Medicare & Medicaid Innovation at CMS to test innovative payment and service delivery models to lower Medicare and Medicaid spending.

Since its enactment, there have been executive, judicial, and Congressional challenges to certain aspects of the ACA. On June 17, 2021, the U.S. Supreme Court dismissed the most recent judicial challenge to the ACA brought by several states without specifically ruling on the constitutionality of the ACA. Thus, in the absence of legislation, the ACA will remain in effect in its current form.

In addition, other legislative changes have been proposed and adopted since the ACA was enacted. For example, beginning April 1, 2013, Medicare payments to providers were reduced under the sequestration required by the Budget Control Act of 2011, which will remain in effect through fiscal year 2032, unless additional Congressional action is taken. Additionally, on January 2, 2013, the American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012 was signed into law, which, among other things, further reduced Medicare payments to several providers, including hospitals, imaging centers, and cancer treatment centers, and increased the statute of limitations period for the government to recover overpayments to providers from three to five years. On March 11, 2021, the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 was signed into law, which eliminated the statutory cap on drug manufacturers’ Medicaid drug rebate liability beginning January 1, 2024. The rebate was previously capped at 100% of a drug’s average manufacturer price.

There has been heightened governmental scrutiny in the U.S. on pharmaceutical pricing practices in light of the rising cost of prescription drugs. Such scrutiny has resulted in several recent congressional inquiries and proposed and enacted federal and state legislation designed to, among other things, bring more transparency to product pricing, review the relationship between pricing and manufacturer patient assistance programs, and reform government program reimbursement methodologies for products. On August 16, 2022, President Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 (IRA) into law. This statute marks the most significant action by Congress with respect to the pharmaceutical industry since adoption of the ACA in 2010. Among other things, the IRA requires manufacturers of certain drugs to engage in price negotiations with Medicare, with prices that can be negotiated subject to a cap; requires manufacturers to pay rebates to HHS if certain Medicare Part B- and Medicare Part D-covered drugs have price increases that outpace an allowable rate of inflation (first due in 2023); and replaces the Part D coverage gap discount program with a new discounting program (beginning in 2025). The IRA permits the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to implement many of these provisions through guidance, as opposed to regulation, for the initial years. CMS published the negotiated prices for the initial ten drugs, which went into effect in January 2026, and for the subsequent 15 drugs, which will first be effective in 2027, as well as the next 15 drugs that will be subject to price negotiation, although the Medicare drug price negotiation program is currently subject to legal challenges. The impact of the IRA on the pharmaceutical industry cannot yet be fully determined but is likely to be significant. Additional drug pricing proposals could appear in future legislation.

More recently, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which was enacted in July 2025, imposes significant reductions in the funding of the Medicaid program. Such reductions are expected to decrease the number of persons enrolled in Medicaid and reduce the services covered by Medicaid, which could adversely affect our sales of any product candidate that we commercialize.

In 2026, the U.S. government launched TrumpRx, a federal initiative to enable patients to gain access to certain prescription drugs at reduced costs based on pricing available in other countries (i.e., most-favored-nation pricing). In addition, the Trump administration is pursuing a two-fold strategy to reduce drug costs in the United States. While it is unclear whether and how the Trump proposals will be implemented, the Trump policies are likely to have a negative impact on the pharmaceutical industry and on our ability to receive adequate revenues for any product candidate that we commercialize. On the one hand, President Trump threatened to impose significant tariffs on pharmaceutical manufacturers that do not adopt pricing policies such as most favored nation pricing, which would tie the price for drugs in the United States to the lowest price in a group of other countries. In response, multiple manufacturers entered into confidential pricing agreements with the federal government. Subsequently, in April 2026, the Trump administration issued a proclamation imposing tariffs under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act on imports of brand pharmaceuticals, biologics and associated pharmaceutical ingredients, beginning July 31, 2026. Exempted from these tariffs, among others, are companies that have executed or are negotiating agreements with the federal government regarding most favored nation pricing and onshoring of production and research and development. On the other hand, the Trump administration is also pursuing traditional regulatory pathways to impose drug pricing policies and published two proposed regulations in December 2025, referred to as Globe and Guard. If finalized, these regulations would implement mandatory payment models under which manufacturers of eligible drugs would be required to pay rebates to the federal government on a portion of the units of their drugs that are reimbursed by Medicare, with the rebate amount based on international reference pricing for the drugs from economically comparable

countries. While the impact of the Globe and Guard proposed regulations, if finalized, cannot yet be determined, it is likely to be significant. Even regulatory proposals or executive actions that are ultimately deemed unlawful could negatively impact the U.S. pharmaceutical sector and our business.

At the state level, legislatures have increasingly passed legislation and implemented regulations designed to control pharmaceutical and biological product pricing, including price or reimbursement constraints, discounts, restrictions on certain product access, marketing cost disclosure, drug price reporting and other transparency measures. Some states have enacted legislation creating so-called prescription drug affordability boards with the goal of imposing price limits on certain drugs in these states, and at least one state board is imposing an upper payment limit. States are also seeking to implement general, across the board price caps for pharmaceuticals, or are seeking to regulate drug distribution. Some measures are designed to encourage importation from other countries and bulk purchasing. These types of initiatives may result in additional reductions in Medicare, Medicaid, and other healthcare funding, and may otherwise affect the prices we may obtain for our product candidates, if approved. Legally mandated price controls on payment amounts by third-party payors or other restrictions could harm our business, results of operations, financial condition, and prospects. In addition, regional healthcare authorities and individual hospitals are increasingly using bidding procedures to determine what pharmaceutical products and which suppliers will be included in their prescription drug and other healthcare programs. This could reduce the ultimate demand for our products, if approved, or put pressure on our product pricing, which could negatively affect our business, results of operations, financial condition, and prospects.

We expect that these new laws and other healthcare reform measures that may be adopted in the future may result in additional reductions in Medicare and other healthcare funding, more rigorous coverage criteria, new payment methodologies, and additional downward pressure on the price that we receive for any approved product. Any reduction in reimbursement from Medicare or other government programs may result in a similar reduction in payments from private payors. The implementation of cost containment measures or other healthcare reforms and initiatives may prevent us from being able to generate revenue, attain profitability, or commercialize our products, if approved.

If product liability lawsuits are brought against us, we may incur substantial liabilities and may be required to limit, delay, or cease commercialization of our product candidates.

We face an inherent risk of product liability as a result of the clinical trials of our product candidates and will face an even greater risk if we commercialize our product candidates, if approved. For example, we may be sued if our product candidates allegedly cause injury or are found to be otherwise unsuitable during product testing, manufacturing, marketing, or sale. Any such product liability claims may include allegations of defects in manufacturing, defects in design, a failure to warn of dangers inherent in the product candidate, negligence, strict liability, and a breach of warranties. Claims may be brought against us by clinical trial participants, patients or others using, administering, or selling products that may be approved in the future. Claims could also be asserted under state consumer protection acts.

If we cannot successfully defend ourselves against product liability claims, we may incur substantial liabilities or be required to limit, delay, or cease the commercialization of our products. Even a successful defense would require significant financial and management resources. Regardless of the merits or eventual outcome, liability claims may result in:

Our current product liability insurance coverage for the United States and certain other jurisdictions may not be adequate to cover all liabilities that we may incur. We may need to increase our insurance coverage as we expand our clinical trials or if we commence commercialization of our product candidates. Insurance coverage is increasingly expensive. Our inability to obtain and retain sufficient product liability insurance at an acceptable cost to protect against potential product liability claims could prevent or inhibit the commercialization of our product candidates. Although we will maintain such insurance, any claim that may be brought against us could result in a court judgment or settlement in an amount that is not covered, in whole or in part, by our insurance or that is in excess of the limits of our insurance coverage. Our insurance policies will also have various exclusions, and we may be subject to a product liability claim for which we have no coverage. We may have to pay any amounts awarded by a court or negotiated in a settlement that exceed our coverage limitations or that are not covered by our insurance, and we may not have, or be able to obtain, sufficient capital to pay such amounts.

Our insurance policies are expensive and protect us from only some business risks, which will leave us exposed to significant uninsured liabilities.

We do not carry insurance for all categories of risk that our business may encounter. Some of the policies we currently maintain include property, general liability, employee benefits liability, business automobile, workers’ compensation, products/clinical trial liability, cyber liability, clinical trials, and directors’ and officers’, and employment practices insurance. We do not know, however, if we will be able to maintain insurance with adequate levels of coverage. No assurance can be given that an insurance carrier will not seek to cancel or deny coverage after a claim has occurred. Any significant uninsured liability may require us to pay substantial amounts, which would adversely affect our financial position and results of operations.

We and our service providers may be subject to a variety of data protection, privacy, and security obligations, including laws, regulations, standards, and contractual provisions, which could increase compliance costs, and our actual or perceived failure to comply with such laws and obligations could subject us to potentially significant liability, fines, or penalties and otherwise harm our business.

We and our service providers maintain a large quantity of personal information, including sensitive personal information, such as confidential business and patient health information, in connection with our business operations and notably our clinical trials, and we are subject to laws and regulations governing the privacy and security of such information. The global data protection landscape is rapidly evolving, and we and our service providers may be affected by or subject to existing, amended, or new laws and regulations in the future, including as our operations continue to expand or if we operate in non-U.S. jurisdictions. These laws and regulations may be subject to differing interpretations by various courts and other governmental authorities, thus creating potentially complex compliance issues for us and our service providers, strategic partners, and future customers. The cost of compliance with these laws, regulations, and standards is high and is likely to increase in the future. Any failure or perceived failure by us to comply with federal, state, or foreign laws or regulations, our internal policies and procedures, or our contracts governing our processing of personal information, could result in negative publicity, government investigations and enforcement actions, claims by third parties (including class actions), and damage to our reputation, any of which could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects.

In the United States, numerous federal and state laws and regulations, including information privacy and security laws, data breach notification laws, and consumer protection laws, that govern the collection, use, storage, transfer, disclosure, protection, and other processing of health-related and other personal information could apply to our operations or the operations of our collaborators and third-party providers. In addition, we may obtain health information from third parties (including research institutions from which we obtain clinical trial data) that are subject

to privacy and security requirements under HIPAA. Consequently, depending on the facts and circumstances, we could be subject to significant liabilities if our practices are non-compliant with applicable privacy and consumer protection laws.

In addition, certain state laws govern the privacy and security of health-related and other personal information, many of which may differ from each other and from HIPAA, thus complicating compliance efforts. Failure to comply with these laws, where applicable, can result in the imposition of significant civil and/or criminal penalties and private litigation. By way of example, the California Consumer Privacy Act, as amended (the CCPA), gives California residents individual privacy rights related to how their personal information is used. The CCPA provides for civil penalties for violations, as well as a private right of action for data breaches that has increased the likelihood of, and risks associated with, data breach litigation. It also imposes additional data protection obligations on covered businesses, such as additional consumer rights processes, limitations on data uses, new risk assessment requirements for higher risk data, and opt outs for certain uses of sensitive data. The CCPA also created a California privacy protection agency authorized to issue substantive regulations and has resulted in increased privacy and information security enforcement. Additional compliance investment and potential business process changes may be required. Approximately one-third of states have passed laws similar to the CCPA, and additional states are proposing similar laws, reflecting a trend toward more stringent privacy legislation in the United States. The scope and application of these laws varies by jurisdiction, and we may be subject to such laws either directly or through a customer. Several states also have adopted laws that govern the privacy of consumer health information, such as Washington’s My Health My Data Act, which also creates rights for consumers and imposes obligations on companies to implement these laws. If we are subject to or affected by HIPAA, the CCPA, or other domestic privacy and data protection laws, any liability from failure to comply with the requirements of these laws could adversely affect our financial condition.

There are also privacy laws in other countries that may impact our operations, now or in the future. For example, in Europe, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) imposes stringent requirements regarding the collection, use, disclosure, storage, transfer, or other processing of personal data of individuals, notably but not exclusively those within the European Economic Area (EEA) or in the context of an establishment in the EEA, including requirements relating to the consent of the individuals to whom the personal data relates, the information provided to the individuals, the documentation we must retain, the security and confidentiality of the personal data, data breach notification and the use of third-party processors in connection with the processing of personal data. Companies that must comply with the GDPR face increased compliance obligations and risk, including more robust regulatory enforcement of data protection requirements and potential fines for noncompliance of up to €20 million or 4% of the annual global revenue of the noncompliant company, whichever is greater. The GDPR also confers a private right of action in some circumstances on data subjects and consumer associations to lodge complaints with supervisory authorities, seek judicial remedies, and obtain compensation for damages resulting from violations of the GDPR. In addition to fines, a breach of the GDPR may result in regulatory investigations, reputational damage, orders to cease or change our data processing activities, enforcement notices, assessment notices (for a compulsory audit), and/or civil claims (including class actions).

Among other requirements, the GDPR regulates transfers of personal data subject to the GDPR to third countries that have not been found to provide adequate protection to such personal data, including the United States (in some circumstances), and the efficacy and longevity of current transfer mechanisms between the EEA and the United States remains uncertain. Case law from the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) states that reliance on the standard contractual clauses—a standard form of contract approved by the European Commission as an adequate personal data transfer mechanism—alone may not necessarily be sufficient in all circumstances and that transfers must be assessed on a case-by-case basis.

We expect the existing legal complexity and uncertainty regarding international personal data transfers to continue and international transfers to the United States and to other jurisdictions more generally to continue to be subject to enhanced scrutiny by regulators. As the regulatory guidance and enforcement landscape in relation to data transfers continue to develop, we could suffer additional costs, complaints and/or regulatory investigations or fines, and/or if we are otherwise unable to transfer personal data between and among countries and regions in which we operate, it could affect the manner in which we operate our business, the geographical location or segregation of our relevant systems and operations, and could adversely affect our financial results.

Further, following the withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the European Union and the end of the transition period, from January 1, 2021, companies could also be subject to the United Kingdom General Data Protection Regulation and Data Protection Act 2018, as amended (collectively, the UK GDPR). The UK GDPR mirrors the fines under the GDPR and has the ability to fine up to the greater of €20 million/£17 million or 4% of annual global revenue. As we expand into other foreign countries and jurisdictions, we may be subject to additional laws and regulations that may affect how we conduct business.

Compliance with U.S. and international data protection laws and regulations could require us to take on more onerous obligations in our contracts, restrict our ability to collect, store, use, transfer, disclose, and otherwise process data, update our data privacy and security policies and procedures, or in some cases, impact our ability to operate in certain jurisdictions. Failure by us or our collaborators and our service providers to comply with U.S. and international data protection laws and regulations could result in government enforcement actions (which could include civil or criminal penalties), private litigation, and/or adverse publicity and could negatively affect our operating results and business. Moreover, clinical trial subjects about whom we or our potential collaborators obtain information, as well as the providers who share this information with us, may contractually limit our ability to use and disclose such information. Claims that we have violated individuals’ privacy rights, failed to comply with data protection laws, or breached our contractual obligations, even if we are not found liable, could be expensive and time consuming to defend, could result in adverse publicity, and adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects.

Our information technology systems, or those of any of our service providers, may fail or suffer security incidents and other disruptions, which could result in a material disruption of our product candidates’ development programs, compromise sensitive information related to our business, or prevent us from accessing critical information, potentially exposing us to liability or otherwise adversely affecting our business.

In the ordinary course of business, we collect, store, and transmit confidential information including but not limited to intellectual property, clinical trial data, proprietary and confidential business information, and personal information of our employees, contractors, service providers and strategic partners (collectively, Confidential Information). Our information technology systems and those of our third-party service providers, strategic partners, and other contractors or consultants are vulnerable to attack, damage, and interruption from computer viruses and malware (e.g., ransomware), “phishing” attacks, malicious code, misconfigurations, “bugs” or other vulnerabilities, natural disasters, terrorism, war, telecommunication and electrical failures, hacking, cyberattacks, phishing attacks and other social engineering schemes, employee theft or misuse, human error, fraud, denial or degradation of service attacks, and sophisticated nation-state and nation-state-supported actors.

In addition, attacks upon information technology systems are increasing in their frequency, levels of persistence, sophistication, and intensity, and are being conducted by sophisticated and organized groups and individuals with a wide range of motives and expertise, as well as through artificial intelligence. Furthermore, because the techniques used to obtain unauthorized access to, or to sabotage, systems change frequently and often are not recognized until launched against a target, we may be unable to anticipate these techniques or implement adequate preventative measures. We may also experience security incidents that may remain undetected for an extended period. Even if identified, we may be unable to adequately investigate or remediate incidents or breaches due to attackers increasingly using tools and techniques that are designed to circumvent controls, to avoid detection, and to remove or obfuscate forensic evidence. There can also be no assurance that our and our third-party service providers’, strategic partners’, contractors’, or consultants’ cybersecurity risk management program and processes, including policies, controls or procedures, will be fully implemented, complied with or effective in protecting our systems, networks and Confidential Information.

We and certain of our service providers are from time to time subject to cyberattacks and security incidents. If any such event, whether actual or perceived, were to occur, it could affect our reputation and/or operations, subject us to lawsuits (including class actions), cause us to incur significant costs, including legal expenses, harm customer confidence, hurt our expansion into new markets, cause us to incur remediation costs, or cause us to lose existing customers. For example, the loss of clinical trial data from clinical trials could result in delays in our regulatory approval efforts and potential regulator enforcement and significantly increase our costs to recover or reproduce the data. We also rely on a third party to manufacture our product candidates, and similar events relating to their computer systems could also have a material adverse effect on our business. To the extent that any actual or perceived disruption

or security incident affects our systems (or those of our third-party service providers, strategic partners, contractors or consultants) or were to result in a loss of or accidental, unlawful, or unauthorized access to, use of, release of, or other processing of Confidential Information, we could incur liability, the further development and commercialization of our product candidates could be delayed, and we could be subject to significant fines, penalties or liabilities for any noncompliance to certain privacy and security laws.

We have also outsourced elements of our information technology infrastructure and, as a result, a number of third-party service providers may or could have access to our Confidential Information. If our third-party service providers fail to protect their information technology systems and our Confidential Information, we may be vulnerable to disruptions in service and unauthorized access to our Confidential Information and we could incur liability and reputational damage. If the information technology systems of our third-party service providers and other contractors and consultants become subject to disruptions or security breaches, we may have insufficient recourse against such third parties and we may have to expend significant resources to mitigate the impact of such an event, and to develop and implement protections to prevent future events of this nature from occurring. Some of the federal, state, and foreign government requirements include obligations of companies to notify individuals and, in some cases, government agencies and enforcement authorities of security breaches involving particular categories of personally identifiable information or personal data, which could result from incidents experienced by us or by our third-party service providers, strategic partners, contractors or consultants. Any adverse impact to the availability, integrity or confidentiality of our or third-party systems or Confidential Information can result in legal claims or proceedings (such as class actions), regulatory investigations and enforcement actions, fines and penalties, or settlements. Our contracts may not contain limitations of liability, and even where they do, there can be no assurance that limitations of liability in our contracts are sufficient to protect us from liabilities, damages, or claims related to our data privacy and security obligations. Although we currently hold cybersecurity insurance, the costs related to significant security breaches or disruptions could be material and cause us to incur significant expenses.

While we have implemented security measures designed to protect against security incidents, there can be no assurance that these measures will be effective. We take steps designed to detect, mitigate and remediate vulnerabilities in our information systems (such as our hardware and/or software, including that of third parties with whom we work). However, we may not detect and remediate all such vulnerabilities including on a timely basis. Further, we may experience delays in developing and deploying remedial measures and patches designed to address identified vulnerabilities. Vulnerabilities could be exploited and result in a security incident.

Our business may be affected by the evolving regulatory framework for AI Technologies.

The regulatory framework for artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning, and automated decision-making technologies (collectively, AI Technologies) is rapidly evolving as many federal, state, and foreign government bodies and agencies have introduced or are currently considering additional laws and regulations. Additionally, existing laws and regulations may be interpreted in ways that would affect the operation of our AI Technologies.

It is possible that new laws and regulations will be adopted in the United States and in other non-U.S. jurisdictions, or that existing laws and regulations, including competition and antitrust laws, may be interpreted in ways that would limit our ability to use AI Technologies for our business, or require us to change the way we use AI Technologies in a manner that negatively affects the performance of our products, services, and business and the way in which we use AI Technologies. We may need to expend resources to adjust our products or services in certain jurisdictions if the laws, regulations, or decisions are not consistent across jurisdictions. Further, the cost to comply with such laws, regulations, or decisions and/or guidance interpreting existing laws, could be significant and would increase our operating expenses (such as by imposing additional reporting obligations regarding our use of AI Technologies). Such an increase in operating expenses, as well as any actual or perceived failure to comply with such laws and regulations, could adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations.

Our business could be affected by litigation, government investigations, and enforcement actions.

We currently operate in a number of jurisdictions in a highly regulated industry, and we could be subject to litigation, government investigation, and enforcement actions on a variety of matters in the United States or foreign jurisdictions, including, without limitation, intellectual property, regulatory, product liability, environmental, whistleblower, false claims, privacy, security, anti-kickback, anti-bribery, securities, commercial, employment, and other claims and legal proceedings that may arise from conducting our business. Any determination that our operations or activities are not in compliance with existing laws or regulations could result in the imposition of fines, civil and

criminal penalties, equitable remedies, including disgorgement, injunctive relief, and/or other sanctions against us, and remediation of any such findings could have an adverse effect on our business operations.

Legal proceedings, government investigations, and enforcement actions can be expensive and time-consuming. An adverse outcome resulting from any such proceedings, investigations or enforcement actions could result in significant damages awards, fines, penalties, exclusion from the federal healthcare programs, suspension or debarment from federal contracts, injunctive relief, product recalls, reputational damage, and modifications of our business practices, which could have a material adverse effect on our business and results of operations. Even if such a proceeding, investigation, or enforcement action is ultimately decided in our favor, the investigation and defense thereof could require substantial financial and management resources.

Our employees and independent contractors, including principal investigators, CROs, consultants, and vendors may be improperly classified or may engage in misconduct or other improper activities, including noncompliance with regulatory standards and requirements.

We endeavor to properly classify our employees as exempt or non-exempt with respect to wage and hour laws, including for purposes of minimum wage, overtime and applicable meal and rest periods, and we monitor and evaluate such classifications. Although there are no current, pending or threatened claims or investigations against us asserting that any employees have been incorrectly classified as exempt, the possibility nevertheless exists that certain job roles could be deemed to have been incorrectly classified as exempt. In addition, we endeavor to classify our workforce properly, and we monitor and evaluate such classifications. Although there are no current, pending or threatened claims or investigations against us asserting that any independent contractors have been incorrectly classified, the possibility nevertheless exists that certain contractors could be deemed to be employees.

We are exposed to the risk that our employees and independent contractors, including principal investigators, CROs, consultants, and vendors may engage in misconduct or other illegal activity. Misconduct by these parties could include intentional, reckless, and/or negligent conduct or disclosure of unauthorized activities to us that violate: (i) the laws and regulations of the FDA and other similar regulatory requirements, including those laws that require the reporting of true, complete, and accurate information to such authorities, (ii) manufacturing standards, including cGMP requirements, (iii) federal and state data privacy, security, fraud and abuse and other healthcare laws and regulations in the United States and abroad, (iv) laws that require the true, complete, and accurate reporting of financial information or data, or (v) laws that prohibit insider trading. Activities subject to these laws also involve the improper use or misrepresentation of information obtained in the course of clinical trials, the creation of fraudulent data in our preclinical studies or clinical trials, or illegal misappropriation of drug product, which could result in regulatory sanctions and cause serious harm to our reputation. It is not always possible to identify and deter misconduct by employees and other third parties, and the precautions we take to detect and prevent this activity may not be effective in controlling unknown or unmanaged risks or losses or in protecting us from governmental investigations or other actions or lawsuits stemming from non-compliance with such laws or regulations. In addition, we are subject to the risk that a person or government could allege such fraud or other misconduct, even if none occurred. If any such actions are instituted against us, and we are not successful in defending ourselves or asserting our rights, those actions could have a significant impact on our business and financial results, including, without limitation, the imposition of significant civil, criminal, and administrative penalties, damages, monetary fines, disgorgements, possible exclusion from participation in Medicare, Medicaid and other federal healthcare programs, suspension or debarment from federal contracts, imprisonment, contractual damages, reputational harm, diminished profits and future earnings, additional reporting requirements and oversight if we become subject to a corporate integrity agreement or similar agreement to resolve allegations of non-compliance with these laws, and curtailment of our operations, any of which could adversely affect our ability to operate our business and our results of operations.

Our ability to use net operating loss carryforwards and other tax attributes may be limited in connection with this offering or other ownership changes.

We have incurred substantial losses during our history, do not expect to become profitable in the near future, and may never achieve profitability. As of December 31, 2025, we had net operating loss (NOL) carryforwards of approximately $161.5 million for federal income tax purposes and $194.5 million for state income tax purposes, which may be available to offset our future taxable income, if any. Our federal NOL carryforwards generated after December 31, 2017, can be carried forward indefinitely but are limited to 80% utilization against taxable income beginning

January 1, 2021, which may require us to pay federal income taxes in future years despite having federal NOL carryforwards to utilize. Unless previously utilized, our state NOL carryforwards begin to expire in various amounts in 2038. Our NOL carryforwards and other tax attributes are subject to review and possible adjustment by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and state tax authorities.

In addition, under Section 382 of the U.S. Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended (the Code), our federal NOL carryforwards may be or become subject to an annual limitation in the event we have had or have in the future an “ownership change.” For these purposes, an “ownership change” generally occurs if one or more stockholders or groups of stockholders who own at least 5% of a company’s stock increase their ownership by more than 50 percentage points over their lowest ownership percentage within a rolling three-year period. Similar rules may apply under state tax laws. We have not determined the amount of the cumulative change in our ownership resulting from this offering or other transactions, or any resulting limitations on our ability to utilize our NOL carryforwards and other tax attributes. However, we believe that our ability to utilize our NOL carryforwards and other tax attributes to offset future taxable income or tax liabilities may be limited as a result of ownership changes, including potential changes in connection with this offering. If we earn taxable income, such limitations could result in increased future income tax liability to us, and our future cash flows could be adversely affected. We have recorded a full valuation allowance related to our NOL carryforwards and other deferred tax assets due to the uncertainty of the ultimate realization of the future benefits of those assets.

Changes to U.S. tariff and import/export regulations may have a negative effect on us.

The United States has enacted, and continues to consider, a range of trade-related measures, including tariffs, export controls, and other policies. The President of the United States has directed agencies to reassess key aspects of U.S. trade policy, and there has been ongoing debate and uncertainty surrounding potential changes to trade agreements, tariff structures, and foreign investment regulations. Shifts in trade policy—whether through legislation, executive action, or international negotiation—have and could continue to alter the global trade landscape and affect supply chains, pricing, and demand for goods and services. These developments, or the perception that such changes may occur, have and could continue to have a material adverse effect on global economic conditions, contribute to volatility in financial markets, and disrupt international trade, including trade between the United States and its key partners. Any of these factors could depress economic activity and the development and commercialization of our product candidates, which could result in a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.

Risks Related to Our Intellectual Property

If we are unable to obtain, maintain, defend, and enforce patent or other intellectual property protection for our product candidates or technology, or if the scope of the patent or other intellectual property protection obtained is not sufficiently broad, our competitors or other third parties could develop and commercialize products similar or identical to ours, and our ability to successfully commercialize our product candidates may be adversely affected.

We rely upon a combination of patent, trade secret, and trademark protection for our product candidates and proprietary technologies to prevent third parties from exploiting our achievements, thus eroding our competitive position in our market. These legal measures afford only limited protection, and competitors or others may gain access to or use our intellectual property and proprietary information. Our success depends in large part on our ability to obtain, maintain, expand, enforce, and defend the scope of our intellectual property protection in the United States and other countries with respect to our product candidates and other proprietary technologies we may develop. We generally seek to protect our proprietary position, in part, by filing patent applications in the United States and abroad relating to our product candidates, manufacturing processes, delivery devices and methods of use. We may also seek to protect our proprietary position by acquiring or in-licensing relevant issued patents or pending patent applications from third parties. For intellectual property we in-license, we may have limited control over prosecution, maintenance, and enforcement/defense and may depend on our licensors, which could adversely affect the scope or availability of protection. If we are unable to obtain, maintain, expand, enforce, and defend the scope of our intellectual property protection, our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects could be materially harmed.

The patent prosecution process is expensive, time-consuming, and complex, and we may not be able to file, prosecute, maintain, enforce, defend, or license all necessary or desirable patent applications or patents at a reasonable cost or in a timely manner or in all jurisdictions. It is also possible that we will fail to identify patentable aspects of our research and development output in time to obtain patent protection. Although we enter into non-disclosure and confidentiality agreements with parties who have access to confidential or patentable aspects of our research and development output, such as our employees, third-party collaborators, CROs, contract manufacturers, consultants, advisors, and other third parties, any of these parties may breach the agreements and disclose such output before a patent application is filed, thereby jeopardizing our ability to seek patent protection. Consequently, we may not be able to prevent any third party from using any of our technology that is in the public domain to compete with our product candidates or technologies.

In addition, our ability to obtain and maintain valid and enforceable patents depends on whether the differences between our inventions and the prior art allow our inventions to be patentable in light of the prior art. Furthermore, publications of discoveries in the scientific literature often lag behind the actual discoveries, and patent applications in the United States and other jurisdictions are typically not published until 18 months after filing, or in some cases not at all. Therefore, we cannot be certain that we were the first to invent the inventions claimed in any of our owned patents or pending patent applications, or that we or any future licensors were the first to file for patent protection of such inventions. Our competitors may have filed, and may in the future file, patent applications covering our products or technology similar to ours. Any such patent application may have priority over our owned and in-licensed patent applications or patents, which could require us to obtain rights to issued patents covering such technologies. If a third party can establish that we were not the first to make or the first to file for patent protection of such inventions, our patents and patent applications may not issue as patents and even if issued, may be challenged and invalidated or rendered unenforceable.

The patent position of biopharmaceutical companies generally is highly uncertain, involves complex legal and factual questions, and has been the subject of much litigation in recent years. As a result, the issuance, scope, validity, enforceability, and commercial value of our patent rights are highly uncertain. Our current and future patent applications may not result in patents being issued.

Any issued patents may not afford sufficient protection of our product candidates or their intended uses against competitors, nor can there be any assurance that the patents issued will not be infringed, designed around, invalidated by third parties, or effectively prevent others from commercializing competitive technologies or products. Further, even if these patents are granted, they may be difficult to enforce. For example, to the extent we rely on method-of-use patents, such patents may not prevent a competitor from marketing the same or a similar product for an indication outside the scope of the patented method, and physicians may prescribe competing products “off-label.” To the extent such conduct infringes our method-of-use claims, that infringement may be difficult to prevent or enforce against in practice.

Further, any issued patents that we own or may license in the future covering our product candidates could be narrowed or found invalid or unenforceable if challenged in court or before administrative bodies in the United States or other countries, including the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). Also, patent terms, including any extensions or adjustments that may or may not be available to us, may be inadequate to protect our competitive position on our product candidates for an adequate amount of time, and we may be subject to claims challenging the inventorship, validity, or enforceability of our patents and/or other intellectual property. Changes in United States patent law, or laws in other countries, could diminish the value of patents in general, thereby impairing our ability to protect our product candidates. Further, if we encounter delays in our development and testing of our product candidates, clinical trials, or regulatory review and approval of our product candidates, the period of time during which we could market our product candidates under patent protection may be reduced (i.e., patents protecting the product candidates might expire before or shortly after such product candidates are commercialized). Thus, our patents may not provide us with sufficient rights to exclude others from commercializing products similar or identical to ours or afford us any meaningful competitive advantage.

Moreover, the claim coverage in a patent application can be significantly reduced before the corresponding patent is granted. Even if patent applications issue as patents, they may not issue in a form that will provide us with any meaningful protection, prevent competitors or other third parties from competing with us, or otherwise provide us with any competitive advantage. Any patents issuing from our owned and any future in-licensed patent applications

may be challenged, narrowed, circumvented, or invalidated by third parties. Consequently, we do not know whether our product candidates and other proprietary technology will be protectable or remain protected by valid and enforceable patents. Even if a patent is granted, our competitors or other third parties may be able to circumvent the patent by developing similar or alternative technologies or products in a non-infringing manner, which could materially adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects. Furthermore, our competitors or other third parties may avail themselves of safe harbors under the Drug Price Competition and Patent Term Restoration Act of 1984 (Hatch-Waxman Amendments) to conduct research and clinical trials.

The issuance of a patent is not conclusive as to its inventorship, scope, validity, or enforceability, and our patent rights may be challenged in the courts or patent offices in the United States and abroad. We may be subject to a third-party post-issuance submission of prior art to the USPTO challenging the validity of one or more claims of our patents or patents we may license in the future. Third-party submissions may also be made prior to a patent’s issuance, precluding the granting of a patent based on our pending patent application or patent application we may license in the future. A third party may also claim that our patent rights are invalid or unenforceable in a litigation. The outcome following legal assertions of invalidity and unenforceability is unpredictable. In addition, we may become involved in opposition, derivation, revocation, reexamination, reissue, post-grant proceedings, inter partes review, interference proceedings, or other similar proceedings in the United States and/or foreign jurisdictions challenging our patent rights. An adverse determination in any such submission, proceeding, or litigation could reduce the scope of, or invalidate or render unenforceable, our patent rights, and may allow third parties, including generic drug companies, to commercialize our product candidates and other proprietary technologies we may develop and compete directly with us.

Moreover, some of our patent rights may in the future be co-owned with third parties. In the United States, each co-owner has the freedom to license and exploit the technology. If we are unable to obtain an exclusive license to any such third-party co-owners’ interest in such patent rights, such co-owners may be able to license their rights to other third parties, including our competitors, and our competitors could market competing products and technology. In addition, we may need the cooperation of any such co-owners of such patent rights in order to enforce such patent rights against third parties, and such cooperation may not be provided to us. Any of the foregoing could have a material adverse effect on our competitive position, business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects.

We may not be able to protect our intellectual property and proprietary rights throughout the world.

Filing, prosecuting, maintaining, enforcing, and defending patents on our product candidates in all countries throughout the world is expensive, and the laws of foreign countries may not protect our intellectual property rights to the same extent as the laws of the United States. Prosecution of foreign patent applications is often a longer process and patents may grant at a later date, and with a shorter term, than in the United States. The requirements for patentability differ in certain jurisdictions and countries. Additionally, the patent laws of some countries do not afford intellectual property protection to the same extent as the laws of the United States. For example, other countries may impose substantial restrictions on the scope of claims, limiting patent protection to specifically disclosed embodiments. Consequently, we may not be able to prevent third parties from practicing our inventions in all countries outside the United States, or from selling or importing products made using our intellectual property in and into the United States or other jurisdictions. Competitors may use our intellectual property in jurisdictions where we have not pursued and obtained patent protection to develop their own products and, further, may export otherwise infringing products to territories where we have patent protection, but enforcement is not as strong as that in the United States. These products may compete with our products, and our patents or patents we may license in the future or other intellectual property rights may not be effective or sufficient to prevent them from competing. Many companies have encountered significant problems in protecting and defending intellectual property rights in foreign jurisdictions. The legal systems of certain countries, particularly certain developing countries, do not favor the enforcement of patents, trade secrets, and other intellectual property protection, particularly those relating to biopharmaceutical products, which could make it difficult for us to stop the infringement of our patents or marketing of competing products in violation of our intellectual property and proprietary rights generally. In addition, some jurisdictions, such as Europe, Japan, and China, may have a higher standard for patentability than in the United States, including, for example, the requirement of claims having literal support in the original patent filing and the limitation on using supporting data that is not in the original patent filing. Under those heightened patentability requirements, we may not be able to obtain sufficient patent protection in certain jurisdictions even though the same or similar patent protection can be secured in the United States and other jurisdictions.

Proceedings to enforce our intellectual property and proprietary rights in foreign jurisdictions could result in substantial costs and divert our efforts and attention from other aspects of our business, could put our patents and any patents we may license in the future at risk of being invalidated or interpreted narrowly, could put our patent applications and any patent applications we may license in the future at risk of not issuing, and could provoke third parties to assert claims against us. We may not prevail in any lawsuits that we initiate, and the damages or other remedies awarded, if any, may not be commercially meaningful. Accordingly, our efforts to enforce our intellectual property and proprietary rights around the world may be inadequate to obtain a significant commercial advantage from the intellectual property that we develop.

Many countries have compulsory licensing laws under which a patent owner may be compelled to grant licenses to third parties. In addition, public policy initiatives may seek to increase access to therapies, including by limiting or weakening patent protection in certain circumstances, which could diminish the value of our intellectual property. Further, many countries limit the enforceability of patents against government agencies or government contractors. In these countries, the patent owner may have limited remedies, which could materially diminish the value of such patent. If we are forced to grant a license to third parties with respect to any patents relevant to our business, our competitive position may be impaired, and our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects may be adversely affected. In addition, geopolitical actions in the United States and in foreign countries (such as the wars between Russia and Ukraine and Israel and Hamas) could increase the uncertainties and costs surrounding the prosecution or maintenance of our patent applications or those of any future licensors. For example, a decree was adopted by the Russian government in March 2022, allowing Russian companies and individuals to exploit inventions owned by patentees from the United States without consent or compensation. Consequently, we would not be able to prevent third parties from practicing our inventions in Russia or from selling or importing product made using our inventions in and into Russia. This or any of the foregoing could increase uncertainties and costs for the maintenance, enforcement, or defense of our issued patents, which could impair our competitive intellectual property position.

Obtaining and maintaining our patent protection depends on compliance with various procedural, document submission, fee payment, and other requirements imposed by government patent agencies, and our patent protection could be reduced or eliminated for non-compliance with these requirements.

The USPTO and various non-U.S. government agencies require compliance with several procedural, documentary, fee payment, and other similar provisions during the patent application process. In some circumstances, we may be dependent on any future licensors to take the necessary action to comply with these requirements with respect to any licensed intellectual property. For example, periodic maintenance fees, renewal fees, annuity fees, and various other government fees on patents and applications will be due to be paid to the USPTO and various government patent agencies outside of the United States over the lifetime of our patents and applications. In certain circumstances, we may rely on licensing partners to pay these fees due to the U.S. and non-U.S. patent agencies. In some cases, an inadvertent lapse can be cured by payment of a late fee or by other means in accordance with the applicable rules. There are situations, however, in which non-compliance can result in abandonment or lapse of the patent or patent application, resulting in a partial or complete loss of patent rights in the relevant jurisdiction. In such an event, potential competitors might be able to enter the market with similar or identical products or technology, which could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects.

The USPTO and various non-U.S. government agencies require compliance with certain foreign filing requirements during the patent application process. For example, in some countries, including the United States, China, India, and some European countries, a foreign filing license is required before certain patent applications are filed. The foreign filing license requirements vary by country and depend on various factors, including where the inventive activity occurred, citizenship status of the inventors, the residency of the inventors and the invention owner, the place of business for the invention owner, and the nature of the subject matter to be disclosed (e.g., items related to national security or national defense). In some cases, a foreign filing license may be obtained retroactively in accordance with the applicable rules. There are situations, however, in which non-compliance can result in abandonment of a pending patent application or can be grounds for revoking or invalidating an issued patent, resulting in the loss of patent rights in the relevant jurisdiction. In such an event, potential competitors might be able to enter the relevant markets with similar or identical products or technology, which could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects. We would also be dependent on any future licensors to take the necessary actions to comply with these requirements with respect to any intellectual property we may license in the future.

Public health pandemics (such as the COVID-19 pandemic), geopolitical instability (war and terrorism), natural disasters, or similar events may impair our and our licensors’ ability to comply with these procedural, document submission, fee payment, and other requirements imposed by government patent agencies, which may materially and adversely affect our ability to obtain or maintain patent protection for our products and product candidates.

Changes in patent laws or their interpretations could diminish the value of patents in general, thereby impairing our ability to protect our products.

Changes in either the patent laws or interpretation of the patent laws in the United States or in other countries could increase the uncertainties and costs surrounding the prosecution of patent applications and the enforcement or defense of issued patents. Assuming that other requirements for patentability are met, prior to March 2013, in the United States, the first to invent the claimed invention was entitled to the patent, while outside the United States, the first to file a patent application was entitled to the patent. After March 2013, under the Leahy-Smith America Invents Act (the America Invents Act) enacted in September 2011, the United States transitioned to a first inventor to file system in which, assuming that other requirements for patentability are met, the first inventor to file a patent application will be entitled to the patent on an invention regardless of whether a third party was the first to invent the claimed invention. A third party that files a patent application in the USPTO after March 2013, but before us or our licensors could therefore be awarded a patent covering an invention of ours or our licensors even if we or our licensors had made the invention before it was made by such third party. This requires us to be cognizant of the time from invention to filing of a patent application. Since patent applications in the United States and most other countries are confidential for a period of time after filing or until issuance, we cannot be certain that we or our licensors are the first to either (i) file any patent application related to our product candidates and other proprietary technologies we may develop or (ii) invent any of the inventions claimed in our patents or patent applications.

The America Invents Act also included a number of significant changes that affect the way patent applications are prosecuted and also affect patent litigation. These include allowing third party protests and submission of prior art to the USPTO during patent prosecution and additional procedures to attack the validity of a patent by USPTO-administered post-grant proceedings, including post-grant review, inter partes review, and derivation proceedings. Because of a lower evidentiary standard in USPTO proceedings compared to the evidentiary standard in United States federal courts necessary to invalidate a patent claim, a third party could potentially provide evidence in a USPTO proceeding sufficient for the USPTO to hold a claim invalid even though the same evidence would be insufficient to invalidate the claim if first presented in a district court action. Accordingly, a third party may attempt to use the USPTO procedures to invalidate our patent claims or any patent claims we may license in the future that would not have been invalidated if first challenged by the third party as a defendant in a district court action.

In addition, the patent positions of companies in the development and commercialization of pharmaceuticals are particularly uncertain. Recent U.S. Supreme Court rulings have narrowed the scope of patent protection available in certain circumstances and weakened the rights of patent owners in certain situations. We cannot predict how decisions by the courts, the U.S. Congress or the USPTO may impact the value of our patent rights. For example, the U.S. Supreme Court held in Amgen v. Sanofi (2023) that a functionally claimed genus was invalid for failing to comply with the enablement requirement of the Patent Act. As such, our patent rights with functional claims may be vulnerable to third party challenges seeking to invalidate these claims for lacking enablement or adequate support in the specification. Depending on future actions by the U.S. Congress, the federal courts and the USPTO, the laws and regulations governing patents could change in unpredictable ways that could have a material adverse effect on our existing patent portfolio and our ability to protect and enforce our intellectual property in the future. Similarly, changes in patent law and regulations in other countries or jurisdictions or changes in the governmental bodies that enforce them or changes in how the relevant governmental authority enforces patent laws or regulations may weaken our ability to obtain new patents or to enforce patents that we have or may obtain or license in the future.

In 2012, the European Union Patent Package (EU Patent Package) regulations were passed with the goal of providing a single pan-European Unitary Patent and a new European Unified Patent Court (UPC) for litigation involving European patents. The EU Patent Package was implemented on June 1, 2023. The UPC is an international court established by a subset of EU Member States, and not all EU Member States participate or have ratified the UPC Agreement; accordingly, the geographic scope of UPC jurisdiction and Unitary Patent coverage is limited to participating EU Member States that have ratified the UPC Agreement. As a result, European patents (including those issued prior to ratification of the EU Patent Package) validated in participating, ratifying EU Member States now by

default automatically fall under the jurisdiction of the UPC, unless otherwise opted out. It is uncertain how the UPC will impact granted European patents in the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries. Our European patent applications, if issued, could be challenged in the UPC. During the first seven years of the UPC’s existence, the UPC legislation allows a patent owner to opt its European patents out of the jurisdiction of the UPC. We may decide to opt out our future European patents from the UPC, but doing so may preclude us from realizing the benefits of the UPC. Moreover, if we do not meet all of the formalities and requirements for opt-out under the UPC, our future European patents could remain under the jurisdiction of the UPC. The UPC will provide our competitors with a new forum to centrally revoke our European patent, and allow for the possibility of a competitor to obtain pan-European injunction. Such a loss of patent protection could have a material adverse impact on our business and our ability to commercialize our technology and product candidates due to increased competition and, resultantly, on our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects. The UPC and Unitary Patent are significant changes in European patent practice. As the UPC is a new court system, there is no precedent for the court, increasing the uncertainty of any litigation in the UPC. We may choose to opt out of UPC jurisdiction for current and future European Patents and decline to request unitary effect for future European Patent grants.

Issued patents covering our product candidates could be found invalid or unenforceable if challenged in court or before administrative bodies in the United States or abroad.

Our patent rights may be subject to priority, validity, inventorship, ownership, and enforceability disputes. Legal proceedings relating to intellectual property claims, with or without merit, are unpredictable and generally expensive and time-consuming and likely to divert significant resources from our core business, including distracting our management and scientific personnel from their normal responsibilities and generally harm our business. If we or any future licensors are unsuccessful in any of these proceedings, such patents and patent applications may be narrowed, invalidated, or held unenforceable. Any of the foregoing could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects.

If we initiate legal proceedings against a third party to enforce a patent covering our product candidates, the defendant could counterclaim that such patent is invalid or unenforceable. In patent litigation in the United States, defendant counterclaims alleging invalidity or unenforceability are commonplace. Grounds for a validity challenge could include an alleged failure to meet any of several statutory requirements, including lack of novelty, obviousness, non-enablement, lack of sufficient written description, failure to claim patent-eligible subject matter, or obviousness-type double patenting. Grounds for an unenforceability assertion could be an allegation that someone connected with prosecution of the patent withheld relevant information from the USPTO, or made a misleading or inconsistent statement, during prosecution. Third parties may raise claims challenging the validity or enforceability of a patent before administrative bodies in the United States or abroad, even outside the context of litigation. Such mechanisms include re-examination, post-grant review, inter partes review, interference proceedings, derivation proceedings, and equivalent proceedings in foreign jurisdictions (e.g., opposition proceedings). Such proceedings could result in the revocation of, cancellation of, or amendment to our patent rights or any patent rights we may obtain or license in the future in such a way that they no longer cover our product candidates or prevent third parties from competing with our product candidates. The outcome following legal assertions of invalidity and unenforceability is unpredictable. With respect to the validity question, for example, we cannot be certain that there is no invalidating prior art, of which we and the patent examiner were unaware during prosecution. If a third party were to prevail on a legal assertion of invalidity or unenforceability, we would lose at least part, and perhaps all, of the patent protection for our product candidates. Such a loss of patent protection would have a material adverse impact on our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects.

Patent terms may be inadequate to protect the competitive position of our product candidates for an adequate amount of time.

Patents have a limited lifespan. In the United States, if all maintenance fees are timely paid, the natural expiration of a patent is generally 20 years from its earliest U.S. non-provisional or international patent application filing date. Various extensions may be available, but the life of a patent, and the protection it affords, is limited. Even if patents covering our product candidates are obtained, once the patent has expired, we may be vulnerable to competition from competitive products, including generics. Given the amount of time required for the development, testing, and regulatory review of new product candidates, patents protecting such product candidates might expire before or shortly after such product candidates are commercialized. As a result, our intellectual property may not provide us with

sufficient rights to exclude others from commercializing products similar or identical to ours. If we do not have sufficient patent life to protect our products, our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects will be adversely affected.

If we do not obtain patent term extension and equivalent extensions outside of the United States for our product candidates, our business may be materially harmed.

Depending upon the timing, duration, and specifics of any FDA regulatory approval of any of our product candidates, one or more of our U.S. patents may be eligible for limited patent term extension under the Hatch-Waxman Amendments. The Hatch-Waxman Amendments permit a patent term extension of up to five years as compensation for patent term lost during the FDA regulatory review process. A patent term extension cannot extend the remaining term of a patent beyond a total of 14 years from the date of product approval, only one patent may be extended, and only those claims covering the approved drug, a method for using it, or a method for manufacturing it may be extended. Similar patent term restoration provisions to compensate for commercialization delay caused by regulatory review are also available in certain foreign jurisdictions, such as in Europe under Supplemental Protection Certificate. However, we may not be granted an extension for various reasons, including failing to exercise due diligence during the testing phase or regulatory review process, failing to apply within applicable deadlines, failing to apply prior to expiration of relevant patents, or failing to satisfy other applicable requirements. Moreover, the applicable time period or the scope of patent protection afforded could be less than we request. In addition, to the extent we wish to pursue patent term extension based on a patent that we may license from a third party in the future, we may need the cooperation of that third party. If we are unable to obtain patent term extension, or the foreign equivalent, or if the term of any such extension is less than we request, our competitors may obtain approval of competing products following our patent expiration, and our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects could be materially harmed.

We may be subject to claims challenging the inventorship of our patents and other intellectual property.

We may be subject to claims that former employees, consultants, collaborators, or other third parties have an interest in our patent rights, trade secrets, or other intellectual property as an inventor, co-inventor, or owner of trade secrets. For example, we may have inventorship disputes arise from conflicting obligations of consultants or others who are involved in developing our product candidates and other proprietary technologies we may develop. Litigation may be necessary to defend against these and other claims challenging inventorship or our patent rights, trade secrets, or other intellectual property. If we fail in defending any such claims, in addition to paying monetary damages, we may lose valuable intellectual property rights, such as exclusive ownership of, or the right to use intellectual property that is important to our product candidates and other proprietary technologies we may develop. Even if we are successful in defending against such claims, litigation could result in substantial costs and be a distraction to our management and other employees. In addition, individuals named as inventors on our patents and patent applications may in the future become involved with competitors or otherwise take actions that could result in the development of products or processes designed to compete with or design around our intellectual property. Any of the foregoing could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

If we are unable to protect the confidentiality of our trade secrets, our business and competitive position would be harmed.

In addition to seeking patent protection for our product candidates and proprietary technologies, we may rely on trade secret protection and confidentiality agreements to protect our unpatented know-how, technology, and other proprietary information and to maintain our competitive position. We seek to protect these trade secrets and other proprietary technology, in part, by entering into non-disclosure and confidentiality agreements with parties who have access to them, such as our employees, third-party collaborators, CROs, contract manufacturers, consultants, advisors, and other third parties. We also enter into confidentiality and invention or patent assignment agreements with our employees and consultants. We also use physical and technological security measures to protect our confidential and proprietary information; however, these measures may be breached or otherwise become ineffective.

Trade secrets and know-how can be difficult to protect. We cannot guarantee that we have entered into applicable agreements with each party that may have or have had access to our trade secrets or proprietary technology and processes. Despite these efforts, any of these parties may breach the agreements and disclose our proprietary information, including our trade secrets, and we may not be able to obtain adequate remedies for such breaches. Monitoring unauthorized uses and disclosures is difficult, and we do not know whether the steps we have taken to protect our proprietary technologies will be effective. We cannot guarantee that any potential trade secrets and other proprietary and confidential information will not be disclosed or that competitors will not otherwise gain access to trade secrets. Enforcing a claim that a party illegally disclosed or misappropriated a trade secret is difficult, expensive, and time-consuming, and the outcome is unpredictable. In addition, some courts inside and outside the United States are less willing or unwilling to protect trade secrets. If any of our trade secrets were to be lawfully obtained or independently developed by a competitor or other third party, we would have no right to prevent them from using that technology or information to compete with us. Furthermore, others may independently discover similar trade secrets and proprietary information. If any of our trade secrets were to be disclosed or misappropriated or if any such information were to be independently developed by a competitor or other third party, our competitive position would be materially and adversely harmed. In addition, we may need to share our proprietary information, including trade secrets, with current or future business partners, collaborators, contractors, and other third parties, including those located in jurisdictions that may present a heightened risk of misappropriation, including through direct intrusion by private parties, foreign actors or those affiliate with or controlled by state actors. As a result, we may encounter significant problems in protecting and defending our intellectual property in the United States and abroad.

We may be subject to claims that third parties have an ownership interest in our trade secrets. For example, we may have disputes arise from conflicting obligations of our employees, consultants, or others who are involved in developing our product candidates. Litigation may be necessary to defend against these and other claims challenging ownership of our trade secrets. If we fail in defending any such claims, in addition to paying monetary damages, we may lose valuable trade secret rights, such as exclusive ownership of, or right to use, trade secrets that are important to our product candidates and other proprietary technologies we may develop. Such an outcome could have a material adverse effect on our business. Even if we are successful in defending against such claims, litigation could result in substantial costs and be a distraction to our management and other employees. Any of the foregoing could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects.

We may be subject to claims that our employees, consultants, or advisors have wrongfully used or disclosed alleged trade secrets of their current or former employers or claims asserting ownership of what we regard as our own intellectual property.

Some of our employees, consultants, and advisors are currently or were previously employed at universities or other biotechnology or pharmaceutical companies, including our competitors or potential competitors. Although we try to ensure that our employees, consultants, and advisors do not use the proprietary information or know-how of others in their work for us, we may be subject to claims that we or these individuals have used or disclosed intellectual property, including trade secrets or other proprietary information, of any such individual’s current or former employer. Litigation may be necessary to defend against these claims. If we fail in defending any such claims, in addition to paying monetary damages, we may lose valuable intellectual property rights or personnel. Even if we are successful in defending against such claims, litigation could result in substantial costs and be a distraction to our management.

In addition, while it is our policy to require our employees and contractors who may be involved in the conception or development of intellectual property to execute agreements assigning such intellectual property to us, we may be unsuccessful in executing such an agreement with each party who, in fact, conceives or develops intellectual property that we regard as our own. The assignment of intellectual property rights may not be self-executing, or the assignment agreements may be breached, and we may be forced to bring claims against third parties, or defend claims that they may bring against us, to determine the ownership of what we regard as our intellectual property. Such claims could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects.

We may not identify relevant third-party patents or may incorrectly interpret the relevance, scope, or expiration of a third-party patent, which might adversely affect our ability to develop and market our products.

We cannot guarantee that any of our patent searches or analyses, including the identification of relevant patents, the scope of patent claims, or the expiration of relevant patents, are or will be complete or thorough, nor can we be certain that we have identified or will identify each and every third-party patent and pending patent application in the United States and abroad that is relevant to or necessary for the commercialization of our current and future product candidates in any jurisdiction. Patent applications in the United States and elsewhere are not published until approximately 18 months after the earliest filing for which priority is claimed, with such earliest filing date being commonly referred to as the priority date. Therefore, patent applications covering our product candidates could have been filed by others without our knowledge. The scope of a patent claim is determined by the interpretation of the law, the words of a patent claim, the written disclosure in a patent, and the patent’s prosecution history. Our interpretation of the relevance or the scope of a patent or a pending patent application may be incorrect, which may negatively impact our ability to market our products. We may incorrectly determine that our products are not covered by a third-party patent or may incorrectly predict whether a third party’s pending patent application will issue with claims of relevant scope. Even if we believe we are free to operate based on our analyses, competitors may obtain issued claims, including in patents we believe are not relevant, that could block our efforts or result in infringement.

Our determination of the expiration date of any patent in the United States or abroad that we consider relevant may be incorrect, and we may incorrectly conclude that a third-party patent is invalid and unenforceable or not infringed. Our failure to identify and correctly interpret relevant patents may negatively impact our ability to develop and market our product candidates. If we fail to identify and correctly interpret relevant patents, we may be subject to infringement claims. Also, because the claims of published patent applications can change between publication and patent grant, there may be published patent applications that may ultimately issue with claims that we infringe. As the number of competitors in the market grows and the number of patents issued in this area increases, the possibility of patent infringement claims escalates. Moreover, in recent years, individuals and groups that are non-practicing entities, commonly referred to as “patent trolls,” have purchased patents and other intellectual property assets for the purpose of making claims of infringement in order to extract settlements. From time to time, we may receive threatening letters, notices or “invitations to license,” or may be the subject of claims that our products and business operations infringe or violate the intellectual property rights of others. We cannot guarantee that we will be able to successfully settle or otherwise resolve such infringement claims. If we fail in any such dispute, in addition to being forced to pay damages, we may be temporarily or permanently prohibited from commercializing any of our product candidates that are held to be infringing. We might, if possible, also be forced to redesign product candidates or services so that we no longer infringe the third-party intellectual property rights. Any of these events, even if we were ultimately to prevail, could require us to divert substantial financial and management resources that we would otherwise be able to devote to our business.

Third-party claims of intellectual property infringement, misappropriation, or other violations against us or our collaborators could be expensive and time consuming and may prevent or delay the development and commercialization of our product candidates.

Our commercial success depends in part on our ability to avoid infringing, misappropriating, and otherwise violating the patents and other intellectual property rights of third parties. There is a substantial amount of complex litigation involving patents and other intellectual property rights in the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries, as well as administrative proceedings for challenging patents, including interference, derivation, and reexamination proceedings before the USPTO or oppositions and other comparable proceedings in foreign jurisdictions.

Numerous U.S. and foreign-issued patents and pending patent applications owned by third parties exist in the fields in which we plan to commercialize our product candidates and in which we are developing other proprietary technologies. As the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries expand and more patents are issued, and as we gain greater visibility and market exposure as a public company, the risk increases that our product candidates and commercializing activities may give rise to claims of infringement of the patent rights of others. We cannot assure that our product candidates and other proprietary technologies we develop will not infringe existing or future patents owned by third parties. We may not be aware of patents that have already been issued for which a third party, such as a competitor in the fields in which we are developing our product candidates, might assert as infringed by us. It is also possible that patents owned by third parties of which we are aware, but which we do not believe we infringe or that

we believe we have valid defenses to any claims of patent infringement, could be found to be infringed by us. It is not unusual that corresponding patents issued in different countries have different scopes of coverage, such that in one country a third-party patent does not pose a material risk, but in another country, the corresponding third-party patent may pose a material risk to our product candidates. As such, we monitor third-party patents in the relevant pharmaceutical markets. In addition, because patent applications can take many years to issue, there may be currently pending patent applications that may later result in issued patents that we may infringe. For example, pending patent applications that have been published can, subject to certain limitations, be later amended in a manner that could cover product candidates or the use of our products. We are aware of certain third-party patents in the United States and elsewhere containing claims directed to methods of manufacturing dopaminergic neurons that may cover certain methods that we may use to manufacture sasineprocel. Based on our current development plans, we currently expect the identified patents to expire before any commercial launch of sasineprocel, if approved. We are also developing alternative manufacturing methods that do not use the methods claimed in the relevant patent claims. However, we cannot assure you that these alternative methods will be successfully developed, suitable for commercial manufacturing, or determined to not infringe those claims. Our expectation regarding patent expiration before commercial launch does not eliminate potential risks relating to manufacturing activities conducted before expiration. If we use a manufacturing method covered by a valid and enforceable claim of one of these patents while it remains in force, we could face infringement claims. If successfully asserted, such claims could require us to obtain a license, modify our manufacturing processes, pay damages, or delay affected activities. A license may not be available on commercially reasonable terms or at all. Developing and implementing alternative manufacturing methods could require additional time, expense, comparability studies or regulatory submissions, which could delay the development or commercialization of sasineprocel.

In the event that any third-party claims that we infringe their patents or that we are otherwise employing their proprietary technology without authorization and initiates litigation against us, even if we believe such claims are without merit, a court of competent jurisdiction could hold that such patents are valid, enforceable, and infringed by us. Defense of infringement claims, regardless of their merit, would involve substantial litigation expense and would be a substantial diversion of management and other employee resources from our business, and may impact our reputation. In addition, such claims may be asserted against our collaborators, licensees, or other business partners, and we may be required to indemnify certain of these parties, which could increase our costs and adversely affect our business. In the event of a successful claim of infringement against us, we may be enjoined from further developing or commercializing the infringing products or technologies. In addition, we may be required to pay substantial damages, including treble damages and attorneys’ fees for willful infringement, obtain one or more licenses from third parties, pay royalties and/or redesign our infringing products or technologies, which may be impossible or require substantial time and monetary expenditure. Such licenses may not be available on commercially reasonable terms or at all. Even if we are able to obtain a license, the license would likely obligate us to pay license fees or royalties or both, and the rights granted to us might be nonexclusive, which could result in our competitors gaining access to the same intellectual property. If we are unable to obtain a necessary license to a third-party patent on commercially reasonable terms or at all, we may be unable to commercialize the infringing products or technologies or such commercialization efforts may be significantly delayed, which could in turn significantly harm our business. In addition, we may in the future pursue patent challenges with respect to third-party patents, including as a defense against the foregoing infringement claims. The outcome of such challenges is unpredictable.

Even if resolved in our favor, the foregoing proceedings could be very expensive, particularly for a company of our size, and time-consuming. Such proceedings could substantially increase our operating losses and reduce the resources available for development activities or any future sales, marketing, or distribution activities. We may not have sufficient financial or other resources to conduct such proceedings adequately. Some of our competitors may be able to sustain the costs of litigation or administrative proceedings more effectively than we can because of greater financial resources. Such proceedings may also absorb significant time of our technical and management personnel and distract them from their normal responsibilities. Uncertainties resulting from such proceedings could impair our ability to compete in the marketplace. In addition, there could be public announcements of the results of hearings, motions, or other interim proceedings or developments and if securities analysts or investors perceive these results to be negative, it could have a substantial adverse effect on the price of our common stock. The occurrence of any of the foregoing could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, or results of operations.

We may in the future pursue invalidity proceedings with respect to third-party patents. The outcome following legal assertions of invalidity is unpredictable. Even if resolved in our favor, these legal proceedings may cause us to incur significant expenses and could distract our technical and management personnel from their normal responsibilities. In addition, there could be public announcements of the results of hearings, motions, or other interim proceedings or developments and if securities analysts or investors perceive these results to be negative, it could have a substantial adverse effect on the price of our common stock. Such proceedings could substantially increase our operating losses and reduce the resources available for development activities or any future sales, marketing, or distribution activities. We may not have sufficient financial or other resources to conduct such proceedings adequately. Some of these third parties may be able to sustain the costs of such proceedings more effectively than we can because of their greater financial resources. Uncertainties resulting from the initiation and continuation of patent proceedings could compromise our ability to compete in the marketplace. If we do not prevail in the patent proceedings the third parties may assert a claim of patent infringement directed at our product candidates.

We may become involved in lawsuits to protect or enforce our patents and other intellectual property rights, which could be expensive, time-consuming, and unsuccessful.

Third parties, such as a competitor, may infringe our patent rights. We may be unable to detect or police all such infringement, and detecting infringement may be particularly difficult for certain manufacturing processes or other activities that are not readily observable. In an infringement proceeding, a court may decide that a patent we own or a patent we may license in the future is invalid or unenforceable or may refuse to stop the other party from using the invention at issue. In addition, our patent rights may become involved in inventorship, ownership, priority, enforceability, or validity disputes. To counter or defend against such claims can be expensive and time-consuming. An adverse result in any litigation proceeding could put our patent rights at risk of being invalidated, held unenforceable or interpreted narrowly. Furthermore, because of the substantial amount of discovery required in connection with intellectual property litigation and proceedings, there is a risk that some of our confidential information could be compromised by disclosure during such litigation and proceedings.

Even if resolved in our favor, litigation or other legal proceedings relating to intellectual property claims may cause us to incur significant expenses and could distract our personnel from their normal responsibilities. In addition, there could be public announcements of the results of hearings, motions or other interim proceedings or developments, and if securities analysts or investors perceive these results to be negative, it could have a substantial adverse effect on the price of our common stock. Such litigation or proceedings could substantially increase our operating losses and reduce the resources available for development activities or any future sales, marketing, or distribution activities. We may not have sufficient financial or other resources to conduct such litigation or proceedings adequately. Some of our competitors may be able to sustain the costs of such litigation or proceedings more effectively than we can because of their greater financial resources and more mature and developed intellectual property portfolios. Uncertainties resulting from the initiation and continuation of patent litigation or other proceedings could have a material adverse effect on our ability to compete in the marketplace.

If our trademarks and trade names are not adequately protected, then we may not be able to build name recognition in our markets of interest, and our business may be adversely affected.

Our registered or unregistered trademarks or trade names may be challenged, infringed, diluted, circumvented, or declared generic or determined to be infringing, misappropriating, or violating other marks. We may not be able to protect our rights to these trademarks and trade names, which we need to build name recognition among potential partners or customers in the markets of interest. During trademark registration proceedings, we may receive rejections of our applications by the USPTO or in foreign jurisdictions. Although we are given an opportunity to respond to such rejections, we may be unable to overcome them. In the event that our trademarks are successfully challenged or determined to be infringing, misappropriating, or violating other marks, we could be forced to rebrand our products, which could result in loss of brand recognition, and could require us to devote resources to advertising and marketing new brands. In addition, in the USPTO and in comparable agencies in many foreign jurisdictions, third parties are given an opportunity to oppose pending trademark applications and to seek to cancel registered trademarks. Opposition or cancellation proceedings may be filed against our trademarks, which may not survive such proceedings. Moreover, any name we may propose to use with our product candidates in the United States must be approved by the FDA, regardless of whether we have registered it, or applied to register it, as a trademark. Similar requirements exist in Europe. The FDA typically conducts a review of proposed product names, including an evaluation of potential for

confusion with other product names. If the FDA or a comparable foreign regulatory authority objects to any of our proposed proprietary product names, we may be required to expend significant additional resources in an effort to identify a suitable substitute name that would qualify under applicable trademark laws, not infringe, misappropriate, or otherwise violate the existing rights of third parties and be acceptable to the FDA. Furthermore, in many countries, owning and maintaining a trademark registration may not provide an adequate defense against a subsequent infringement claim asserted by the owner of a senior trademark.

We may not be able to obtain, protect, or enforce our rights to these trademarks and trade names, which we need to build name recognition among potential partners or customers in our markets of interest. At times, competitors or other third parties may adopt trade names or trademarks similar to ours, thereby impeding our ability to build brand identity and possibly leading to market confusion. In addition, there could be potential trade name or trademark infringement, misappropriation, dilution, or other claims brought by owners of other registered trademarks or trademarks that incorporate variations of our registered or unregistered trademarks or trade names. Over the long term, if we are unable to establish name recognition based on our trademarks and trade names, then we may not be able to compete effectively, and our business may be adversely affected. Our efforts to obtain, enforce, or protect our proprietary rights related to trademarks, trade names, domain name, or other intellectual property may be ineffective and could result in substantial costs and diversion of resources and could adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects.

Intellectual property rights do not necessarily address all potential threats.

The degree of future protection afforded by our intellectual property rights is uncertain because intellectual property rights have limitations and may not adequately protect our business or permit us to maintain our competitive advantage. For example:

Should any of the foregoing occur, it could adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects.

We partially depend on intellectual property licensed from third parties, and our licensors may not always act in our best interest. If we fail to comply with our obligations under our intellectual property licenses, if the licenses are terminated or if disputes regarding these licenses arise, we could lose significant rights that are important to our business.

We are dependent, in part, on patents, know-how and proprietary technology licensed from others, including Cell X, CCF, iPS Academia Japan and Sumitomo. In addition to the foregoing, we are a party to a number of other license agreements under which we are granted rights to intellectual property that are critical to our business, and we may enter into additional license agreements in the future with third parties. Our existing license agreements impose, and we expect that any future license agreements where we in-license intellectual property, will impose on us, various development, regulatory and/or commercial diligence obligations, payment of milestones and/or royalties and other obligations. If we fail to comply with our obligations under these agreements, or we are subject to bankruptcy-related proceedings, the licensor may have the right to terminate the license, in which event we would not be able to develop or market products covered by the license, or we may be subject to litigation for breach of these agreements.

If we or our licensors fail to adequately protect our licensed intellectual property, our ability to commercialize product candidates could suffer. We do not have complete control over the maintenance, prosecution and litigation of our in-licensed patents and patent applications and may have limited control over future intellectual property that may be in-licensed. For example, we cannot be certain that activities such as the maintenance and prosecution by our licensors have been or will be conducted in compliance with applicable laws and regulations or will result in valid and enforceable patents and other intellectual property rights. It is possible that our licensors’ infringement proceedings or defense activities may be less vigorous than had we conducted them ourselves or may not be conducted in accordance with our best interests.

In addition, the agreements under which we license intellectual property or technology from third parties are complex, and certain provisions in such agreements may be susceptible to multiple interpretations. The resolution of any contract interpretation disagreement that may arise could narrow what we believe to be the scope of our rights to the relevant patents, know-how and proprietary technology, or increase what we believe to be our financial or other obligations under the relevant agreement. Disputes that may arise between us and our licensors regarding intellectual property subject to a license agreement could include disputes regarding:

If disputes over intellectual property that we have licensed prevent or impair our ability to maintain our current licensing arrangements on acceptable terms, we may be unable to successfully develop and commercialize the affected technology or product candidates. As a result, any termination of or disputes over our intellectual property licenses

could result in the loss of our ability to develop and commercialize our product candidates, or we could lose other significant rights, any of which could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

For example, our agreements with certain of our third-party research partners provide that improvements developed in the course of our relationship may be owned solely by either us or our third-party research partner, or jointly between us and the third party. If we determine that rights to such improvements owned solely by a research partner or other third party with whom we collaborate are necessary to commercialize our product candidates or maintain our competitive advantage, we may need to obtain a license from such third party in order to use the improvements and continue developing, manufacturing or marketing our product candidates. We may not be able to obtain such a license on an exclusive basis, on commercially reasonable terms, or at all, which could prevent us from commercializing our product candidates or allow our competitors or others the chance to access technology that is important to our business. We also may need the cooperation of any co-owners of our intellectual property in order to enforce such intellectual property against third parties, and such cooperation may not be provided to us.

We may not be successful in obtaining or maintaining necessary rights to product components and processes for our development pipeline through acquisitions and in-licenses.

The growth of our business may depend in part on our ability to acquire, in-license, or use third-party intellectual property and proprietary rights. We also depend on intellectual property, know-how, trade secrets, and other proprietary rights that we license from third parties, and termination or expiration of any of these licenses could result in the loss of significant rights and could harm our ability to develop and commercialize our product candidates. For example, product candidates may require specific materials, components, or processes to work effectively and efficiently, or we may be required by the FDA or comparable foreign regulatory authorities to provide a companion diagnostic test or tests with our product candidates, any of which could require us to obtain rights to use intellectual property held by third parties. In addition, with respect to any patent or other intellectual property rights we may co-own with third parties, we may require licenses to such co-owners’ interest to such patents.

We may be unable to acquire or in-license any compositions, methods of use, processes, or other third-party intellectual property rights from third parties that we identify as necessary or important to our business operations. In addition, we may fail to obtain any of these licenses at a reasonable cost or on reasonable terms, if at all. Were that to happen, we may need to cease use of the compositions or methods covered by those third-party intellectual property rights and may need to seek to develop alternative approaches that do not infringe, misappropriate, or otherwise violate those intellectual property rights, which may entail additional costs and development delays, even if we were able to develop such alternatives, which may not be feasible. Even if we are able to obtain a license, it may be non-exclusive, which means that our competitors may also receive access to the same technologies licensed to us. In that event, we may be required to expend significant time and resources to develop or license replacement technology. In addition, our existing and future license and collaboration agreements may impose diligence, milestone payment, royalty, insurance, and other obligations on us, and if we fail to comply with these obligations, our licensors may have the right to terminate the applicable license. We may also enter into sublicense arrangements, and if our sublicensor fails to comply with its obligations under an upstream license, the upstream licensor may terminate the upstream license, which could terminate our sublicense and leave us without rights to the applicable intellectual property unless we can obtain a direct license, which may not be available on reasonable terms or at all.

Additionally, we may collaborate with academic institutions to accelerate our research and development under written agreements with these institutions. In certain cases, these institutions provide us with an option to negotiate a license to any of the institution’s rights in technology resulting from the collaboration. Even if we hold such an option, we may be unable to negotiate a license from the institution within the specified timeframe or under terms that are acceptable to us. If we are unable to do so, the institution may offer the intellectual property rights to others, potentially blocking our ability to pursue our program. Even if we are able to obtain a license, it may be non-exclusive, and our competitors may also receive access to the same technologies licensed to us.

The licensing and acquisition of third-party intellectual property rights is a competitive area, and companies that may be more established or have greater resources than we do may also be pursuing strategies to license or acquire third-party intellectual property rights that we may consider necessary or attractive in order to commercialize our product candidates. More established companies may have a competitive advantage over us due to their size, cash resources, or greater clinical development and commercialization capabilities. In addition, companies that perceive us

to be a competitor may be unwilling to assign or license rights to us. There can be no assurance that we will be able to successfully complete these types of negotiations and ultimately acquire the rights to the intellectual property surrounding the additional product candidates that we may seek to develop or market. If we are unable to successfully obtain rights to required third-party intellectual property or to maintain the existing intellectual property rights we have, we may have to abandon development of certain programs and our business financial condition, results of operations, and prospects could suffer.

Disputes may also arise between us and our licensors regarding licensed intellectual property, including the scope of rights granted, interpretation-related issues, diligence obligations, sublicense rights, ownership of improvements or jointly developed intellectual property, and the control of prosecution, maintenance, and enforcement. If such disputes prevent or impair our ability to maintain or enforce our licensed rights on acceptable terms, we may be unable to successfully develop and commercialize the affected product candidates.

Risks Related to This Offering and Ownership of Our Common Stock

There has been no public market for our common stock. An active, liquid, and orderly market for our common stock may not develop, or we may in the future fail to satisfy the continued listing requirements of Nasdaq, and you may not be able to resell your common stock at or above the initial public offering price or at all.

Prior to this offering, there has been no public market for our common stock. Although our common stock has been approved for listing on the Nasdaq Global Select Market (Nasdaq) under the symbol “ASPE”, an active trading market for our common stock may never develop or may not be sustained following this offering. We and the representatives of the underwriters have determined the initial public offering price of our common stock through negotiation. This price may not necessarily reflect the price at which investors in the market will be willing to buy and sell our shares following this offering. In addition, an active trading market may not develop following the consummation of this offering or, if it is developed, may not be sustained. The lack of an active market may impair your ability to sell your shares at the time you wish to sell them or at a price that you consider reasonable. An inactive market may also impair our ability to raise capital by selling shares and may impair our ability to acquire other businesses or technologies using our shares as consideration, which, in turn, could materially adversely affect our business.

If we fail to satisfy the continued listing requirements of Nasdaq, such as the corporate governance requirements or the minimum closing bid price requirement, Nasdaq may take steps to delist our common stock. Such a delisting would likely have a negative effect on the price of our common stock and would impair your ability to sell or purchase our common stock when you wish to do so. In the event of a delisting, we can provide no assurance that any action taken by us to restore compliance with listing requirements would allow our common stock to become listed again, stabilize the market price or improve the liquidity of our common stock, prevent our common stock from dropping below the Nasdaq minimum bid price requirement, or prevent future non-compliance with the listing requirements of Nasdaq.

The trading price of the shares of our common stock may be highly volatile, and purchasers of our common stock could lose all or part of their investment.

The trading price of our common stock following this offering is likely to be highly volatile and subject to wide fluctuations in response to various factors, some of which are beyond our control. The stock market in general and the market for stock of biotechnology and biopharmaceutical companies in particular have experienced extreme volatility that has often been unrelated to the operating performance of particular companies. As a result of this volatility, investors may not be able to sell their common stock at or above the initial public offering price. The market price for our common stock may be influenced by those factors discussed in this “Risk Factors” section and many others, including:

In addition, in the past, stockholders have initiated class action lawsuits against biopharmaceutical companies following periods of volatility in the market prices of these companies’ stock. Such litigation, if instituted against us, could cause us to incur substantial costs, divert our management’s attention and resources and damage our reputation, which could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

We will have broad discretion in the use of proceeds from this offering and may allocate the net proceeds from this offering in ways that you and other stockholders may not approve.

Our management will have broad discretion in the application of the net proceeds from this offering, including for any of the purposes described in the section titled “Use of Proceeds.” Because of the number and variability of factors that will determine our use of the net proceeds from this offering, their ultimate use may vary substantially from their currently intended use. Our management might not apply our net proceeds in ways that ultimately increase the value of your investment, and the failure by our management to apply these funds effectively could harm our

business. Pending their use, we may invest the net proceeds from this offering in short- and intermediate-term, interest-bearing obligations, investment-grade instruments, certificates of deposit, or direct or guaranteed obligations of the U.S. government. These investments may not yield a favorable return to our stockholders. If we do not invest or apply the net proceeds from this offering in ways that enhance stockholder value, we may fail to achieve expected results, which could cause our stock price to decline.

You will suffer immediate and substantial dilution in the net tangible book value of the common stock you purchase in this offering.

The initial public offering price of our common stock is substantially higher than the pro forma as adjusted net tangible book value per share of our outstanding common stock immediately after the closing of this offering. Purchasers of common stock in this offering will experience immediate dilution of approximately $7.66 per share, based on the initial public offering price of $15.00 per share. In the past, we issued options to acquire common stock at prices significantly below the initial public offering price. To the extent these outstanding options are ultimately exercised, investors purchasing common stock in this offering will sustain further dilution. For a further description of the dilution that you will experience immediately after this offering, see the section titled “Dilution.”

After this offering, our executive officers, directors, and principal stockholders, if they choose to act together, will continue to have the ability to significantly influence all matters submitted to stockholders for approval.

Following the completion of this offering, our executive officers, directors, and greater than 5% stockholders, in the aggregate, will own approximately 44% of our outstanding common stock (assuming no exercise of the underwriters’ option to purchase additional shares and no exercise of outstanding options and without giving effect to any potential purchases by such persons in this offering). As a result, such persons, acting together, will have the ability to significantly influence all matters submitted to our board of directors or stockholders for approval, including the appointment of our management, the election and removal of directors and approval of any significant transaction, as well as our management and business affairs. This concentration of ownership may have the effect of delaying, deferring, or preventing a change in control, impeding a merger, consolidation, takeover or other business combination involving us, or discouraging a potential acquiror from making a tender offer or otherwise attempting to obtain control of our business, even if such a transaction would benefit other stockholders. Additionally, the concentration of stock ownership may adversely affect the trading price of our common stock due to investors’ perception that conflicts of interest may exist or arise.

We do not currently intend to pay dividends on our common stock, so any returns on your investment will be limited to the value of our common stock.

We have never declared or paid any cash dividend on our common stock. We currently anticipate that we will retain future earnings for the development, operation, and expansion of our business and do not anticipate declaring or paying any cash dividends for the foreseeable future. In addition, any future debt agreements may preclude us from paying dividends. Any return to stockholders will therefore be limited to the appreciation of their stock. There is no guarantee that shares of our common stock will appreciate in value or even maintain the price at which stockholders have purchased their shares.

Sales of a substantial number of shares of our common stock by our existing stockholders in the public market could cause our stock price to fall.

Sales of a substantial number of shares of our common stock in the public market or the perception that these sales might occur could significantly reduce the market price of our common stock and impair our ability to raise adequate capital through the sale of additional equity or equity-linked securities.

Based on shares of common stock outstanding as of June 30, 2026, upon the closing of this offering, we will have a total of 29,078,600 shares of common stock outstanding, assuming no exercise of the underwriters’ option to purchase additional shares and no exercise of outstanding options. Of these shares, only the 9,375,000 shares of common stock sold in this offering by us, plus any shares sold upon exercise of the underwriters’ option to purchase

additional shares, will be freely tradable, without restriction, in the public market immediately following this offering, unless they are purchased by one of our affiliates.

Our directors and executive officers and substantially all of our securityholders have entered into lock-up agreements with the representatives pursuant to which they may not, with limited exceptions and among other things, for a period of 180 days from the date of this prospectus, offer, sell or otherwise transfer or dispose of any of our securities, without the prior written consent of Leerink Partners LLC, Piper Sandler & Co., Stifel, Nicolaus & Company, Incorporated and UBS Securities LLC. The underwriters may permit our officers, directors, and other securityholders who are subject to the lock-up agreements to sell shares prior to the expiration of the lock-up agreements at any time in their sole discretion. See the section titled “Underwriting.” Sales of these shares, or perceptions that they will be sold, could cause the trading price of our common stock to decline. After the lock-up agreements expire, up to an additional 19,703,600 shares of common stock will be eligible for sale in the public market, of which 12,762,164 shares will be held by directors, executive officers and other affiliates and will be subject to volume limitations under Rule 144 under the Securities Act, in each case based on shares of our common stock outstanding as of June 30, 2026 and without giving effect to any potential purchases by such persons in this offering.

In addition, as of June 30, 2026, 3,043,497 shares of common stock that are subject to outstanding options under our employee benefit plans will become eligible for sale in the public market to the extent permitted by the provisions of various vesting schedules, the lock-up agreements, and Rule 144 and Rule 701 under the Securities Act. If these additional shares of common stock are sold, or if it is perceived that they will be sold, in the public market, the trading price of our common stock could decline.

After this offering, the holders of 18,956,358 shares of our outstanding common stock, or approximately 65.2% of our total outstanding common stock based on shares outstanding as of June 30, 2026, will be entitled to rights with respect to the registration of their shares under the Securities Act, subject to vesting and the 180-day lock-up agreements described above. See the section titled “Description of Capital Stock—Registration Rights.” Registration of these shares under the Securities Act would result in the shares becoming freely tradable without restriction under the Securities Act, except for shares held by affiliates, as defined in Rule 144 under the Securities Act. Any sales of securities by these stockholders could have a material adverse effect on the trading price of our common stock.

We are an emerging growth company and a smaller reporting company, and the reduced disclosure and governance requirements applicable to emerging growth companies and smaller reporting companies may make our common stock less attractive to investors.

We are an emerging growth company, as defined in the JOBS Act, and may remain an emerging growth company until the last day of the fiscal year following the fifth anniversary of the completion of this offering. However, if certain events occur prior to the end of such five-year period, including if we become a “large accelerated filer”, as defined under the Exchange Act, our annual gross revenue exceeds $1.235 billion, or we issue more than $1.0 billion of non-convertible debt in any three-year period, we will cease to be an emerging growth company prior to the end of such five-year period. For so long as we remain an emerging growth company, we are permitted and intend to rely on exemptions from certain disclosure requirements that are applicable to other public companies that are not emerging growth companies. These exemptions include:

We have taken advantage of reduced reporting burdens in this prospectus. In particular, in this prospectus, we have provided only two years of audited financial statements and have not included all of the executive compensation-related information that would be required if we were not an emerging growth company. We cannot predict whether investors will find our common stock less attractive if we rely on these exemptions. If some investors find our common stock less attractive as a result, there may be a less active trading market for our common stock and our stock price may be reduced or more volatile. In addition, the JOBS Act provides that an emerging growth company can take advantage of an extended transition period for complying with new or revised accounting standards. This allows an emerging growth company to delay the adoption of these accounting standards until they would otherwise apply to private companies. We have irrevocably elected to avail ourselves of this exemption and, therefore, we may not be subject to the same new or revised accounting standards as other public companies that are not emerging growth companies. We intend to rely on other exemptions provided by the JOBS Act, including without limitation, not being required to comply with the auditor attestation requirements of Section 404(b) of Sarbanes-Oxley.

We are also a smaller reporting company as defined in the Exchange Act. We may continue to be a smaller reporting company even after we are no longer an emerging growth company. We may take advantage of certain of the scaled disclosures available to smaller reporting companies and will be able to take advantage of these scaled disclosures for so long as our voting and non-voting common stock held by non-affiliates is less than $250.0 million measured on the last business day of our second fiscal quarter, or our annual revenue is less than $100.0 million during the most recently completed fiscal year, and our voting and non-voting common stock held by non-affiliates is less than $700.0 million measured on the last business day of our second fiscal quarter.

Provisions in our charter documents and under Delaware law could discourage a takeover that stockholders may consider favorable and may lead to entrenchment of management.

Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation and amended and restated bylaws that will be in effect immediately prior to the closing of this offering will contain provisions that could significantly reduce the value of our shares to a potential acquiror or delay or prevent changes in control or changes in our management without the consent of our board of directors. The provisions in our charter documents will include the following:

We are also subject to the anti-takeover provisions contained in Section 203 of the Delaware General Corporation Law. Under Section 203, a corporation may not, in general, engage in a business combination with any holder of 15% or more of its capital stock unless the holder has held the stock for three years or, among other exceptions, the board of directors has approved the transaction.

Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation will provide that the Court of Chancery of the State of Delaware will be the exclusive forum for substantially all disputes between us and our stockholders and that the federal district courts shall be the exclusive forum for the resolution of any complaint asserting a cause of action arising under the Securities Act, which could limit our stockholders’ ability to obtain a favorable judicial forum for disputes with us or our directors, officers, or employees or the underwriters or any offering giving rise to such claim.

Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation that will be in effect immediately prior to the consummation of this offering will provide that unless we consent in writing to the selection of an alternative forum, the Court of Chancery of the State of Delaware is the exclusive forum for any derivative action or proceeding brought on our behalf, any action asserting a breach of fiduciary duty, any action asserting a claim against us arising pursuant to the Delaware General Corporation Law, our amended and restated certificate of incorporation or our amended and restated bylaws, any action to interpret, apply, enforce or determine the validity of our amended and restated certificate of incorporation or our amended or restated bylaws, or any action asserting a claim against us that is governed by the internal affairs doctrine; provided, that, this provision would not apply to suits brought to enforce a duty or liability created by the Exchange Act or any other claim for which the federal courts have exclusive jurisdiction. Furthermore, our amended and restated certificate of incorporation will also provide that unless we consent in writing to the selection of an alternative forum, the federal district courts of the United States shall be the exclusive forum for the resolution of any complaint asserting a cause of action arising under the Securities Act, the Exchange Act and any claims for which the federal courts have exclusive jurisdiction. These choice of forum provisions may limit a stockholder’s ability to bring a claim in a judicial forum that it finds favorable for disputes with us or our directors, officers, or other employees, which may discourage such lawsuits against us and our directors, officers, and other employees and result in increased costs for investors to bring a claim. By agreeing to this provision, however, stockholders will not be deemed to have waived our compliance with the federal securities laws and the rules and regulations thereunder. Furthermore, the enforceability of similar choice of forum provisions in other companies’ certificates of incorporation has been challenged in legal proceedings, and it is possible that a court could find these types of provisions to be inapplicable or unenforceable. If a court were to find the choice of forum provisions in our amended and restated certificate of incorporation to be inapplicable or unenforceable in an action, we may incur additional costs associated with resolving such action in other jurisdictions, which could adversely affect our business and financial condition.

Participation in this offering by our existing stockholders and/or their affiliated entities may reduce the public float for our common stock.

To the extent certain of our existing stockholders and their affiliated entities participate in this offering, such purchases would reduce the non-affiliate public float of our shares, meaning the number of shares of our common stock that are not held by officers, directors, and controlling stockholders. A reduction in the public float could reduce the number of shares that are available to be traded at any given time, thereby adversely impacting the liquidity of our common stock and depressing the price at which you may be able to sell shares of common stock purchased in this offering.

General Risk Factors

We will incur significant increased costs as a result of operating as a public company, and our management will be required to devote substantial time to new compliance initiatives.

As a public company, we will incur significant legal, accounting, and other expenses that we did not incur as a private company. We will be subject to the reporting requirements of the Exchange Act, which will require, among other things, that we file with the SEC annual, quarterly, and current reports with respect to our business and financial condition. In addition, Sarbanes-Oxley, as well as rules subsequently adopted by the SEC and Nasdaq to implement provisions of Sarbanes-Oxley, impose significant requirements on public companies, including requiring establishment and maintenance of effective disclosure and financial controls and certain corporate governance practices. Further, pursuant to the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010, the SEC has adopted additional rules and regulations in these areas, such as mandatory “say on pay” voting requirements that will apply to us when we cease to be an emerging growth company. Stockholder activism, the current political environment and the current high level of government intervention and regulatory reform may lead to substantial new regulations and disclosure obligations, which may lead to additional compliance costs and impact the manner in which we operate our business in ways we cannot currently anticipate.

We expect the rules and regulations applicable to public companies to substantially increase our legal and financial compliance costs and to make some activities more time consuming and costly. The increased costs will decrease our net income or increase our net loss, and may require us to reduce expenditures in other areas of our business. For example, we expect these rules and regulations to make it more difficult and more expensive for us to obtain director and officer liability insurance, and we may be required to incur substantial costs to maintain the same or similar coverage. We cannot predict or estimate the amount or timing of additional costs we may incur to comply with these requirements. The impact of these requirements could also make it more difficult for us to attract and retain qualified persons to serve on our board of directors, our board committees, or as executive officers. If these requirements divert the attention of our management and personnel from other business concerns, they could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

We are subject to U.S. and certain foreign export and import controls, sanctions, embargoes, anti-corruption laws, and anti-money laundering laws and regulations. We could face criminal liability and other serious consequences for violations, which could harm our business.

We are subject to export control and import laws and regulations, including the U.S. Export Administration Regulations, U.S. Customs regulations, and various economic and trade sanctions regulations administered by the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Controls and anti-corruption and anti-money laundering laws and regulations, including the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act of 1977, as amended, the U.S. domestic bribery statute contained in 18 U.S.C. § 201, the U.S. Travel Act, the USA PATRIOT Act and other state and national anti-bribery and anti-money laundering laws in the countries in which we conduct activities. Anti-corruption laws are interpreted broadly and prohibit companies and their employees, agents, CROs, contractors and other collaborators and partners from authorizing, promising, offering, providing, soliciting, or receiving, directly or indirectly, improper payments or anything else of value to or from recipients in the public or private sector. We may engage third parties for clinical trials outside of the United States, to sell our products abroad if and when we enter a commercialization phase, and/or to obtain necessary permits, licenses, patent registrations and other regulatory approvals. We have direct or indirect interactions with officials and employees of government agencies or government-affiliated hospitals, universities, and other organizations. We can be held liable for the corrupt or other illegal activities of our employees, agents, CROs, contractors, and other collaborators and partners, even if we do not explicitly authorize or have actual

knowledge of such activities, and any training or compliance programs or other initiatives we undertake to prevent such activities may not be effective.

Any violations of the laws and regulations described above may result in substantial civil and criminal fines and penalties, imprisonment, the loss of export or import privileges, debarment, tax reassessments, breach of contract and fraud litigation, reputational harm, and other consequences.

Furthermore, U.S. export control laws and economic sanctions prohibit the provision of certain products and services to countries, governments, and persons targeted by U.S. sanctions. U.S. sanctions that have been or may be imposed as a result of military conflicts in other countries may impact our ability to continue activities at future clinical trial sites within regions covered by such sanctions. If we fail to comply with export and import regulations and such economic sanctions, penalties could be imposed, including fines and/or denial of certain export privileges. These export and import controls and economic sanctions could also adversely affect our supply chain.

Business disruptions could seriously harm our future revenue and financial condition and increase our costs and expenses.

Our operations and the operations of our suppliers, CROs, CMOs, and clinical sites could be subject to earthquakes, power shortages, telecommunications or infrastructure failures, cybersecurity incidents, physical security breaches, water shortages, floods, hurricanes, typhoons, blizzards and other extreme weather conditions, fires, public health pandemics or epidemics (including, for example, the COVID-19 pandemic), and other natural or manmade disasters or business interruptions, for which we are predominantly self-insured. We rely on third-party manufacturers or suppliers to produce our product candidates and its components and on CROs and clinical sites to conduct our clinical trials, and do not have a redundant source of supply for all components of our product candidates. Our ability to obtain clinical or, if approved, commercial, supplies of our product candidates could be disrupted if the operations of these suppliers were affected by a man-made or natural disaster or other business interruption, and our ability to commence, conduct or complete our clinical trials in a timely manner could be similarly adversely affected by any of the foregoing. In addition, our corporate headquarters is located in San Diego, California near major earthquake faults and fire zones, and the ultimate impact on us of being located near major earthquake faults and fire zones and being consolidated in a certain geographical area is unknown. The occurrence of any of these business disruptions could seriously harm our operations and financial condition and increase our costs and expenses.

Unstable market and economic conditions and adverse developments with respect to financial institutions and associated liquidity risk may have serious adverse consequences on our business, financial condition, and stock price.

From time to time, the global credit and financial markets have experienced extreme volatility and disruptions, including severely diminished liquidity and credit availability, declines in consumer confidence, declines in economic growth, increases in unemployment rates, and uncertainty about economic stability. The financial markets and the global economy may also be adversely affected by the current or anticipated impact of military conflict, including the conflict between Russia and Ukraine and in the Middle East, terrorism, or other geopolitical events. Sanctions imposed by the United States and other countries in response to such conflicts, including the one in Ukraine, may also adversely impact the financial markets and the global economy, and any economic countermeasures by the affected countries or others could exacerbate market and economic instability. In addition, in 2023 the closures of financial institutions and their placement into receivership with the FDIC created bank-specific and broader financial institution liquidity risk and concerns. Future adverse developments with respect to specific financial institutions or the broader financial services industry may lead to market-wide liquidity shortages, impair the ability of companies to access near-term working capital needs, and create additional market and economic uncertainty. There can be no assurance that future credit and financial market instability and a deterioration in confidence in economic conditions will not occur. Our general business strategy may be adversely affected by any such economic downturn, liquidity shortages, volatile business environment or continued unpredictable and unstable market conditions. If the equity and credit markets deteriorate, or if adverse developments are experienced by financial institutions, it may cause short-term liquidity risk and also make any necessary debt or equity financing more difficult, more costly, more onerous with respect to financial and operating covenants and more dilutive. Failure to secure any necessary financing in a timely manner and on favorable terms could have a material adverse effect on our growth strategy, financial performance and stock price and could require us to delay, limit, reduce or abandon clinical development or future commercialization efforts or

grant rights to develop and market our product candidates even if we would otherwise prefer to develop and market such product candidates ourselves. In addition, there is a risk that one or more of our current service providers, financial institutions, manufacturers, and other partners may be adversely affected by the foregoing risks, which could directly affect our ability to attain our operating goals on schedule and on budget.

Changes in tax laws or regulations may materially adversely affect our financial condition, results of operations and cash flows, or adversely impact the value of an investment in our common stock.

New income, sales, use or other tax laws, statutes, rules, regulations, or ordinances could be enacted at any time, or interpreted, changed, modified, or applied adversely to us, any of which could adversely affect our business operations and financial performance. The likelihood of these changes being enacted or implemented is unclear. We are currently unable to predict whether such changes will occur and, if so, the ultimate impact on our business. To the extent that such changes have a negative impact on us, including as a result of related uncertainty, these changes may materially and adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and cash flow.

If securities or industry analysts do not publish research or reports or publish unfavorable research or reports about us, our business or our market, our stock price and trading volume could decline.

The trading market for our common stock will depend in part on the research and reports that securities or industry analysts publish about us, our business, our market, or our competitors. We do not currently have and may never obtain research coverage by securities and industry analysts. If no securities or industry analysts commence coverage of our company, the trading price for our stock would be negatively impacted. In the event we obtain securities or industry analyst coverage, if one or more of the analysts who covers us downgrades our stock, or if we fail to meet the expectations of one or more of these analysts, our stock price would likely decline. If one or more of these analysts ceases to cover us or fails to regularly publish reports on us, interest in our stock could decrease, which could cause our stock price or trading volume to decline.

If we fail to maintain proper and effective internal control over financial reporting, our ability to produce accurate and timely financial statements could be impaired, investors may lose confidence in our financial reporting, and the trading price of our common stock may decline.

We are not currently required to comply with the rules of the SEC implementing Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act and are therefore not required to make a formal assessment of the effectiveness of our internal control over financial reporting for that purpose. Upon becoming a public company, we will be required to comply with the SEC’s rules implementing Sections 302 and 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, which will require management to certify financial and other information in our quarterly and annual reports and provide an annual management report on the effectiveness of internal control over financial reporting. Although we will be required to disclose changes made in our internal control over financial reporting on a quarterly basis, we will not be required to make our first annual assessment of our internal control over financial reporting until our second annual report on Form 10-K.

However, as an “emerging growth company,” our independent registered public accounting firm will not be required to formally attest to the effectiveness of our internal control over financial reporting until the later of the year following our first annual report required to be filed with the SEC or the date we are no longer an emerging growth company. When we lose our status as an “emerging growth company” and do not otherwise qualify as a “smaller reporting company” with less than $100.0 million in annual revenue, our independent registered public accounting firm will be required to attest to the effectiveness of our internal control over financial reporting. The rules governing the standards that must be met for our management to assess our internal control over financial reporting are complex and require significant documentation, testing and possible remediation. To comply with the requirements of being a reporting company under the Exchange Act, we may need to upgrade our information technology systems; implement additional financial and management controls, reporting systems and procedures; and hire additional accounting and finance staff. If we or, if required, our auditors are unable to conclude that our internal control over financial reporting is effective, investors may lose confidence in our financial reporting and the trading price of our common stock may decline.

Implementing any appropriate changes to our internal control over financial reporting may distract our officers and employees, entail substantial costs to modify our existing processes and take significant time to complete. These changes may not, however, be effective in establishing and maintaining the adequacy of our internal controls, and any failure to maintain that adequacy or consequent inability to produce accurate financial statements on a timely basis, could increase our operating costs and materially and adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

We cannot assure you that there will not be material weaknesses or significant deficiencies in our internal control over financial reporting in the future. Any failure to maintain internal control over financial reporting could severely inhibit our ability to accurately report our financial condition, results of operations or cash flows. If we are unable to conclude that our internal control over financial reporting is effective, or if our independent registered public accounting firm determines we have a material weakness or significant deficiency in our internal control over financial reporting once that firm begins its Section 404 reviews, investors may lose confidence in the accuracy and completeness of our financial reports, the market price of our common stock could decline, and we could be subject to sanctions or investigations by Nasdaq, the SEC, or other regulatory authorities. Failure to remedy any material weakness in our internal control over financial reporting, or to implement or maintain other effective control systems required of public companies, could also restrict our future access to the capital markets.

Our disclosure controls and procedures may not prevent or detect all errors or acts of fraud.

Upon the completion of this offering, we will become subject to periodic reporting requirements of the Exchange Act. Our disclosure controls and procedures are designed to reasonably assure that information required to be disclosed by us in reports we file or submit under the Exchange Act is accumulated and communicated to management, and recorded, processed, summarized and reported within the time periods specified in the rules and forms of the SEC. We believe that any disclosure controls and procedures or internal controls and procedures, no matter how well conceived and operated, can provide only reasonable, not absolute, assurance that the objectives of the control system are met.

These inherent limitations include the realities that judgments in decision-making can be faulty and that breakdowns can occur because of simple error or mistake. Additionally, controls can be circumvented by the individual acts of some persons, by collusion of two or more people or by an unauthorized override of the controls. Accordingly, because of the inherent limitations in our control system, misstatements or insufficient disclosures due to error or fraud may occur and not be detected.

We could be subject to securities class action litigation, which is expensive and could divert management attention.

The market price of our common stock is likely to be volatile. In the past, securities class action litigation has often been brought against a company following a decline in the market price of its securities. This risk is especially relevant for us because biotechnology and biopharmaceutical companies have experienced significant stock price volatility in recent years. If we face such litigation, even if ultimately decided in our favor, it could result in substantial costs (including the cost to defend against and any potential adverse outcome resulting from any such proceeding), damage to our reputation and a diversion of our management’s attention and resources from other business concerns, which could harm our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

SPECIAL NOTE REGARDING FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS

This prospectus contains forward-looking statements about us and our industry. All statements other than statements of historical facts contained in this prospectus, including statements regarding our future results of operations and financial position, business strategy, research and development plans, the anticipated timing, costs, design, and conduct of our ongoing and planned clinical trials and preclinical studies for our product candidates, such as the advancement of sasineprocel through Phase 3 trials and the development of sasineprocel into genetic PD, the timing and likelihood of regulatory filings and approvals for our product candidates, our ability to commercialize our product candidates, if approved, the pricing and reimbursement of our products, if approved, the potential to develop future product candidates and pursue automated manufacturing processes for such product candidates, the potential benefits of strategic collaborations and the potential to enter into any future strategic arrangements, the timing and likelihood of success, plans, and objectives of management for future operations, and future results of anticipated product development efforts, are forward-looking statements. These statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other important factors that may cause our actual results, performance, or achievements to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements.

In some cases, you can identify forward-looking statements by terms such as “may,” “will,” “should,” “expect,” “plan,” “anticipate,” “could,” “intend,” “target,” “project,” “contemplates,” “believes,” “estimates,” “predicts,” “potential,” or “continue” or the negative of these terms or other similar expressions. The forward-looking statements in this prospectus are only predictions. We have based these forward-looking statements largely on our current expectations and projections about future events and financial and other trends that we believe may affect our business, financial condition, and results of operations. These forward-looking statements speak only as of the date of this prospectus and are subject to a number of risks, uncertainties, and assumptions described in the sections titled “Risk Factors” and “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations” and elsewhere in this prospectus. Because forward-looking statements are inherently subject to risks and uncertainties, some of which cannot be predicted or quantified and some of which are beyond our control, you should not rely on these forward-looking statements as predictions of future events. The events and circumstances reflected in our forward-looking statements may not be achieved or occur and actual results could differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking statements. Moreover, we operate in an evolving environment. New risk factors and uncertainties may emerge from time to time, and it is not possible for management to predict all risk factors and uncertainties. Except as required by applicable law, we undertake no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements contained herein, whether as a result of any new information, future events, changed circumstances, or otherwise. You should review the factors and risks we describe in the reports we will file from time to time with the SEC after the date of this prospectus. See the section titled “Where You Can Find More Information.”

In addition, statements that “we believe” and similarly qualified statements reflect our beliefs and opinions on the relevant subject. These statements are based upon information available to us as of the date of this prospectus, and while we believe such information forms a reasonable basis for such statements, such information may be limited or incomplete, and our statements should not be read to indicate that we have conducted an exhaustive inquiry into, or review of, all potentially available relevant information. These statements are inherently uncertain, and you are cautioned not to rely unduly upon them.

MARKET AND INDUSTRY DATA

We obtained the industry, market, and competitive position data used throughout this prospectus from our own internal estimates and research, as well as from independent market research, industry, and general publications and surveys, governmental agencies, and publicly available information in addition to research, surveys, and studies conducted by third parties. The content of these third-party sources, except to the extent specifically set forth in this prospectus, does not constitute a portion of this prospectus and is not incorporated herein. Internal estimates are derived from publicly available information released by industry analysts and third-party sources, our internal research, and our industry experience and are based on assumptions made by us based on such data and our knowledge of our industry and market, which we believe to be reasonable. In some cases, we do not expressly refer to the sources from which this data is derived. In that regard, when we refer to one or more sources of this type of data in any paragraph, you should assume that other data of this type appearing in the same paragraph is derived from the same sources, unless otherwise expressly stated or the context otherwise requires.

In addition, while we are responsible for all of the disclosure contained in this prospectus and we believe the industry, market, and competitive position data included in this prospectus is reliable and based on reasonable assumptions, such data involve risks and uncertainties and are subject to change based on various factors, including those discussed in the sections titled “Risk Factors” and “Special Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements.” These and other factors could cause results to differ materially from those expressed in the estimates made by the independent parties or by us.

USE OF PROCEEDS

We estimate that the net proceeds to us from this offering will be approximately $125.8 million (or approximately $145.4 million if the underwriters exercise their option to purchase additional shares in full), based on the initial public offering price of $15.00 per share, and after deducting the underwriting discounts and commissions and estimated offering expenses payable by us.

The principal purposes of this offering are to obtain additional capital to support our operations, to create a public market for our common stock, and to facilitate our future access to the public equity markets. We currently intend to use the net proceeds from this offering, together with our existing cash, cash equivalents, and marketable securities, as follows:

We may also use a portion of the remaining net proceeds and our existing cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities to in-license, acquire, or invest in complementary businesses, technologies, products, or assets. However, we have no current commitments or obligations to do so.

Based on our current operating plans, we believe that the estimated net proceeds from this offering, together with our existing cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities, will be sufficient to fund our operations into the second half of 2028. We have based these estimates on assumptions that may prove to be wrong, and we could use our capital resources sooner than we currently expect. Additionally, our expected use of existing cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities and our net proceeds from this offering represent our intentions based upon our current plans and business conditions, which could change in the future as our plans and business conditions evolve. The amounts and timing of our actual expenditures may vary significantly depending on numerous factors, including the progress and costs of our development activities, the status of and results from clinical trials and preclinical studies, as well as any collaborations that we may enter into with third parties for our products, and the amount of cash used in our operations and any unforeseen cash needs as well as other factors described in the sections titled “Risk Factors,” “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations,” and “Special Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements.”

The net proceeds from this offering, together with our existing cash, cash equivalents, and marketable securities will not be sufficient to complete the Phase 1/2a ASPIRO trial, the Phase 3 trial for sasineprocel, which we intend to initiate prior to the completion of the Phase 1/2a ASPIRO trial, or the development of sasineprocel or any other current or future product candidates. After this offering, we will require additional capital in order to advance our current and any future product candidates through clinical trials, regulatory approval, and commercialization. Until such time, if ever, as we can generate substantial revenue, we expect to finance our cash needs through equity offerings, debt financings, or other capital sources, including potential collaborations, licenses, and other similar arrangements. Nevertheless, we may be unable to raise additional funds or enter into such other arrangements when needed on favorable terms or at all.

Pending the uses described above, we plan to invest the net proceeds in a variety of capital preservation instruments, including short-term, interest-bearing obligations, investment-grade instruments, certificates of deposit, and direct or guaranteed obligations of the United States.

DIVIDEND POLICY

We have never declared or paid any cash dividends on our capital stock. We currently intend to retain future earnings, if any, to finance the operation of our business and do not anticipate paying any cash dividends on our capital stock in the foreseeable future. Any future determination related to our dividend policy will be made at the discretion of our board of directors after considering our financial condition, results of operations, current and anticipated capital requirements, business prospects, and other factors our board of directors deems relevant, and subject to applicable laws and the restrictions contained in any future financing instruments.

CAPITALIZATION

The following table sets forth our cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities and capitalization as of June 30, 2026:

You should read this information in conjunction with our financial statements and related notes included in this prospectus and the section titled “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations” and other financial information contained in this prospectus.

The number of shares of our common stock issued and outstanding, pro forma and pro forma as adjusted in the table above, is based on 19,703,600 shares of our common stock outstanding as of June 30, 2026 after giving effect to (i) the automatic conversion of all outstanding shares of our convertible preferred stock into 17,971,324 shares of our common stock immediately prior to the closing of this offering and (ii) the Note Forgiveness,including the treatment of 622,707 shares of common stock as outstanding. See Note 13 to our unaudited interim financial statements

included elsewhere in this prospectus for additional information related to the Note Forgiveness. The number of shares of our common stock issued and outstanding, pro forma and pro forma as adjusted in the table above excludes:

DILUTION

If you invest in our common stock in this offering, your ownership interest will be immediately and substantially diluted to the extent of the difference between the initial public offering price per share and the pro forma as adjusted net tangible book value per share of our common stock immediately after this offering.

As of June 30, 2026, our historical net tangible book value (deficit) was $(251.1) million, or $(226.28) per share of our common stock, based on 1,732,276 shares of common stock issued and 1,109,569 shares of common stock outstanding as of such date. Our historical net tangible book value (deficit) per share represents total tangible assets less total liabilities and convertible preferred stock, which is not included within permanent equity, divided by the number of shares of common stock outstanding at June 30, 2026.

On a pro forma basis, after giving effect to (i) the automatic conversion of all outstanding shares of our convertible preferred stock into 17,971,324 shares of our common stock and the related reclassification of the carrying value of the convertible preferred stock to permanent equity immediately prior to the closing of this offering, and (ii) the Note Forgiveness, including the resulting treatment of 622,707 shares of common stock as outstanding, our pro forma net tangible book value as of June 30, 2026 would have been $87.7 million, or $4.45 per share of our common stock.

After giving further effect to the sale and issuance of 9,375,000 shares of our common stock in this offering at the initial public offering price of $15.00 per share, and after deducting the underwriting discounts and commissions and estimated offering expenses payable by us, our pro forma as adjusted net tangible book value as of June 30, 2026 would have been approximately $213.5 million, or approximately $7.34 per share. This amount represents an immediate increase in pro forma net tangible book value of approximately $2.89 per share to our existing stockholders and an immediate dilution in pro forma net tangible book value of approximately $7.66 per share to new investors purchasing shares of common stock in this offering.

Dilution per share to new investors is determined by subtracting pro forma as adjusted net tangible book value per share after this offering from the initial public offering price per share paid by new investors. The following table illustrates this dilution (without giving effect to any exercise by the underwriters of their option to purchase additional shares):

If the underwriters exercise their option to purchase additional shares of our common stock in full in this offering, the pro forma as adjusted net tangible book value after the offering would be approximately $7.65 per share, the increase in pro forma as adjusted net tangible book value per share to existing stockholders would be approximately $3.20 per share, and the dilution per share to investors in this offering would be $7.35 per share.

The following table summarizes on the pro forma as adjusted basis described above, as of June 30, 2026, the differences between the number of shares purchased from us, the total consideration paid to us in cash, and the weighted-average price per share paid by existing stockholders for shares issued prior to this offering and the price to be paid by new investors in this offering. The calculations below are based on the initial public offering price of $15.00

per share, before deducting the underwriting discounts and commissions and estimated offering expenses payable by us.

If the underwriters exercise their option to purchase additional shares of our common stock in full:

The foregoing tables and calculations above (other than the historical net tangible book value calculations) are based on 19,703,600 shares of our common stock outstanding as of June 30, 2026 after giving effect to (i) the automatic conversion of all outstanding shares of our convertible preferred stock into 17,971,324 shares of our common stock immediately prior to the closing of this offering, and (ii) the Note Forgiveness,including the treatment of 622,707 shares of common stock as outstanding. See Note 13 to our unaudited interim financial statements included elsewhere in this prospectus for additional information related to the Note Forgiveness. The number of shares of our common stock issued and outstanding as of June 30, 2026 in the foregoing tables and calculations above excludes:

To the extent any outstanding options are exercised, new options or other equity awards are issued under our equity incentive plans, or we issue additional equity or convertible securities in the future, there will be further dilution to new investors participating in this offering.

MANAGEMENT’S DISCUSSION AND ANALYSIS OF FINANCIAL CONDITION AND RESULTS OF OPERATIONS

You should read the following discussion and analysis of our financial condition and results of operations together with our financial statements and related notes and other financial information included elsewhere in this prospectus. Some of the information contained in this discussion and analysis or set forth elsewhere in this prospectus, including information with respect to our plans and strategy for our business and related financing, includes forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties. As a result of many factors, including those factors set forth in the sections titled “Special Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements” and “Risk Factors” of this prospectus, our actual results could differ materially from the results described in or implied by the forward-looking statements contained in the following discussion and analysis.

Overview

Aspen Neuroscience, Inc. is a leading, clinical-stage regenerative medicine biotechnology company focused on developing autologous iPSC-derived therapies to address neurodegenerative diseases with high unmet medical need. Our lead product candidate, sasineprocel, is an investigational single-dose, autologous iPSC-based cell therapy being evaluated for the treatment of PD. We believe sasineprocel has the potential to be disease-modifying by primarily replacing a patient’s lost DA neurons with DANPCs. We are headquartered in San Diego, California, and were originally incorporated in Delaware on May 18, 2018.

Since our inception in 2018, we have devoted substantially all of our time and efforts to performing research and development activities, raising capital and recruiting management, technical, and business development staff to support our operations. To date, we have funded our operations primarily through aggregate gross proceeds of approximately $340 million from the sales of our convertible preferred stock, including approximately $115.6 million from our Series C convertible preferred stock financing in 2025.

We have incurred significant net losses since inception and we expect to continue to incur substantial losses for the foreseeable future. Our net losses for the years ended December 31, 2025 and 2024 were $62.1 million and $48.6 million, respectively. Our net losses for the six months ended June 30, 2026 and 2025 were $36.5 million and $31.8 million, respectively. As of June 30, 2026, we had an accumulated deficit of $264.9 million.

We expect our operating expenses to significantly increase as we continue to develop, conduct clinical trials, and seek regulatory approvals for our product candidates, engage in other research and development activities to expand our pipeline of product candidates, expand our operations and headcount, maintain and expand our intellectual property portfolio, and, if we obtain approval for one or more of our product candidates, launch commercial activities. We also expect to incur additional operating expenses associated with operating as a public company upon the completion of this offering, including costs related to SEC reporting obligations, Sarbanes-Oxley compliance, director and officer liability insurance, investor relations, and additional finance and legal personnel. Our net losses may fluctuate significantly from quarter-to-quarter and year-to-year, depending on the timing and scope of our clinical trials and our expenditures on other research and development activities.

We will not generate any revenue from product sales unless and until we successfully complete clinical development and obtain regulatory approval for one or more of our product candidates. If we obtain regulatory approval for any of our product candidates, we expect to incur significant expenses related to developing our internal commercialization capability to support product sales, marketing, and distribution. We may also seek to generate revenue through collaboration agreements, licensing arrangements, or other strategic transactions prior to or in connection with any such approval.

As a result, we will require substantial additional funding to support our ongoing operations as we advance our product candidates through clinical development, seek regulatory approvals, and prepare for and, if any of our product candidates are approved, proceed to commercialization. Until such time as we can generate substantial revenue from product sales, if ever, we expect to finance our operating activities through a combination of equity offerings, debt financings, or other capital sources, including potential collaborations, licenses, or other strategic arrangements. However, we may be unable to raise additional funds or enter into such agreements when needed, on acceptable terms,

or at all. Our inability to obtain adequate funding could have a material adverse effect on our business, results of operations, and financial condition.

At this time, due to the inherently unpredictable nature of clinical development and the early stage of our product candidates, we cannot reasonably estimate the costs required or timelines needed to complete development, obtain marketing approval, and commercialize our current or any future product candidates, if at all. For the same reasons, we are unable to accurately predict the timing or magnitude of increased expenses or when, or if, we will achieve profitability. Even if we do achieve profitability, we may not be able to sustain or increase it on a quarterly or annual basis. Our ability to continue advancing our programs will depend on our ability to obtain additional funding. If we are unable to secure sufficient capital on acceptable terms, we may be forced to delay, reduce, or eliminate some or all of our research and development programs, product portfolio expansion efforts, or commercialization activities, which could adversely affect our business prospects. In such circumstances, we may also be required to substantially reduce or terminate operations.

In various closings from October 2025 to November 2025, we issued and sold to investors in private placements an aggregate of 76,173,492 shares of Series C convertible preferred stock at a per share purchase price of $1.5179, and we received gross proceeds of approximately $115.6 million. As of June 30, 2026, we had cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities of $72.4 million. Together with the estimated net proceeds from this offering, we believe our cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities will be sufficient to fund our operating expenses and capital expenditures into the second half of 2028. We have based this estimate on assumptions that may prove to be wrong, and we could use our capital resources sooner than we expect. Additionally, our expected use of existing cash, cash equivalents, marketable securities, and our net proceeds from this offering represent our intentions based upon our current plans and business conditions, which could change in the future as our plans and business conditions evolve. See “Liquidity and Capital Resources—Funding Requirements” below.

Results of Operations

Components of Results of Operations and Comparison of the Years Ended December 31, 2025 and 2024

The following table summarizes our results of operations for each of the periods below (in thousands):

To date, we have not generated any revenue. We do not expect to generate any revenue unless and until we successfully complete clinical development and obtain regulatory approval for one or more of our product candidates. If we fail to complete clinical development or obtain regulatory approval for our product candidates, our ability to generate future revenues and our results of operations and financial position would be adversely affected.

Operating Expenses

Our operating expenses consist of research and development expenses and general and administrative expenses.

Research and Development Expenses

Our research and development expenses consist primarily of costs incurred in connection with the research, development and manufacturing of our lead product candidate, sasineprocel. Our research and development expenses include:

We expense research and development costs in the period in which they are incurred. Research and development activities are central to our business model. We expect our research and development expenses to increase significantly over the near term as we advance sasineprocel through clinical development, including the commencement of a Phase 3 registrational trial.

The following table summarizes our research and development expenses for the periods indicated (in thousands):

Research and development expenses were $41.8 million for the year ended December 31, 2025, compared to $35.6 million for the year ended December 31, 2024. The increase of $6.2 million was due to an increase in non-personnel costs primarily associated with the development and production of sasineprocel of $3.0 million, increased personnel costs for salaries, bonuses and benefits of $2.1 million, increased facilities costs of $0.5 million, increased depreciation expense of $0.4 million, and increased stock-based compensation expense of $0.2 million. Substantially all of our non-personnel research and development expenses for the years ended December 31, 2025 and 2024 related to our lead product candidate, sasineprocel. Non-personnel research and development expenses related to other programs were immaterial for the years ended December 31, 2025 and 2024.

General and Administrative Expenses

General and administrative expenses consist primarily of employee-related costs, including salaries, bonuses, benefits, and stock-based compensation expenses for personnel in executive, finance, and other administrative functions. General and administrative expenses also include legal fees relating to intellectual property and corporate matters; professional fees paid for auditing, tax and consulting services; insurance costs; and facility-related expenses, which include direct depreciation costs and allocated expenses for rent and maintenance of facilities and other operating costs.

We expect that our general and administrative expenses will increase in the near term as we expand our headcount to support increased research and development activities. We also expect to incur increased expenses associated with being a public company, including costs for directors and officers’ insurance, legal, audit, regulatory, and tax-related services related to compliance with the rules and regulations of the SEC and Nasdaq listing standards, and investor relations costs.

The following table summarizes our general and administrative expenses for the periods indicated (in thousands):

General and administrative expenses were $17.5 million for the year ended December 31, 2025, compared to $17.9 million for the year ended December 31, 2024. The decrease of $0.4 million was primarily due to decreases in personnel costs resulting from decreases in stock-based compensation as prior grants either fully vested or were forfeited.

Other (Loss) Income

Interest income

Interest income consists of interest earned on our cash equivalents and marketable securities. Interest income was $1.8 million for the year ended December 31, 2025, compared to $4.4 million for the year ended December 31, 2024. The decrease of $2.6 million was primarily due to the lower average balance of cash equivalents and marketable securities during the year ended December 31, 2025.

Other (loss) income, net

Other (loss) income, net, primarily reflects changes in the fair value of the Cell X Convertible Note (described below in “—Contractual Obligations and Commitments—Cell X A&R Collaboration and License Agreement”), which is accounted for under the fair value option, with changes in fair value recognized in other (loss) income. Other loss was $4.5 million for the year ended December 31, 2025, compared to other income of $0.5 million for the year ended December 31, 2024. The decrease of $5.0 million was primarily due to a reduction in the fair value of the Cell X Convertible Note (as described below) resulting from changes in our estimated expected future investment returns of the Cell X Convertible Note.

Comparison of the Six Months Ended June 30, 2026 and 2025

The following table summarizes our results of operations for each of the periods below (in thousands):

Research and Development Expenses

The following table summarizes our research and development expenses for the periods indicated (in thousands):

Research and development expenses were $28.5 million for the six months ended June 30, 2026, compared to $20.8 million for the six months ended June 30, 2025. The increase of $7.6 million was due to an increase in non-personnel costs primarily associated with the development and production of sasineprocel of $4.1 million, increased personnel costs for salaries, bonuses and benefits of $2.2 million, increased facilities and equipment costs of $0.6 million, increased stock-based compensation expense of $0.7 million, and increased depreciation expense of $0.1 million. Substantially all of our non-personnel research and development expenses for the six months ended June 30, 2026 and 2025 related to our lead product candidate, sasineprocel. Non-personnel research and development expenses related to other programs were immaterial for the six months ended June 30, 2026 and 2025.

General and Administrative Expenses

The following table summarizes our general and administrative expenses for the periods indicated (in thousands):

General and administrative expenses were $9.8 million for the six months ended June 30, 2026, compared to $10.1 million for the six months ended June 30, 2025. The decrease of $0.3 million was primarily due to decreases in professional, consultant and other external spend of $0.5 million, decreases in salaries, bonuses and benefits of $0.2 million, partially offset by increases in stock-based compensation of $0.5 million.

Other Income (Loss)

Interest income

Interest income consists of interest earned on our cash equivalents and marketable securities. Interest income was $1.7 million for the six months ended June 30, 2026, compared to $0.9 million for the six months ended June 30, 2025. The increase of $0.8 million was primarily due to the higher average balance of cash equivalents and marketable securities during the six months ended June 30, 2026.

Other income (loss), net

Other income (loss), net, primarily reflects changes in the fair value of the Cell X Convertible Note (described below in “—Contractual Obligations and Commitments—Cell X A&R Collaboration and License Agreement”), which is accounted for under the fair value option, with changes in fair value recognized in other income (loss). Other income was $2,000 for the six months ended June 30, 2026, compared to other loss of $1.7 million for the six months ended June 30, 2025. The increase of $1.7 million was primarily due to a reduction in the fair value of the Cell X Convertible Note (as described below) of $1.7 million during the six months ended June 30, 2025, compared to an increase of $2,000 of the fair value of the Cell X Convertible Note during the six months ended June 30, 2026, each resulting from changes in our estimated expected future investment returns of the Cell X Convertible Note.

Liquidity and Capital Resources

Sources of Liquidity

We have incurred net losses and negative cash flows from operations since our inception and anticipate we will continue to incur net losses for the foreseeable future. We expect to incur substantial expenditures as we advance our primary product candidate through clinical development, undergo the regulatory approval process, engage in other research and development activities to expand our pipeline of product candidates, expand our operations and headcount, and maintain and expand our intellectual property. Further, upon the completion of this offering, we expect to incur additional costs associated with operating as a public company.

To date, we have funded our operations primarily through the sale of preferred stock. We have raised an aggregate of approximately $340 million in gross proceeds from the issuance of preferred stock, including $115.6

million in gross proceeds from the issuance and sale of our Series C preferred stock in the fourth quarter of 2025. As of June 30, 2026 and December 31, 2025, we had cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities of $72.4 million and $110.7 million, respectively.

Cash Flows

Comparison of the Years Ended December 31, 2025 and 2024

The following table summarizes our cash flows for the periods indicated (in thousands):

Operating Activities

For the year ended December 31, 2025, net cash used in operating activities was $52.8 million, reflecting a net loss of $62.1 million and a net change in our operating assets and liabilities of $1.8 million, partially offset by non-cash charges of $11.0 million. Non-cash charges primarily consisted of the $4.5 million change in the fair value of the Cell X Convertible Note, stock-based compensation of $2.5 million, amortization of our right-of use lease assets of $2.3 million, and depreciation of $1.6 million.

For the year ended December 31, 2024, net cash used in operating activities was $44.2 million, reflecting a net loss of $48.6 million and a net change in our operating assets and liabilities of $0.6 million, partially offset by non-cash charges of $3.8 million. Non-cash charges primarily consisted of stock-based compensation of $2.7 million, amortization of our right-of-use lease assets of $2.2 million, and depreciation of $1.4 million, offset by the accretion of the discount on our marketable securities of $2.0 million.

Investing Activities

For the year ended December 31, 2025, net cash provided by investing activities was $4.2 million, primarily consisting of maturities of marketable securities of $47.5 million, partially offset by the purchase of marketable securities of $33.6 million and purchases of property and equipment of $9.7 million.

For the year ended December 31, 2024, net cash provided by investing activities was $20.6 million, primarily consisting of maturities of marketable securities of $103.1 million, partially offset by purchase of marketable securities of $74.9 million, the purchase of the Cell X Convertible Note of $5.0 million, and purchases of property and equipment of $2.6 million.

Financing Activities

For the year ended December 31, 2025, net cash provided by financing activities was $115.5 million, primarily consisting of net cash proceeds from the issuance of Series C preferred stock.

For the year ended December 31, 2024, net cash provided by financing activities was $0.5 million, primarily consisting of cash proceeds from stock option exercises by employees under the 2018 Plan.

Comparison of the Six Months Ended June 30, 2026 and 2025

The following table summarizes our cash flows for the periods indicated (in thousands):

Operating Activities

For the six months ended June 30, 2026, net cash used in operating activities was $34.5 million, reflecting a net loss of $36.5 million and a net change in our operating assets and liabilities of $1.8 million, offset by non-cash charges of $3.8 million. Non-cash charges primarily consisted of stock-based compensation of $2.5 million, amortization of our right-of-use lease assets of $1.2 million, and depreciation of $0.9 million, primarily offset by the accretion of discounts on short-term investments of $0.7 million.

For the six months ended June 30, 2025, net cash used in operating activities was $30.6 million, reflecting a net loss of $31.8 million and a net change in our operating assets and liabilities of $3.8 million, offset by non-cash charges of $4.9 million. Non-cash charges primarily consisted of a decrease in the fair value of the Cell X Convertible Note of $1.7 million, stock-based compensation of $1.2 million, amortization of our right-of-use lease assets of $1.1 million, and depreciation of $0.8 million.

Investing Activities

For the six months ended June 30, 2026, net cash used in investing activities was $25.6 million, consisting of purchases of marketable securities of $55.6 million, and purchases of property and equipment of $3.8 million, offset by maturities of marketable securities of $33.8 million.

For the six months ended June 30, 2025, net cash provided by investing activities was $24.8 million, consisting of maturities of marketable securities of $38.3 million, offset by purchases of marketable securities of $9.8 million, and purchases of property and equipment of $3.7 million.

Financing Activities

For the six months ended June 30, 2026, net cash used in financing activities was $0.7 million resulting from the payment of $0.8 million in deferred offering costs related to our planned initial public offering, offset by proceeds from the exercises of employee stock options of $0.1 million.

For the six months ended June 30, 2025, net cash provided by financing activities was $50,000, consisting of proceeds from the exercises of employee stock options.

Funding Requirements

As of June 30, 2026, we had cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities of $72.4 million. Based on our current operating plan, we estimate that our existing cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities as of June 30, 2026 will not be sufficient to fund our capital and operating expenditures for at least the twelve months following the date the unaudited financial statements were issued, and there is substantial doubt about our ability to continue as a

going concern. Nevertheless, together with the estimated net proceeds from this offering, we believe our cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities will be sufficient to fund our operating expenses and capital expenditures into the second half of 2028. However, our forecast of the period of time through which our financial resources will be adequate to support our operations is a forward-looking statement that involves risk and uncertainties, and actual results could vary materially. We have based this estimate on assumptions that may prove to be wrong, and we could expend our capital resources sooner than we currently expect. Additionally, our expected use of existing cash, cash equivalents, marketable securities, and our net proceeds from this offering represent our intentions based upon our current plans and business conditions, which could change in the future as our plans and business conditions evolve.

We will need substantial additional capital to develop our lead program and fund operations for the foreseeable future. The net proceeds from this offering, together with our existing cash, cash equivalents, and marketable securities will not be sufficient to complete the Phase 1/2a ASPIRO trial, the Phase 3 trial for sasineprocel, which we intend to initiate prior to the completion of the Phase 1/2a ASPIRO trial, or the development of sasineprocel or any other current or future product candidates. Our future capital requirements are difficult to predict and will depend on many factors, including but not limited to:

Until such time as we can generate substantial revenue from product sales, if ever, we expect to finance our operating activities through a combination of public or private equity offerings, debt financings, or other capital sources, including potential collaborations, licenses, or other strategic arrangements. However, we may be unable to raise additional funds or enter into such other arrangements when needed on favorable terms or at all. To the extent that we raise additional capital through the sale of equity or convertible debt securities, the ownership interest of our stockholders will be diluted, and the terms of these securities may include liquidation or other preferences that adversely affect the rights of our existing common stockholders. In addition, debt financing and equity financing, if available, may involve agreements that include covenants limiting or restricting our ability to take specific actions, such as incurring additional debt, making capital expenditures, or declaring dividends. If we raise funds through collaborations, or other similar arrangements with third parties, we may have to relinquish valuable rights to our technologies, future revenue streams, research programs, or product candidates or may have to grant licenses on terms that may not be favorable to us and/or may reduce the value of our common stock. If we are unable to raise additional

funds through equity or debt financings or through commercial arrangements when needed, we may be required to delay, limit, reduce or terminate our product development or future commercialization efforts or grant rights to develop and market our product candidates even if we would otherwise prefer to develop and market such product candidates ourselves. Any of these actions could materially and adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

Contractual Obligations and Commitments

During the normal course of our business, we enter into agreements for research and professional services, and for the purchase of lab supplies used in our research and clinical trial activities. These agreements are important to our operations but do not involve material financial commitments and generally provide for termination after a notice period, and, therefore, are cancelable contracts and not separately presented. For more information regarding our operational relationships, see the section titled “Business—Manufacturing.”

Lease Agreements

In March 2019, we entered into a lease agreement for office, research and development, and laboratory space located in San Diego, California, which commenced in April 2019. We subsequently amended the lease to expand the premises to approximately 31,000 rentable square feet and extended the term through September 15, 2027. We are required to maintain a letter of credit in the amount of $0.2 million as security for our obligations under this lease, which is recorded as restricted cash.

In May 2021, we entered into a lease agreement for approximately 22,000 rentable square feet of office, research and development, laboratory, GMP manufacturing and warehouse space located in San Diego, California. This lease commenced on April 1, 2022, and has a term expiring on July 31, 2032, with one option to renew for an additional five-year term. We are required to maintain a letter of credit in the amount of $0.4 million as security for our obligations under this lease, which is recorded as restricted cash.

As of June 30, 2026, total future minimum lease payments under our operating lease agreements were $11.6 million.

In August 2026, we entered into a noncancelable operating lease agreement with HCP Life Science REIT, Inc. for approximately 48,696 rentable square feet of office, research and development, laboratory, storage and warehouse space located in La Jolla, California (the New Lease), which we intend to establish as our corporate headquarters after the lease for our existing corporate headquarters expires in September 2027. The New Lease has an initial term of 93 months commencing on July 1, 2027 and expiring on March 31, 2035. The New Lease includes a beneficial occupancy period beginning on execution of the agreement and continuing through June 30, 2027, allowing us to complete facility improvements, install equipment and furniture, and begin certain operations prior to the July 1, 2027 lease commencement date without payment of base rent. At execution, we were obligated to pay $0.3 million, representing the first month’s base rent and estimated direct expenses. The New Lease provides for a 23-month rent abatement period, during which no base rent is due; as a result, our next base rent payment is not due until July 2029. Aggregate base rent is approximately $20.2 million, net of abatements, with refurbishment and other construction allowances of up to approximately $2.5 million and a special allowance of up to $2.0 million, and a required letter of credit of approximately $0.4 million.

TSRI License Agreement

In October 2018, we were assigned an exclusive license agreement effective July 2018 by Summit for Stem Cell Foundation with the Scripps Research Institute (TSRI, and the agreement, the TSRI License Agreement). Under the TSRI License Agreement, TSRI granted us an exclusive, worldwide, royalty-bearing license, with the right to sublicense through multiple tiers (subject to certain conditions), under certain intellectual property relating to certain methods for differentiating DA neurons from iPSCs and certain bioinformatics assays, and together with certain licensed biological materials, to make, have made, use, have used, sell, have sold, offer for sale and import licensed products, services and processes in all fields worldwide. The licensed intellectual property includes methods that are used in the manufacture of sasineprocel. TSRI reserved rights in the licensed intellectual property and/or licensed

biological materials for non-corporate sponsored internal research and educational purposes without obligation to further compensate us for such uses and further reserved the right to grant similar non-exclusive licenses to other nonprofit or academic institutions for similar internal research and educational purposes.

Under the TSRI License Agreement, we are obligated to use commercially reasonable efforts to develop and obtain regulatory approval for, and, if applicable, market and sell licensed products, services and processes in sufficient quantities to meet market demands. In addition, for each of the disclosed inventions and intellectual property described above that are the subject of our license, we are obligated to achieve certain development diligence benchmarks relating to intellectual property development and regulatory filings by specified anniversaries of the TSRI License Agreement’s effective date. Such benchmarks may be extended by us up to two times for a certain number of months upon the payment of a fee. If we fail to achieve such development diligence benchmarks, TSRI has the right, at its option, to either terminate the TSRI License Agreement in its entirety, terminate our rights with respect to specific licensed products, services or processes, or convert the license granted to us to non-exclusive upon advance notice.

We paid TSRI a non-creditable, non-refundable license issue upfront fee of $1,000. We are further obligated to pay TSRI a running royalty of 1.0% on future net sales of licensed products, services and processes on a licensed product-by-licensed product and country-by-country basis. We are also obligated to pay TSRI the following percentage of non-royalty sublicensing revenues: (a) 15% if the sublicense is executed prior to the third anniversary of the effective date of the TSRI License Agreement, and (b) 5% if executed thereafter. Sublicense revenue fees paid by us in the first year after execution of the applicable sublicense shall be capped at $250,000. Payments related to the TSRI License Agreement are made in the period when the contingency is resolved, and the amounts become payable. Other than the non-creditable, non-refundable license issue upfront fee, no amounts have been payable under the TSRI License Agreement.

Unless terminated earlier, the TSRI License Agreement expires upon such time as no further royalties are due to TSRI, which lasts, on a country-by-country basis, until ten years after the date of first commercial sale of the first licensed product, licensed process, or licensed service sold in such country that was covered by the same invention disclosure among the disclosed intellectual property, but in any event no later than 20 years following the effective date of the TSRI License Agreement. We may terminate the TSRI License Agreement for convenience at any time upon advance notice to TSRI. TSRI may terminate the TSRI License Agreement for our material breach (subject to separate cure periods depending on whether our breach is payment-related or not), certain insolvency proceedings involving us, or if we commit a felony relating to the development, manufacture, use, marketing, distribution or sale of licensed products, services, processes or biological materials. Upon any early termination, the licenses granted to us terminate and such rights revert to TSRI.

AJ License Agreement

In September 2019, we entered into a non-exclusive license agreement with iPS Academia Japan, Inc. (the AJ License Agreement) pursuant to which iPS Academia Japan, Inc. (AJ) granted us a worldwide, limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable and royalty-bearing license, without the right to grant or authorize sublicenses, under certain patents relating to iPSCs licensed to AJ by Kyoto University for the development, manufacture, and sale of licensed products for therapeutic uses in humans (but excluding diagnostic and prophylactic purposes). We also received a limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable, royalty bearing license, without the right to grant sublicenses, under certain licensed cells to develop, make, have made and use licensed cells solely for the development and manufacture of licensed products. We utilize licensed technology under the AJ License Agreement in the manufacture of sasineprocel.

Pursuant to the AJ License Agreement, we have paid AJ aggregate upfront fees of $60,000 and are obligated to pay annual maintenance fees of $25,000 until and including the calendar year in which we obtain approval of a first new drug application of a licensed product in the territory. We have paid development milestones of $290,000 and are obligated to pay future milestones of up to $135,000 upon the successful achievement of development milestones, and up to $1.1 million in the aggregate when certain net sales thresholds of a licensed product are met. We are obligated to pay AJ a running royalty rate in the low single digits, of net sales of licensed products. Our running royalty obligations are determined on a country-by-country and product-by-product basis, and shall only be due with respect to licensed products in the applicable country in the territory so long as the development, manufacture, sale, import or export of the licensed products is covered by licensed patents in such country. Once all licensed patents are extinguished in a given country, whether by expiration, lapse, revocation, or otherwise, our obligation to pay running

royalties in that country ceases, except with respect to the applicable running royalties for the licensed patents used prior to the extinguishment in any such country. In addition, beginning in the calendar year following the first NDA approval of a licensed product in the territory and continuing through the expiration or termination of the AJ License Agreement, we must pay AJ a certain creditable annual minimum royalty in the mid-tens of thousands of dollars range, reduced by any running royalties paid during a certain number of preceding royalty reporting periods.

Under the AJ License Agreement, we are also required to grant AJ a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free and fully paid-up license under any improvement patents we develop in the course of or as a result of exercising the license granted under the AJ License Agreement, with AJ having the right to sublicense such improvement patents to Kyoto University and other non-commercial academic institutions in Japan for academic research and educational purposes. The AJ License Agreement contains additional customary representations and warranties, covenants, indemnifications and insurance and confidentiality provisions for agreements of its type.

We are required to use commercially reasonable due diligence in developing and marketing licensed products worldwide. Unless earlier terminated in accordance with its terms, the AJ License Agreement continues until the expiration of the last to expire patent within the licensed patents worldwide. Each party may terminate the AJ License Agreement if the other party conducts any act that incurs incurable damage to the credibility, trust or reputation of the terminating party. AJ may terminate the AJ License Agreement upon written notice for uncured material breach by us (with a cure period for remedy), if we undergo an insolvency event, if we challenge, directly or indirectly, any licensed patent in any country, or if we undergo a change of control and fail to notify AJ or if our acquirer is then currently in any legal dispute or licensing conflict with AJ or the owner of the licensed patents. We may terminate the AJ License Agreement for convenience upon advance written notice.

In the event that AJ’s upstream license agreement with Kyoto University (under which AJ obtained rights to the licensed patents licensed to us) is terminated, the AJ License Agreement shall automatically terminate on the date of termination of AJ’s license with Kyoto University. In such case, AJ shall cause Kyoto University to negotiate with us the terms of a direct license between us and Kyoto University on similar terms and conditions to the AJ License Agreement, provided certain conditions are met. However, upon any termination of the AJ-Kyoto University upstream license, the licenses granted to us under the AJ License Agreement shall survive automatically for a set period of time as described in the AJ License Agreement, from the date of termination provided that certain conditions and obligations of ours are met.

Payments related to the AJ License Agreement are expensed in the period when the contingency is resolved, and the amounts become payable. We incurred expenses of $235,000 and $25,000 under this agreement during the years ended December 31, 2025 and 2024, respectively. We did not incur any expenses under this agreement during the six months ended June 30, 2026 and 2025.

Sumitomo License Agreement

In December 2023, we entered into a non-exclusive license agreement with Sumitomo Pharma Co., Ltd. (the Sumitomo License Agreement), pursuant to which Sumitomo Pharma Co., Ltd. (together with its successors and assigns under the Sumitomo License Agreement, including RACTHERA Co., Ltd. following the Organizational Split described below, Sumitomo) granted us a non-exclusive sublicense under certain patent rights originally licensed by ID Pharma Co., Ltd. (ID Pharma) to Sumitomo relating to technology for manufacturing iPSCs. Under the terms of the Sumitomo License Agreement, Sumitomo granted us a non-exclusive, non-transferable, and non-sublicensable license to manufacture iPS cells, and to use such iPS cells to develop, have developed, manufacture, have manufactured, import, distribute, and have distributed licensed products in the licensed territory (described below) in the field of autologous therapy for neurodegenerative disorders in the central nervous system and degenerative eye disorders. We utilize licensed technology under the Sumitomo License Agreement in the manufacture of sasineprocel. In connection with Sumitomo’s reorganization of its regenerative medicine and cell therapy business, effected through an absorption-type company split and related share transfer under the Companies Act of Japan (the Organizational Split), Sumitomo’s rights and obligations under the Sumitomo License Agreement were transferred to, assigned to and/or succeeded by RACTHERA Co., Ltd., with our prior consent.

The licensed territory under the Sumitomo License Agreement initially covers the region of the United States and Canada. We have the option to expand the licensed territory to include two other regions: (a) certain European countries upon additional payment to Sumitomo and (b) certain Asian countries upon a further additional payment to Sumitomo. If we wish to sublicense all or any portion of our rights in the licensed IP to a third party, Sumitomo has agreed to use reasonable efforts to negotiate and enter into a direct license with such third party on terms no less favorable than those in our agreement, except where such third party is a competitor of Sumitomo.

We retain ownership of any improvement, invention or discovery in relation to the licensed IP. However, we are required to grant Sumitomo an irrevocable, non-exclusive, non-transferable, perpetual, worldwide, royalty-free license, without a right to sublicense, to exploit all such improvements solely in connection with exploitation of the licensed IP.

We paid Sumitomo a non-refundable upfront payment ¥40.0 million in December 2023 and are required to pay non-refundable annual license fees of ¥6.0 million, creditable against royalties in the fiscal year of the first commercial sale of a licensed product and each year thereafter. Thus far, we have paid Sumitomo ¥25.0 million towards certain development milestones and are obligated to pay Sumitomo future development milestone payments of up to ¥125.0 million per licensed product per region for each of the three regions in the licensed territory upon the successful achievement of each development milestone, and up to ¥1.85 billion per licensed product when certain net sales thresholds of a licensed product are met. We are also required to pay Sumitomo a running royalty in the low single digits of annual net sales of each licensed product on a country-by-country basis during the royalty term, which lasts until the later of 1) the lapse, expiry or abandonment of the last valid claim covering the licensed intellectual property or 2) the tenth anniversary of the first commercial sale of a licensed product in the licensed territory. The royalty rate may be reduced pursuant to a customary reduction for certain intellectual property license payments in favor of third parties, subject to a low single-digit royalty rate floor. We incurred expenses of ¥6.0 million and ¥6.0 million under the Sumitomo License Agreement during the years ended December 31, 2025 and 2024, respectively. We incurred expenses of ¥3.0 million and ¥3.0 million under the Sumitomo License Agreement during the six months ended June 30, 2026 and 2025, respectively.

The Sumitomo License Agreement continues on a licensed product-by-licensed product and country-by-country basis until the expiration of all royalty terms. Upon expiration (but not early termination), our license under the Sumitomo License Agreement becomes fully paid and irrevocable. Either party may terminate the Sumitomo License Agreement for the other party’s material breach (subject to differing applicable cure periods if the breach is payment-related or not) and if the other party enters into insolvency proceedings. Sumitomo may terminate the agreement if we initiate any action to challenge the validity, enforceability or scope of the licensed IP. In the event the original license agreement between Sumitomo and ID Pharma is terminated, the Sumitomo License Agreement automatically terminates, and Sumitomo is required to reasonably cooperate in assisting us in entering into a direct license with ID Pharma. We may terminate the Sumitomo License Agreement in its entirety or on a licensed product-by-licensed product and region-by-region basis at any time for convenience upon advance written notice.

Cell X A&R Collaboration and License Agreement

In January 2024, we entered into a Collaboration and License Agreement (the Prior Cell X Agreement) with Cell X Technologies, Inc. (Cell X), which was amended and restated in August 2026 (as amended and restated, the A&R Cell X Agreement), pursuant to which we license systems and methods for automated detection, analysis, isolation, and harvesting of biological objects, including iPSCs, as well as related image analysis technologies (the Cell X Platform Technology). We hold (a) an exclusive, worldwide, sublicensable license under the Cell X Platform Technology to develop, practice, make, have made, use, sell, offer to sell, import and commercialize cellular therapeutic products made using the Cell X Platform Technology (Licensed Products) for the diagnosis, treatment, or prevention of PD and leukodystrophies using autologous or allogeneic iPSCs and cells derived from iPSCs (the Exclusive License), (b) a perpetual, irrevocable, fully paid-up, non-exclusive, worldwide, sublicensable license under the Cell X Platform Technology to develop, practice, make, have made, use, sell, offer to sell, import and commercialize Licensed Products for the treatment or prevention all other indications using autologous iPSCs and cells derived from iPSCs, and (c) an exclusive, worldwide, sublicensable license under the Cell X Platform Technology for PD and leukodystrophies, or non-exclusive, worldwide, sublicensable license under the Cell X Platform Technology for other autologous indications, to develop, practice, have practiced, make, have made and use automated cell processing systems (Licensed Instruments) incorporating the Cell X Platform Technology solely to the

extent the Licensed Instruments are used as research, manufacturing, processing or analytical tools to enable autologous or allogeneic iPSCs or cells derived from iPSCs for the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of PD or leukodystrophies and the treatment or prevention all other indications (the Instrument License). The A&R Cell X Agreement does not require us to pay royalties on Licensed Products. We utilize the Cell X Platform Technology in connection with our manufacturing process for sasineprocel.

Under the A&R Cell X Agreement, the parties’ prior collaboration program was replaced with a technology transfer and support framework. Pursuant to this framework, Cell X is required to transfer specified licensed know-how and documentation to us and provide certain consultation and technical assistance. Pursuant to the A&R Cell X Agreement, we entered into a master services agreement with Cell X under which Cell X may perform services pursuant to statements of work entered into from time to time. We paid Cell X an upfront fee of $250,000 in 2024 under the Prior Cell X Agreement, which was included as a component of research and development expenses in the statement of operations. Under the A&R Cell X Agreement, we are obligated to pay future development and regulatory milestone payments of up to approximately $8.8 million in the aggregate, consisting of up to $6.0 million for up to two licensed products for PD and up to $2.8 million for one licensed product for leukodystrophies. We may also be required to reimburse Cell X for approved technical and regulatory support in excess of specified no-cost support hours. We paid Cell X a total of $2.8 million and $6.0 million during the years ended December 31, 2024 and 2025, respectively, which included those expenses incurred under the Prior Cell X Agreement. Unless terminated earlier, the A&R Cell X Agreement continues on a Licensed Product-by-Licensed Product, exclusive indication-by-exclusive indication and country-by-country basis until the expiration of the last-to-expire valid claim of the licensed patent rights in such country. Upon expiration, our Exclusive License converts to an irrevocable, perpetual, exclusive, and sublicensable license and our Instrument License converts to an irrevocable, perpetual, fully paid-up, and sublicensable license. We may terminate the A&R Cell X Agreement in its entirety, or on a Licensed Product-by-Licensed Product, exclusive indication-by-exclusive indication, or country-by-country basis, at any time after the first anniversary of the effective date of the A&R Cell X Agreement, upon 90 days’ prior written notice to Cell X. Either party may terminate the A&R Cell X Agreement for the other party’s material breach, subject to customary cure periods, or upon a bankruptcy event of the other party. Cell X may also terminate if we challenge the validity, enforceability or scope of the licensed rights. Upon an early termination, all licenses granted to us other than the non-exclusive licenses terminate; provided, however, that upon termination by us for Cell X’s material breach, and upon our written election, our Exclusive License becomes irrevocable and perpetual, provided we continue to make milestone payments as set forth in the A&R Cell X Agreement. Qualifying sublicenses granted by us survive termination as direct licenses from Cell X, subject to specified conditions.

Cell X Secured Convertible Promissory Note

In January 2024, we entered into a Secured Convertible Promissory Note Purchase Agreement with Cell X pursuant to which we purchased a secured convertible promissory note (the Cell X Convertible Note) with an original principal amount of $5.0 million bearing 8% simple interest per annum. The Cell X Convertible Note is secured by a first priority security interest in substantially all of Cell X’s assets, including its intellectual property. The outstanding principal and interest shall automatically convert into shares of Cell X’s preferred stock upon a qualified financing in Cell X. We have optional conversion rights upon a non-qualified equity financing and upon maturity of the Cell X Convertible Note. The principal and accrued interest are due and payable upon the earliest to occur of (i) the maturity date, (ii) a sale of Cell X (whether to us or to a third party), or (iii) the occurrence of an Event of Default, as defined in the Cell X Convertible Note. Following the Cell X Side Letter (as defined below), in the event we acquire Cell X or in the event of a third-party sale of Cell X, we are entitled to receive the entire outstanding amount of the Cell X Convertible Note. The fair value of the Cell X Convertible Note was $0.9 million and $5.5 million as of December 31, 2025 and December 31, 2024, respectively, which is included in other noncurrent assets on the balance sheet. The fair value of the Cell X Convertible Note was $0.9 million as of June 30, 2026.

In January 2026, we entered into a First Amendment to the Cell X Convertible Note, which extended the original maturity date of January 22, 2026 to February 22, 2026. Subsequently, we entered into a series of additional amendments to further extend the maturity date. In August 2026, we entered into a Side Letter agreement with Cell X (the Cell X Side Letter), pursuant to which, upon the satisfaction of certain conditions, the maturity date will be extended to March 31, 2028 and all security related to the Cell X Convertible Note will be released.

CCF Exclusive License Agreement

In August 2026, we entered into an Exclusive License Agreement (the CCF Agreement) with The Cleveland Clinic Foundation (CCF), pursuant to which CCF granted us direct licenses under certain patents, software and know-how underlying the Cell X Platform Technology (the CCF Licensed Technology). We hold (a) an exclusive, worldwide, sublicensable license under the CCF Licensed Technology to develop, practice, have practiced, make, have made, use, sell, offer to sell, import and commercialize cellular therapeutic products for the diagnosis, treatment and prevention of PD and leukodystrophies using autologous or allogeneic iPSCs and cells derived from iPSCs, (b) a non-exclusive, worldwide, sublicensable license under the CCF Licensed Technology to develop, practice, have practiced, make, have made, use, sell, offer to sell, import and commercialize cellular therapeutic products for the treatment or prevention of all other indications using autologous iPSCs and cells derived from iPSCs, and (c) an exclusive, worldwide sublicensable license under the CCF Licensed Technology for PD and leukodystrophies and non-exclusive, worldwide, sublicensable license under the CCF Licensed Technology for all other indications to develop, practice, have practiced, make, have made and automated cell processing systems (Licensed Instruments) incorporating the CCF Licensed Technology solely to the extent the Licensed Instruments are used as research, manufacturing, processing or analytical tools in connection with such cellular therapeutic products (and not as standalone commercial products) for the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of PD or leukodystrophies and the treatment or prevention all other indications. We may elect, at any time before December 31, 2031, to convert leukodystrophies from an exclusive indication to a non-exclusive indication. We are required to use commercially reasonable efforts to develop and commercialize the licensed products worldwide. The CCF Agreement does not require us to pay running royalties based on a percentage of net sales of licensed products; however, we are obligated to pay fixed minimum annual payments and milestone payments as described below.

Under the CCF Agreement, we are obligated to pay CCF an upfront fee in the low five figures and a fixed, minimum annual royalty payment of $140,000 for 2026 and each calendar year thereafter during the term. We may also be obligated to pay milestone payments of up to approximately $6.1 million in the aggregate, consisting of up to approximately $3.1 million in development and commercialization milestone payments and up to $3.0 million in sales milestone payments. We are also obligated to reimburse CCF for our pro rata share of patent prosecution costs and expenses incurred by CCF after the effective date, calculated based on the total number of direct licensees of such patents at the time such costs are incurred.

Unless terminated earlier, the CCF Agreement continues on a country-by-country and licensed product-by-licensed product basis until the expiration of the last-to-expire valid claim covering the applicable licensed product in such country. Upon expiration, the licenses granted under the CCF Agreement become fully paid-up, irrevocable and perpetual on a country-by-country and licensed product-by-licensed product basis. We may terminate the CCF Agreement for CCF’s uncured material breach upon 60 days’ notice, or for any other reason upon 60 days’ notice and payment of a termination fee and any other amounts then due or owing. CCF may terminate the CCF Agreement upon specified events relating to our insolvency or for an uncured failure to pay amounts due, a materially false or misleading representation or statement, or an uncured failure to perform a material covenant. CCF may also terminate the CCF Agreement if we challenge specified licensed patents, subject to certain exceptions and a cure period. If CCF does not terminate the CCF Agreement following such a challenge, the fixed minimum annual royalty payment and certain milestone payments associated with the challenged patents may be increased. Upon termination, our rights to the CCF Licensed Technology terminate and revert to CCF. Qualifying sublicenses granted by us survive termination as direct licenses from CCF, subject to specified conditions.

California Institute for Regenerative Medicine Award

In March 2024, CIRM issued an $8.0 million award to us to co-sponsor a Phase 1/2a dose escalation study of our lead product candidate, sasineprocel, in sporadic PD (the Award). We are eligible to receive seven disbursements in varying amounts, with one disbursement receivable upon the execution of the Award, and six disbursements receivable upon the completion of certain milestones throughout the project period of the Award, which is estimated to be from April 2024 to September 2026 (the Award Period).

Following the conclusion of the Award Period, we have, in our sole discretion, the option to treat the Award either as a loan or as a grant. If we do not elect to treat the Award as a loan within 10 years of the award date, the Award will be considered a grant, and we will be obligated to pay CIRM, on a quarterly basis, a low single-digit

royalty on commercial sales of sasineprocel until such aggregate royalty payments equal nine times the total amount awarded to us under the award. If we elect to treat the Award as a loan, we would be obligated to repay the loan within ten business days of making the election at an amount based on a specified percentage of the Award (ranging from 80% to 100%, plus, in certain cases, interest up to an annual percentage rate of 10% plus LIBOR), with the applicable amounts based on the phase of development of sasineprocel at the time the election is made.

We have elected for accounting purposes to treat the Award as a direct research and development arrangement in accordance with ASC 730-20, Research and Development—Research and Development Arrangements, as we do not intend to repay the Award other than by way of royalty payments on potential future sales of sasineprocel. The Award is recognized as an offset to research and development expenses as costs related to the project are incurred as we have concluded that the research and development risk is substantive and it is not yet probable that development will be successful. A deferred liability is recorded when the cash disbursements under the Award exceed the related research and development expenses incurred through such date.

During the year ended December 31, 2025, we received two cash disbursements under the Award totaling $1.7 million. During the year ended December 31, 2025, $2.8 million was recognized as an offset to research and development expense, and $0.4 million was deferred and recorded in other current liabilities as of December 31, 2025. During the year ended December 31, 2024, we received three cash disbursements under the award totaling $5.7 million. During the year ended December 31, 2024, $4.2 million was recognized as an offset to research and development expense, and $1.5 million was deferred and recorded in other current liabilities as of December 31, 2024.

During the six months ended June 30, 2026 and 2025, we did not receive any cash disbursements under the Award. We recognized $0.9 million and $1.0 million as an offset to research and development expense for the six months ended June 30, 2026 and 2025, respectively. We recorded no deferred liability for the Award as of June 30, 2026.

Critical Accounting Policies and Use of Estimates

This discussion and analysis of our financial condition and results of operations is based on our financial statements included elsewhere in this prospectus, which have been prepared in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles in the United States (GAAP). The preparation of our financial statements and related disclosures requires us to make estimates and assumptions that affect the reported amounts of assets and liabilities, costs and expenses and the disclosure of contingent assets and liabilities in our financial statements. We base our estimates on historical experience, known trends and events and various other factors that we believe are reasonable under the circumstances, the results of which form the basis for making judgments about the carrying values of assets and liabilities that are not readily apparent from other sources. We evaluate our estimates and assumptions on an ongoing basis. Our actual results may differ from these estimates under different assumptions or conditions.

While our significant accounting policies are described in more detail in Note 1 to our audited financial statements appearing elsewhere in this prospectus, we believe that the following accounting policies are those most critical to the judgments and estimates used in the preparation of our financial statements.

Accrued Research and Development Expenses

We are required to estimate our accrued expenses resulting from obligations under contracts with vendors, consultants and CROs, in connection with conducting research and development activities. The financial terms of these contracts are subject to negotiations, which vary from contract to contract and may result in payment flows that do not match the periods over which materials or services are provided under such contracts. We reflect research and development expenses in our financial statements by matching those expenses with the period in which services and efforts are expended. We account for these expenses according to the progress of the associated preclinical study or clinical trial as measured by the timing of various aspects of the trial or related activities. We determine accrual estimates through review of the underlying contracts along with preparation of financial models taking into account discussions with research and other key personnel as to the progress of studies, or other services being conducted. During the course of a trial, we adjust our rate of expense recognition if actual results differ from our estimates.

There may be instances in which payments made to our vendors will exceed the level of services provided and result in a prepayment of the research and development expense. In accruing service fees, we estimate the time period over which services will be performed and the level of effort to be expended in each period. If the actual timing of the performance of services or the level of effort varies from our estimate, we adjust the accrual or prepaid expense accordingly. Advance payments for goods and services that will be used in future research and development activities are expensed when the activity has been performed or when the goods have been received rather than when the payment is made. Although we do not expect our estimates to be materially different from amounts actually incurred, if our estimates of the status and timing of services performed differ from the actual status and timing of services performed, it could result in us reporting amounts that are too high or too low in any particular period. To date, there have been no material differences between our estimates of such expenses and the amounts actually incurred.

Stock-Based Compensation Expense

Stock-based compensation expense represents the cost of the grant date fair value of equity awards recognized over the requisite service period of the awards (usually the vesting period) on a straight-line basis. We estimate the fair value of equity awards using the Black-Scholes option pricing model and recognize forfeitures as they occur. Estimating the fair value of equity awards as of the grant date using valuation models, such as the Black-Scholes option pricing model, is affected by assumptions regarding a number of variables, including the risk-free interest rate, the expected stock price volatility, the expected term of stock options, the expected dividend yield and the fair value of the underlying common stock on the date of grant. Changes in the assumptions can materially affect the fair value and ultimately how much stock-based compensation expense is recognized. These inputs are subjective and generally require significant analysis and judgment to develop. See Note 6 to our financial statements included elsewhere in this prospectus for information concerning specific assumptions we used in applying the Black-Scholes option pricing model to determine the estimated fair value of our stock options granted during the years ended December 31, 2025 and 2024 and during the six months ended June 30, 2026 and 2025.

We recorded stock-based compensation expense of $2.5 million and $2.7 million for the years ended December 31, 2025 and 2024, respectively. We recorded stock-based compensation expense of $2.5 million and $1.2 million for the six months ended June 30, 2026 and 2025, respectively. As of June 30, 2026, there was $12.0 million of total unrecognized stock-based compensation expense related to unvested stock options and early-exercised stock options, which we expect to recognize over a remaining weighted-average period of 3.2 years. We expect to continue to grant stock options and other equity-based awards in the future, and to the extent that we do, our stock-based compensation expense recognized in future periods will likely increase.

Common Stock Valuation

In the absence of an active market for our common stock, the fair value of our common stock was determined by our Board of Directors in accordance with the methodologies outlined in the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants Practice Aid, Valuation of Privately-Held-Company Equity Securities Issued as Compensation (the Practice Aid). In doing so, our Board of Directors determined the best estimate of fair value of our common stock, exercising reasonable judgment and considering numerous objective and subjective factors, including:

The Practice Aid identifies various available methods for allocating enterprise value across classes and series of capital stock to determine the estimated fair value of common stock at each valuation date.

In accordance with the Practice Aid, we considered the following methods:

Based on our early stage of development, the difficulty in predicting the range of specific outcomes (and their likelihood), and other relevant factors, the OPM allocation method was considered most appropriate for valuations prior to November 30, 2025. For valuations prepared after November 30, 2025, a hybrid method between the PWERM and OPM was used, where the equity value was probability-weighted across multiple scenarios, including an initial public offering (IPO) scenario and a stay-private scenario, and then probability weighted the resulting per share values based on management’s assessment of the likelihood of each outcome. Under the IPO scenario, we applied a fully diluted precedent transaction (backsolve) approach that uses the most recent preferred stock financing as a reference point for value on a fully diluted basis. Under the stay private scenario, we inferred total equity value using a backsolve method anchored to our most recent preferred financing (adjusted for market movement) and allocated that value across our company’s share classes using an OPM. Because our common stock is not publicly traded, we also considered the illiquidity of our common stock and reflected a discount for lack of marketability based on an expected time to liquidity. The resulting scenario weighted value represents an estimate of the fair value of our common stock on a minority, nonmarketable basis.

There are significant judgments and estimates inherent in the determination of the fair value of our common stock. These judgments and estimates include assumptions regarding our future operating performance, the time to complete an initial public offering or other liquidity event, and the determination of the appropriate valuation methods.

Once a public trading market for our common stock has been established in connection with the completion of this offering, it will no longer be necessary for our Board of Directors to estimate the fair value of our common stock in connection with our accounting for granted stock options or for any other such awards we may grant, as the fair value of our common stock will be determined based on the closing price of our common stock as reported on the date of grant on the stock exchange on which our common stock is traded.

Off–Balance Sheet Arrangements

During the periods presented we did not have, nor do we currently have, any off–balance sheet arrangements as defined under SEC rules.

Recent Accounting Pronouncements

For a description of recent accounting pronouncements, see Note 1 to our financial statements appearing elsewhere in this prospectus.

Emerging Growth Company and Smaller Reporting Company Status

As an emerging growth company under the JOBS Act, we can take advantage of an extended transition period for complying with new or revised accounting standards. This period allows an emerging growth company to delay the adoption of certain accounting standards until those standards would otherwise apply to private companies. We have elected to avail ourselves of this exemption from new or revised accounting standards and, therefore, our financial statements may not be comparable to companies that comply with new or revised accounting pronouncements as of public company effective dates. We also intend to rely on other exemptions provided by the JOBS Act, including without limitation, not being required to comply with the auditor attestation requirements of Section 404(b) of Sarbanes-Oxley.

We will remain an emerging growth company until the earliest of (i) the last day of the fiscal year following the fifth anniversary of the consummation of this offering; (ii) the last day of the fiscal year in which we have total annual gross revenue of at least $1.235 billion; (iii) the last day of the fiscal year in which we are deemed to be a “large accelerated filer” as defined in Rule 12b-2 under the Exchange Act, which would occur if the market value of our common stock held by non-affiliates exceeded $700.0 million as of the last business day of the second fiscal quarter of such year; or (iv) the date on which we have issued more than $1.0 billion in nonconvertible debt securities during the prior three-year period.

We are also a smaller reporting company as defined in the Exchange Act. We may continue to be a smaller reporting company even after we are no longer an emerging growth company. We may take advantage of certain of the scaled disclosures available to smaller reporting companies and will be able to take advantage of these scaled disclosures for so long as our voting and non-voting common stock held by non-affiliates is less than $250.0 million measured on the last business day of our second fiscal quarter, or our annual revenue is less than $100.0 million during the most recently completed fiscal year and our voting and non-voting common stock held by non-affiliates is less than $700.0 million measured on the last business day of our second fiscal quarter.

Quantitative and Qualitative Disclosures About Market Risk

Interest Rate Risk

Our cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities consist of cash held in readily available checking and money market accounts, as well as short-term debt securities. We are exposed to market risk related to fluctuations in interest rates and market prices. Our primary exposure to market risk is interest rate sensitivity, which is affected by changes in the general level of United States interest rates. Because of the short-term nature of the instruments in our portfolio, a sudden change in market interest rates would not be expected to have a material impact on our financial condition or results of operations.

Foreign Currency

We contract with vendors in foreign countries, including countries in Europe and the Asia Pacific. We are therefore subject to fluctuations in foreign currency rates in connection with these agreements. We do not hedge our foreign currency exchange rate risk.

Net realized and unrealized gains and losses from foreign currency transactions are reported in other income (expense), net, in the statements of operations and comprehensive loss. The impact of foreign currency costs on our operations have been negligible for all periods presented.

Inflation Risk

Inflation generally affects us by increasing our cost of labor and clinical trial costs. We do not believe that inflation has had a material effect on our results of operations during the periods presented.

BUSINESS

Aspen Neuroscience, Inc. is a leading, clinical-stage regenerative medicine biotechnology company focused on developing autologous iPSC-derived therapies to address neurodegenerative diseases with high unmet medical need. Our lead product candidate, sasineprocel, is an investigational single-dose, autologous iPSC-based cell therapy being evaluated for the treatment of PD. We believe sasineprocel has the potential to be disease-modifying by replacing a patient’s lost DA neurons with DANPCs, capable of integrating and reestablishing functional connections. In an ongoing Phase 1/2a ASPIRO clinical trial of sasineprocel in mid-stage to moderately advanced sporadic PD, patients have experienced, what we believe to be, sustained and clinically meaningful improvements in motor, quality of life, and non-motor symptoms as measured by comparison to clinically meaningful change benchmarks. Based on these findings, we believe sasineprocel has the potential to improve upon the current standard of care in PD and address the significant unmet need for a disease-modifying therapy that may slow or halt the progression of this devastating disease. These benchmarks are reviewed on an ongoing basis during the trial and reflect management’s belief based on a review of published literature, regulatory agency guidelines and precedent in PD clinical research, and discussions with key opinion leaders in the field. The benchmarks have not been discussed with the FDA or any other government regulatory authority, and have not been independently validated by any third parties.

PD is a progressive neurodegenerative disease primarily characterized by the loss of DA neurons as well as impaired DA neurotransmission that results in the progressive deterioration of motor and non-motor neurological function. It is the second most common neurodegenerative disorder, estimated to affect more than one million people in the United States and more than 10 million people globally. The prevalence has doubled globally over the past 25 years, making it one of the fastest growing CNS diseases. PD patients suffer from characteristic motor symptoms, including movement, coordination and speech impairments, as well as non-motor symptoms, including loss of sense of smell, sleep behavior disorders, difficulty swallowing, urinary symptoms, constipation, orthostatic hypotension, depression, psychosis, dementia and cognitive impairment. These symptoms can severely impact a patient’s quality of life, contribute to progressive disability and loss of independence, and are associated with increased morbidity and mortality over time.

The current standard of care is palliative DRT, including levodopa and dopamine agonists, which addresses motor symptoms but does not replace lost DA neurons, nor does it slow continued neuronal degeneration. DRT inadequately addresses non-motor symptoms, decreases in effectiveness over time, and is associated with side effects that can significantly impact patient quality of life. As DRT loses its effectiveness or as its side effects become intolerable, advanced therapies, such as DBS, are considered. While DBS can be effective in addressing certain motor symptoms of PD, it has not been shown to slow disease progression in mid-stage to moderately advanced PD patients and can potentially worsen cognition, gait, speech and other axial symptoms. DBS has other drawbacks as well, including long delays in access and optimization, multiple invasive surgeries with permanent implanted hardware and risks such as hemorrhage, infection, and device failure. In contrast to DRT and DBS, cell replacement therapy holds significant promise as an approach to restore and replace lost dopamine neurons and neural circuitry necessary for normal motor and non-motor function. Our cell replacement approach represents a promising therapy that could provide long-term benefits from a single administration without the need for permanently implanted hardware.

Allogeneic approaches in development for PD can require one year or more of immunosuppressive therapy post-treatment, which is associated with increased risks of infection, organ toxicity, and metabolic complications. In contrast, autologous cell therapies are derived from a patient’s own cells which reduces the risk of immune rejection after transplantation. Our clinical trial of sasineprocel has not required any immunosuppression post-administration and is designed to support the formation of functional synaptic connections and neural circuitry without the need for immune suppression. In third-party NHP models of PD, autologous DA progenitor cell transplantation survived without immunosuppression and integrated more robustly and produced more sustained motor improvements than allogeneic transplants. Moreover, our autologous iPSC approach is designed to require minimal cell expansion, which may reduce the opportunity for genomic abnormalities to arise and for cells harboring growth-promoting abnormalities to become selectively enriched during extended culture. While this is designed to be a one-time therapy, the autologous nature of the product could allow for redosing, if valuable over a patient’s multi-year course. We believe our autologous cell replacement strategy presents a significant advantage over both current standard-of-care therapies and

allogeneic cell therapies in development for PD, and has the potential to deliver a tolerable, disease-modifying treatment with durable, long-term effectiveness.

Sasineprocel and our end-to-end autologous iPSC platform are based on advances in cellular reprogramming, including the Nobel Prize–winning discovery by Shinya Yamanaka and John B. Gurdon, which demonstrated that mature, specialized cells can be reprogrammed into iPSCs through the introduction of defined transcription factors (commonly referred to as Yamanaka factors). We combine these foundational reprogramming methods with our stem cell biology expertise, the latest artificial intelligence, ML and genomic approaches to optimize cell identity, purity and functional potential and to enable a scalable, reproducible, standardized, and data-driven manufacturing process for autologous cell therapy. Sasineprocel, our proprietary autologous iPSC-derived composition of DANPCs, CNS progenitors, and glial progenitors, is designed to establish a biologically active cellular microenvironment that supports cell engraftment, survival, and functional integration of transplanted cells with the goal of restoring functional dopamine signaling in PD patients. We believe the sustained benefit observed in patients treated with sasineprocel provides evidence of neural circuitry reconstruction and is further supported by preclinical studies, in which we observed that DANPCs transplanted into PD animal models differentiated into DA neurons that integrated into the brain and restored dopamine signaling. We hypothesize that sasineprocel’s combination of cells beyond DANPCs may play a key role in supporting neural synapse formation and general microenvironmental health to enable a broad and profound treatment effect in PD patients, including improvement in non-motor symptoms.

We are currently conducting the open-label Phase 1/2a ASPIRO trial evaluating sasineprocel in patients with sporadic PD and have begun enrolling genetic PD patients. The trial consists of sequential dose cohorts with sasineprocel administered as a single bilateral intracranial injection into the post-commissural putamen, an area of the brain that participates in motor control, using well-understood, standard stereotactic neurosurgical techniques. The study’s primary objective is to assess safety and tolerability. The study’s secondary and exploratory objectives are to evaluate the potential efficacy of sasineprocel, measured by changes from baseline in multiple patient- and clinician-reported PD-specific outcomes. These include changes in MDS‐UPDRS Parts I-IV, which measures the severity and progression of PD, including motor and non-motor symptoms; Hauser diary (to measure “Good On” time, defined as time without troublesome dyskinesia); and quality of life measures including PDQ-39. 18FDOPA PET imaging is being used to evaluate the engraftment of cells. Certain of the secondary endpoints used in this trial are validated endpoints used in previous PD registrational clinical trials.

As of August 18, 2026, the data cutoff date, 15 patients had been dosed, with seven participants receiving a low dose and eight participants receiving a high dose. Sasineprocel was observed to be generally well-tolerated with the majority of reported adverse events being mild to moderate. Among the patients dosed, 72 TEAEs were reported. There was no evidence of graft-induced dyskinesias or graft rejection, and no clinically significant hemorrhages were observed post-operatively. As sasineprocel is autologous, with no requirement for immunosuppression, there were no immunosuppression-related events. Only one TEAE, myoclonus (sudden, uncontrollable muscle movement), was considered possibly related to sasineprocel, with sertraline, a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor, identified as a co-suspect medication. One participant had two serious adverse events related to the surgical procedure (neck swelling and dysphagia due to intubation in the prone position and ischemic stroke (cerebral infarction) due to pre-operative interruption of anticoagulants that the patient was taking for a history of deep venous thrombosis). The most commonly reported TEAEs, defined as occurring in 10% or more of patients, were related to the surgery, including incision site pain, swollen tongue, headache, infusion site pain, glossodynia, hypoesthesia, and oropharyngeal pain. Two patients had intracranial hemorrhages not requiring any surgical treatment. Of these two patients, one patient had no associated symptoms and the other, who had a history of migraine, experienced a headache which resolved, with levetiracetam identified as a co-suspect medication. As of the data cutoff date, all 12 patients from the first three cohorts had at least one six-month or later follow up evaluation.

We assessed clinical efficacy outcomes every six months after administration of sasineprocel. We observed improvements across several secondary and exploratory endpoints, including changes in Good On Time (On time without troublesome dyskinesia normalized to 16 hours of the day), Off time, MDS-UPDRS Part III OFF, MDS-UPDRS Part II ON, and PDQ-39 scores, as summarized below. Certain of the secondary endpoints used in this trial, including Good On Time and MDS-UPDRS Part III OFF, are validated registrational endpoints used in previous PD registrational clinical trials. The mean improvements at 18 months in both cohorts and 24 months in the low dose cohort for Good On Time and MDS-UPDRS Part III OFF scores were above clinically meaningful change benchmarks. The mean PDQ-39 and MDS-UPDRS Part II ON scores improved above clinically meaningful change

benchmarks in the low dose cohort at 18 and 24 months and were stable in the high dose cohort at 18 months. 18FDOPA PET imaging is also being used to evaluate the engraftment of cells. 18FDOPA PET imaging showed elevated 18FDOPA uptake values at six, 12, and 18 months following sasineprocel administration compared to baseline, which is evidence of the survival, viability, and integration of transplanted iPSCs. Clinically meaningful change benchmarks are reviewed on an ongoing basis during the trial and reflect management’s belief based on a review of published literature, regulatory agency guidelines and precedent in PD clinical research, and discussions with key opinion leaders in the field. The benchmarks have not been discussed with the FDA or any other government regulatory authority, and have not been independently validated by any third parties.

Additionally, the ASPIRO trial is exploring changes in DA medication as measured by LEDD, a standardized calculation that converts all DA medications a patient is taking into a single equivalent dose of levodopa, providing a measure of total daily DA medication burden using established methodology. A reduction in LEDD suggests that a patient requires less DA medication to manage their motor symptoms. As of the data cutoff date, in the low dose cohort, two, three, three and three patients showed a reduction in LEDD at six, 12, 18 and 24 months, respectively, and one patient experienced an LEDD increase at 18 and 24 months. In the high dose cohort, at six months, three out of eight patients showed an LEDD reduction and one patient showed an LEDD increase; at 12 months, two out of four patients showed an LEDD reduction and one patient showed an LEDD increase; at 18 months, three out of four patients showed an LEDD reduction and one showed an LEDD increase.

Figure 1. Sustained improvements observed across multiple validated PD endpoints. Data summarized above is as of August 18, 2026. A decrease (negative number) compared to baseline is an improvement for MDS-UPDRS scores and PDQ-39. The numbers in parentheses represent standard deviations. Mean changes in data summarized above are driven by totality of data across patients and not driven by a limited number of patients exhibiting significantly better-than-average improvements. *For the four high dose patients for whom data was available at the 12-month and 18-month assessments, the baseline values for Good On Time (hours) Hauser Diary, Off Time (hours) Hauser Diary, MDS-UPDRS Part III OFF score, MDS-UPDRS Part II ON score, and PDQ-39 were: 11.7 (0.9), 4.3 (0.9), 44.0 (4.2), 9.5 (9.3), 16.1 (15.6), respectively. For the three low dose patients in Cohort 4, no data is yet available because six months have not elapsed since dosing for all three patients.

We expect to report further long-term data from the ASPIRO trial in the first half of 2028. In addition, we plan to dose a single cohort of approximately three to six patients with genetic PD in the ASPIRO trial. We anticipate initiating biopsy collection for the Phase 3 trial by the end of 2026. Following feedback from the FDA, we anticipate dosing patients in the Phase 3 trial in the second half of 2027.