Rehovot, Israel – November 19, 2009 – Evogene Ltd. (TASE: EVGN) announced today its financial results for the third quarter, ended September 30, 2009.
Ofer Haviv, Evogene's president and CEO stated: "During the third quarter of 2009, we continued advancing our R&D activities under our existing collaboration agreements with world leading seed companies. In order to support these and anticipated new collaborations, along with our own internal programs, we recently completed a significant expansion of our capacity in terms of staffing, facilities and equipment. This included a new greenhouse site for model and target plant growth at Kibutz Naan in Israel, and expansion of our molecular biology and tissue culture labs. With this significantly increased computational gene discovery and plant validation capacity and our strong cash position, we enthusiastically look forward to the continuing growth of our company.”
Revenues for the first nine months ended September 30, 2009 were $7.4 million, compared to $1.1 million for the same period in 2008. Revenues for the third quarter of 2009 were $2.6 million, compared to $0.9 million for the same period in 2008. Revenues for the first nine months and third quarter of 2009 include revenues generated mainly under the collaboration with Monsanto.
Profit from ordinary operations for the first nine months of 2009 was $747 thousand, compared to a loss from ordinary operations of $5.0 million in the same period in 2008. Loss from ordinary operations for the third quarter of 2009 was $113 thousand, compared to a loss from ordinary operations of $2.3 million in the same period in 2008.
Total comprehensive loss for the first nine months ended September 30, 2009, was $3.0 million, or $0.11 per share, as a result of $5.0 million of non-cash financial expenses due to revaluation of certain non-employee options, primarily options issued in the 2007 IPO. These revaluations for accounting purposes reflect changes in the fair market value of Evogene ordinary shares and the market value of the options. This is compared to a total comprehensive loss of $9.1 million, or $0.44 per share, in the same period in 2008, including non-cash financial expenses of $4.3 million due to the revaluation of options.
Total comprehensive profit for the third quarter of 2009 was $2.1 million, or $0.07 per share, as a result of $1.3 million of non-cash financial income due to revaluation of certain non-employee options, primarily options issued in the 2007 IPO. This is compared to a total comprehensive loss of $7.6 million, or $0.35 per share, including non-cash financial expenses of $4.8 million due to the revaluation of options.
As of September 30, 2009, Evogene had approximately $39 million in cash, cash equivalents, cash deposits and short-term marketable securities, an increase of $10 million compared to $29 million as of December 31, 2008. This increase is mainly due to the exercise in the previous quarter of the company's outstanding Series 1 options that were issued as part of the company’s IPO in June 2007.
About Evogene
Evogene is a world leading developer of improved plant traits. The company’s proprietary product development platform combines state of the art computational gene discovery technology (The ATHLETE), plant and field validation capabilities and unique selection systems. Evogene's current programs focus on the improvement of key plant traits, such as yield and stress tolerance, and the improvement of plants specifically for biofuel uses. Evogene has collaboration and licensing agreements with world leading companies in the agro-biotech and alternative energy industries. Evogene's headquarters are in Rehovot, Israel, and its stock is traded on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange (TASE: EVGN). For additional information, please visit Evogene’s website at www.evogene.com.
This press release contains "forward-looking statements". These statements include words like "may," "expects," "believes," “scheduled” and "intends," and they describe opinions about future events. These forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties that may cause the actual results, performance or achievements of Evogene Ltd. to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements.
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