Half-year Results

20 May 2025 IXICO plc (AIM: IXI), a global leader in neuroscience imaging and biomarker analytics, using its AI-driven platform to help advance drug development in neurological disorders, today announces its unaudited interim results for the six months ended 31 March 2025 ('H1 2025' or the 'period').

Financial highlights

• Revenues up 26% to £3.2 million (H1 2024: £2.5m) putting the Company in a strong position to deliver or exceed guidance
• Gross margin increased by 23% to a level of 49.6% (H1 2024: 40.2%), reflecting increased revenues and thereby accessing operational leverage
• Order book of £13.1m as at 31 March 2025 (H1 2024: £12.7m)
• EBITDA loss of £0.7m to 31 March 2025 (H1 2024: £1.3m loss)
• Strong cash position £5.0 million at 31 March 2025 (H1 2024: £2.5m). The Group raised £3.7 million of new capital (net of placing costs) in October 2024

Operational highlights

• Strengthening of operations with key hires that enhance US footprint and deepen C-Suite expertise
• Exciting technology and product roadmap progress announced in Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease that increases commercial opportunities
• Diversification of projects across therapeutic areas, clinical phases, geographies and customer types
• Focussed execution on the Innovate, Lead, Scale strategy, building a foundation for growth that will become increasingly visible across the second half of 2025 and into 2026.

Post period activity

• Contract signed with a major global pharmaceuticals company to provide trial management and neuroimaging analytics for a Phase 1 Huntington's Disease clinical trial.

Bram Goorden, CEO of IXICO, commented: "The first half of 2025 indicates that our 'Innovate Lead Scale' strategy has created the foundations for a return to growth driven by the diversification of revenue streams, therapeutic areas and market verticals, together with the scope extension of existing client programs. It has been a positive first six months defined by disciplined commercial execution, scientific innovation and truly differentiated technology development. My conviction has been further strengthened that the Company is going to make an accelerated impact in the thriving space of neurodegenerative disease research."

A recording of the results presentation will be made available on the Group's website here: https://ixico.com/investors/company-information/investor-videos/

IXICO continues to grow, and be highly respected for, its position as an AI-driven neuroscience imaging and biomarker analytics company using its proprietary technology platform to help the biopharmaceutical industry develop treatments for neurological disease.

The first six months of this financial year can be characterised as a period of focussed execution on the Innovate, Lead, Scale strategy outlined as part of the successful £3.7m net capital raise conducted in October 2024. The strategy aims to deepen the use of IXICO's platform across multiple neurological disease areas, clinical trial phases and geographies, particularly expanding further into Alzheimer's Disease (AD) and Parkinson's Disease (PD) to deliver a clear path to continued revenue growth, increased visibility and extended market penetration.

Relative to the same period in the prior year, this focus has led to a 26% increase in H1 revenues to £3.2m (H1 2024: £2.5m) and growth in the order book to £13.1m (H1 2024: £12.7m). The positive commercial momentum is the result of three key drivers: i) greater diversification of projects across therapeutic areas, clinical phases, geographies and customer types, ii) scope extensions on existing contracts, iii) entering new vertical areas such as the validation of clinical diagnostics. At the same time the Company has progressed scientific innovation combined with global operational delivery excellence and continued to deploy the next generation of IXICO's end-to-end analytics platform, equipped with the latest technology and algorithms to help address evolutions in neurological R&D.

During the period IXICO announced a number of commercial partnerships and contracts for global imaging trial management and analysis, including a Phase II Huntington's Disease (HD) clinical trial as announced on 10 December 2024 and the validation analysis of a new biomarker in AD as announced on 27 February 2025 using the dataset from the Global Alzheimer's Platform Foundation's groundbreaking Bio-Hermes-001 study, of which IXICO is a key participant. What is particularly encouraging about these contract wins is the longer term nature of these agreements that provide the potential for additional future revenues.

It is a positive start to the FY25 period and one that provides confidence that the strategy is delivering and generating opportunities for growth and market differentiation in the thriving space of neurodegenerative disease research.

Operations

A key element of the capital raise at the start of FY25 was to strengthen IXICO's commercial operations to accelerate contract wins. To that end the Company has expanded its global footprint, hiring Terry Reilly, as VP, Head of Commercial, who has a strong track record and network within the CNS biopharma industry. Terry is based in the US, and oversees global commercial development. In addition, hires have been made to broaden the number and expertise of people in the US together with resource additions in the global Science and Technology teams.

IXICO has also moved to broaden its leadership team adding two new members to the C-Suite. Mark Austin, previously VP Technology at IXICO and the architect of the IXICO Platform has been promoted to Chief Technology Officer (CTO). Mark will continue to lead technology strategy and will accelerate further scalability of the Platform internally and through partnerships. James Chandler joins IXICO as Chief Business Officer (CBO) responsible for amplifying the visibility of IXICO and overseeing marketing, investor relations and corporate development, driving partnership and collaboration opportunities.

These resource additions, together with the existing high performing senior management team, will enable IXICO to utilise and expand its technology advantage, accelerate commercial growth and seek new ways to enhance value. The impact of the new hires is already being felt with positive momentum on new commercial partnerships coming through the pipeline especially in the areas of AD and PD. The Group also retains market dominance and growth in HD, a foundational part of IXICO's business and a therapeutic area moving towards having an FDA approved drug.

Product & Technology Roadmap

As ever, continued innovation and development of the IXICO Platform is critical. Using imaging remains the gold standard to determine whether a neurological treatment may have the anticipated effect. IXICO continually invests in refining existing protocols, and developing some of the most advanced new methods to assess how developmental drugs act on brain function.

Analysing the impact of a drug is important, not only from an efficacy perspective, but also for safety since there are potential side-effects which require monitoring, for example in neurology measuring amyloid-related imaging abnormalities (ARIA). In addition, these new drugs will come at a high cost to prescribe, which is why we currently see regulators approving some of these novel therapies, but governmental health organisations and decision makers are still hesitating to reimburse as they want to better understand the patient populations which will benefit most. This is the essence of precision medicine, something we have seen develop enormously in the field of cancer research and treatment which is now translating to neurological disease.

During the period IXICO has focussed on building a pipeline of highly innovative new products, and on bringing those products to the market as quickly as possible. The product pipeline demonstrates market leading expertise and clear differentiation that will broaden IXICO's commercial opportunities in AD, PD and a range of other neurological disease areas. Proprietary technology development has been focussed around three key innovation themes, offering new capabilities in AD and PD.

Vascular biomarkers

IXICO is developing a series of biomarker algorithms to identify and measure vascular abnormities, a common contributing factor in neurodegenerative disease where MRI approaches remain the standard. While particularly relevant for screening, safety and efficacy in AD, measuring vascular components and abnormalities has wider applications in other neurological therapeutic areas such as Cerebral Amyloid Angiopathy (CAA), Stroke, and Multiple Sclerosis. The first in a series of planned vascular biomarker algorithms will be available to clients on their clinical trials from Q3 FY25 with further releases planned for FY26.

Neuromelanin biomarker

The presence of neuromelanin, a dark pigment found in specific brain regions, is associated with Parkinson's disease. Currently there are no imaging-based tools robust enough to measure neuromelanin for clinical trial use. IXICO has passed the proof of concept phase in developing a neuromelanin imaging solution with the support of a leading external Key Opinion Leader (KOL) and is making rapid progress towards commercialising a neuromelanin product that will be available to clients on their clinical trials from Q4 FY25.

Inflammation measurement

Building on an already competitive offering, IXICO is working to expand its services in inflammation measurement, looking at how diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) approaches could be used to better understand inflammatory processes in the brain by measuring microstructural changes early in the disease process. Separately, IXICO is also developing markers of vascular pathology to enable the measurement of down-stream damage linked to neuroinflammatory processes when it becomes visible on conventional MRI.

Biopharma market

The role of neuroimaging remains a key component in neurological clinical trials. Analyses derived from radiology such as MRI and PET scans are an effective way to show signals of efficacy and safety, especially early-on, so biopharma companies can advance or fail fast through development cycles. Upon approval of therapies, there is a further need for precision biomarker analysis to bring new treatments to market and continue to monitor the effectiveness and safety of new medicines through post-marketing surveillance.

Funding and financial health of the biopharmaceutical industry climate remains conservative, while the impact of US tariff decisions as it relates to drug R&D remains uncertain. Early public commentary from the management teams of many pharmaceutical companies indicate that they are taking some actions to mitigate risk. Regarding US 'tariff' uncertainty, IXICO has not directly experienced any immediate impact from customers changing clinical development plans, descoping or delaying potential projects. In particular, in neurological research, interest in developing new medicines for many conditions that currently do not have effective treatments is high with projected growth estimates for the neurological disorder drugs market varying between 5.1% to 7.9% CAGR.[1]

Post period activity

In May 2025, IXICO signed a contract with a major global pharmaceuticals company to provide trial management and neuroimaging analytics for a Phase 1 Huntington's Disease clinical trial. The contract value is over £0.5 million, revenue from which will be recognised over the 3 year-period of the clinical trial.

Outlook

It has been a good six months. The new strategy is bearing fruit, with 2025 trading showing a growing trajectory in line with expectations. It is early in the execution of that strategy with the full impact expected to become more visible across the second half of 2025 and into 2026. The expansion of the IXICO biomarker Platform into more therapeutic areas and more verticals offers an exciting opportunity to realise a greater proportion of the significant potential of the technology.

The Group's role as a transformative global partner enabling the R&D into precision medicine in neurological disease, undoubtedly has a positive impact. One that not only translates into a medium term return to profitability for the Group, but more importantly one that will improve the future lives of patients around the world suffering from currently untreated neurological diseases.

Bram Goorden

CEO, IXICO plc

Financial Review

1Order book is contracted but not yet recognised revenue adjusted down to reflect the Company's best estimate of delivery.

Revenue

• The Group reports revenue of £3.2 million (H1 2024: £2.5m) representing a 26% increase on the equivalent prior period.
• This revenue increase was caused by a strengthening in new contract bookings across the second six months of FY24 and the first six months of FY25. This reflects an improvement in the Company's commercial approach and positioning as a global service provider in what otherwise remains a challenging market for the biopharmaceutical industry (and biotech in particular) created by an uncertain global economy and tight capital markets. This continues to impact the start-up of planned new trials.
• The Group anticipates that the actions it has taken since it raised capital in October 2024 will lead to increased order volumes across the second half of the financial year. This is expected to deliver an order book that will grow across the remainder of the year.

Gross profit and margin

• Gross profit for H1-2025 is £1.6 million (H1 2024: £1.0m) with a gross margin of 49.6% (H1 2024: 40.2%).
• The year-on-year absolute change is reflective of increased revenue in the period and the relatively fixed cost nature of IXICO's costs of delivery.
• The gross profit of the Group is a factor of the total revenues achieved, and the specific margins of the projects delivered (sales mix) with later phase trials tending to deliver higher gross margins. As the Group further diversifies its order book, wins more trials and increases the number of trials that are late stage, so the gross margin of the Group will further improve.

Operating expenses and capital expenditure

• The Group's operating expenditure for H1 2025 is £2.8 million (H1 2024: £2.9m)
• Careful management of operating expenditure, including the reduction of headcount in the prior year, has been partially offset by specific, growth-targeted investments made since the Group raised capital in October 2024. These investments are within R&D (Innovation) and S&M (Lead & Scale) and are designed to drive commercial traction, especially in the therapeutic indications of AD and PD.
• Capitalised R&D expenditure relating to staff costs in the period totalled £0.2 million (H1 2024: £0.2m). This reflects ongoing development of the Group's technology platform, expanding both the analysis pipelines, particularly in AD and PD, and to further streamline clinical trial data capture and their management for clients.

EBITDA and operating loss

• The Group has reported an EBITDA loss of £0.7 million (H1 2024: £1.3m) and operating loss of £0.9 million (H1 2024: £1.6m). Both reflect the increased revenues across the period, increased gross margins and stable operating expenditure.

Order book

• The Group's order book totalled £13.1 million at 31 March 2025 (H1 2024: £12.7m). Across the last twelve months the order book has increased by £0.4 million reflecting £9.7 million of new contracts and contract value increases, offset by £6.4 million revenues recognised and £2.9 million of contract value reductions reflecting the cancellation or descope of contracts and other minor adjustments including foreign exchange losses.

Cash

• The Group had a cash balance of £5.0 million at 31 March 2025 (H1 2024: £2.5m). The Group raised £3.7 million of new capital (net of placing costs) in October 2024. Excluding this capital raise, the Group reports net cash outflows of £0.5 million in the six months to 31 March 2025 (H1 2024: £1.5m).
• Operating cash outflows totalled £0.9 million (H1 2024: £1.5m) before accounting for timing differences relating to movements in receivables and payables.

Net Assets

• The Group reports net assets at 31 March 2025 of £12.3 million (H1 2024: £10.0m). This reflects the increase of the Group's working capital position to £5.6 million (H1 2024: £3.5m) and maintaining of its non-current asset position at £6.8 million (H1 2024: £6.8m).

Consolidated Statement of Comprehensive Income

For the six months ended 31 March 2025 - unaudited

Other comprehensive income/(expense):

Items that will be reclassified subsequently to profit or loss

Consolidated Statement of Changes in Equity

For the six months ended 31 March 2025 - unaudited

Consolidated Statement of Cashflows

For the six months ended 31 March 2024 - unaudited

Notes to the financial statements

• Presentation of the financial statements
• General information

The Company is a parent of a number of subsidiaries, together referred to throughout as 'the Group'. The Group is an established provider of technology-enabled imaging services to the global biopharmaceutical industry. The Group's services are used to select patients for clinical trials and assess the safety and efficacy of new drugs in development within the field of neurological disease.

Basis of preparation

The condensed consolidated interim financial statements were approved by the Board of Directors for issue on 20 May 2025. The condensed consolidated interim financial statements do not comprise statutory accounts within the meaning of section 434 of the Companies Act 2006. The condensed consolidated interim financial statements for the six months ended 31 March 2025, together with the comparative information for the six months ended 31 March 2024 are unaudited.

The statutory accounts of the Company for the year ended 30 September 2024 were approved by the Board of Directors on 3 December 2024 and delivered to the Registrar of Companies. The report of the auditors on those accounts was unqualified, did not contain an emphasis of matter paragraph and did not contain any statement under section 498 of the Companies Act 2006.

The condensed consolidated interim financial statements comprise a Statement of Comprehensive Income, a Statement of Financial Position, a Statement of Changes in Equity, a Statement of Cash Flows, and accompanying notes. These financial statements have been prepared under the historical cost convention modified by the revaluation of certain financial instruments.

The condensed consolidated interim financial statements are presented in Great British Pounds ('£' or 'GBP') and are rounded to the nearest thousand unless otherwise stated. This is the functional currency of the Group, and is the currency of the primary economic environment in which it operates. Foreign currency transactions are accounted for in accordance with the policies set out below.

Basis of consolidation

The condensed consolidated interim financial statements incorporate the accounts of the Company and its subsidiary companies adjusted to eliminate intra-Group balances and any unrealised gains and losses or income and expenses arising from intra-Group transactions. When necessary, adjustments are made to the financial statements of subsidiaries to bring their accounting policies into line with the Group's accounting policies.

The results of subsidiary companies are included in the condensed consolidated interim financial statements from the date that control commences until the date that control ceases. The assets and liabilities of foreign operations are translated into GBP at exchange rates prevailing at the end of the reporting period. Income statements and cash flows of foreign operations are translated into GBP at average monthly exchange rates which approximate foreign exchange rates at the date of the transaction. Foreign exchange differences arising on retranslation are recognised directly in a separate translation reserve.

Going concern

Following the completion of a £3.7 million capital raise (net of proceeds) in October 2024, the Group is well positioned to deliver on its strategic goals. This capital raise was supported by both existing and new institutional investors confirming strong alignment to the Group's strategy and was oversubscribed. This growth is supported by a strong balance sheet for its size with period end net assets of £12.3 million, a £5.0 million cash balance, as well as an orderbook of £13.1 million, representing future contracted revenues.

In assessing going concern, management has prepared detailed sensitised forecasts which consider different scenarios through to December 2025. These include the risk to current projects and expected future sales pipelines. The Directors have considered these forecasts, alongside the Group's strong balance sheet and cash balance as well as the ability for the Group to mitigate costs if necessary. After due consideration of these forecasts, the Directors concluded with confidence that the Group has adequate financial resources to continue in operation for the foreseeable future.

• Significant accounting policies, judgements, and estimation uncertainty

The unaudited condensed consolidated interim financial statements have been prepared using the accounting policies as described in the 30 September 2024 audited year end Annual Report and have been consistently applied.

When preparing the condensed consolidated interim financial statements, the Directors make a number of judgements, estimates and assumptions about the recognition and measurement of assets, liabilities, income and expenses.

• Significant accounting policies, judgements, and estimation uncertainty (continued)

Significant management judgements

Capitalisation of internally developed software

Distinguishing the research and development phases of a new software product and determining whether the requirements for the capitalisation of development costs are met requires judgement. Management assesses whether a project meets the recognition criteria as set out in IAS 38 based on an individual project basis. Where the criteria are not met, the research and development expenditure will be expensed in the Consolidated Statement of Comprehensive Income. Where the recognition criteria are met, the items will be capitalised as an intangible asset.

During the period ended 31 March 2025, research and development expenses totalled £861,000 (H1 2024: £898,000). Of this amount, £235,000 (H1 2024: £275,000) was capitalised as an intangible asset, £191,000 (H1 2024: £230,000) relating to employee costs and £44,000 (H1 2024: £45,000) relating to external costs. The balance of expenditure being £626,000 (H1 2024: £623,000) is recognised in the Consolidated Statement of Comprehensive Income as an expense.

Recovery of deferred tax assets

Deferred tax assets have not been recognised for deductible temporary differences and tax losses. The Directors consider that there is not sufficient certainty that future taxable profits will be available to utilise those temporary differences and tax losses.

Estimation uncertainty

Information about estimates and assumptions that have the most significant effect on recognition and measurement of assets, liabilities, income and expenses is provided below. Changes to these estimations may result in substantially different results for the period.

Determination of transaction prices in revenue recognition

Client contracts include an agreed work order so the transaction price for a contract is allocated against each distinct performance obligations for each service, based on their relative stand-alone selling prices. For legacy contracts prior to the adoption of IFRS 15, management were required to estimate the standalone price allocated to each distinct service that were previously grouped in a single price. For new contracts, the fair value of individual components is based on actual amounts charged by the Group on a stand-alone basis. Management have determined that for items recognised on a straight-line basis, including project, site and data management, the demands of this on the company are spread evenly over the life of the revenue stream. This was determined through an understanding of the work required to deliver the various revenue streams and the obligations within the contract needing to be met.

Share-based payments

The Group measures the cost of equity-settled transactions with employees by reference to the fair value of the equity instruments at the date at which they are granted. The fair value of the options granted is measured using an option valuation model, taking into account the terms and conditions upon which the options were granted.

Useful lives of depreciable assets

Earnings per share

Basic earnings per share is calculated by dividing earnings attributable to the owners of the Company by the weighted average number of shares in issue during the period. The diluted EPS is calculated by dividing earnings attributable to the owners of the Company by the weighted average number of shares in issue taking into account the share options outstanding during the period. For the 6 months to 31 March 2025, there was no dilutive effect as the share options in issue would have decreased the loss per share.

The basic and diluted earnings per share for the Group and Company is:

Issued capital and reserves

Ordinary shares and share premium

The Company has one class of ordinary shares. The share capital issued has a nominal value of £0.01 and all carry the right to one vote at shareholders' meetings and are eligible to receive dividends. Share premium is recognised when the amount paid for a share is in excess of the nominal value.

The Group and Company's opening and closing share capital and share premium reserves are:

Group and Company

This resulted in an increase in share capital of £16,957.

Share-based payments

Certain Directors and employees of the Group hold options to subscribe for shares in the Company under share option schemes. There are 2 distinct structures to the share options in operation in the Group (H1 2024: 2). Both structures relate to a single scheme outlined in the EMI Share Option Plan 2014, which was subsequently renewed and updated in 2024.

Total share options outstanding have a range of exercise prices from £0.01 to £0.70 per option and the weighted average contractual life is 9.3 years (H1 2024: 6.1 years). The total charge for the period relating to employee share-based payment plans for continuing operations was a charge of £88,000 (H1 2024: £5,000 reversal).

During the period, share options were granted to the Executive Directors and several employees. Those options granted to the Executive Directors were discussed with the Group's largest shareholders alongside the capital raise undertaken in October 2024 and were presented in the circular accompanying this capital raise. An additional 7,413,488 of these options were put to shareholder vote at the AGM in January 2025 and received support from 99.76% of those shareholders who voted.

Details of the share options under the scheme outstanding during the period are as follows:

[1] https://www.fortunebusinessinsights.com/central-nervous-system-treatment-market-103973