2. Summary of Significant Accounting Policies

Basis of Presentation and Use of Estimates

The accompanying interim condensed financial statements of the Company are unaudited. These interim condensed financial statements have been prepared in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles in the United States of America (“U.S. GAAP”) and the applicable rules and regulations of the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) for interim financial information. Accordingly, they do not include all of the information and footnotes required by U.S. GAAP for complete financial statements. The December 31, 2020 condensed balance sheet was derived from the audited financial statements as of that date but does not include all of the information and footnotes required by U.S. GAAP for complete financial statements.

The preparation of financial statements in conformity with U.S. GAAP requires management to make estimates and assumptions that affect the amounts reported in the financial statements and accompanying notes. The Company bases its estimates on historical experience and market-specific or other relevant assumptions that it believes are reasonable under the circumstances. The amounts of assets and liabilities reported in the Company’s condensed balance sheets and the amounts of expenses and income reported for each of the periods presented are affected by estimates and assumptions, which are used for, but are not limited to, determining research and development periods under collaboration arrangements, stock-based compensation expense, valuation of marketable securities, impairment of long-lived assets, income taxes and certain accrued liabilities. Actual results could differ from such estimates or assumptions.

The full extent to which the COVID-19 pandemic will directly or indirectly impact the Company’s business, results of operations and financial condition, including revenue, expenses, manufacturing, clinical trials, research and development costs and employee-related amounts, will depend on future developments that are highly uncertain, including as a result of new information that may emerge concerning COVID-19 and the actions taken to contain or treat it, as well as the economic impact on local, regional, national and international customers, suppliers, service providers and markets. The Company has made estimates of the impact of COVID-19 within its financial statements and there may be changes to those estimates in future periods. Actual results could differ from such estimates or assumptions.

The accompanying unaudited interim condensed financial statements have been prepared on the same basis as the audited financial statements and, in the opinion of management, reflect all adjustments of a normal recurring nature considered necessary to state fairly the Company’s financial position, results of operations, comprehensive loss, and cash flows for the interim periods. The interim results for the three and nine months ended September 30, 2021 are not necessarily indicative of the results that may be expected for the year ending December 31, 2021, or for any other future annual or interim period.

The information included in this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q should be read in conjunction with the Company’s audited financial statements included in the Annual Report on Form 10-K pursuant to Section 13 or 15(d) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, for the year ended December 31, 2020.

Recently Adopted Accounting Pronouncements

In June 2016, the Financial Accounting Standards Board (“FASB”) issued Accounting Standards Updates (“ASU”) 2016-13 (Topic 326), Financial Instruments Credit Losses. The guidance modifies the measurement and recognition of credit losses for most financial assets and certain other instruments. The amendment updates the guidance for measuring and recording credit losses on financial assets measured at amortized cost by replacing the “incurred loss” model with an “expected loss” model. The Company adopted ASU 2016-13 in the third quarter of 2021 using the modified retrospective adoption approach. As a result of this adoption, the Company presents these financial assets, which include the accounts receivable and available-for-sale debt securities, at the net amount the Company expects to collect. The amendment also requires the Company to record credit losses related to available-for-sale debt securities as an allowance through net income rather than reducing the carrying amount under the historical, other-than-temporary-impairment model. The adoption of ASU 2016-13 did not have a material impact on the Company’s financial statements and related disclosures for the quarter ended September 30, 2021.    

In February 2016, the FASB issued ASU 2016-02 (Topic 842), Leases (Accounting Standards Codification, or “ASC”, 842). ASC 842 supersedes the lease recognition requirements in ASC 840, Leases. ASC 842 clarifies the definition of a lease and requires lessees to recognize right-of-use assets and lease liabilities for all leases, including those classified as operating leases under previous lease accounting guidance. The Company adopted ASC 842 on July 1, 2021, effective as of January 1, 2021. There was no impact on the Company’s accumulated deficit as of January 1, 2021 as a result of the adoption of this standard. Results for the three and nine months ended September 30, 2021 are presented under Topic 842. Other prior period amounts are not adjusted and continue to be reported in accordance with our historic accounting under previous lease guidance, ASC Topic 840: Leases (“Topic 840”). The Company elected the package of practical expedients permitted under the transition guidance of the new standard, which allowed the Company to carry forward its historical assessment on whether a contract is or contains a lease, lease classification, and initial direct costs. Upon adoption on January 1, 2021, the Company recognized operating lease right-of-use (“ROU”) assets of $29.7 million, and current and non-current operating lease liabilities of $2.9 million and $27.8 million, respectively. In connection with the adoption of this standard, deferred rent of $1.3 million and prepaid rent of $0.3 million, which was previously recorded in prepaid expenses and other current assets on the balance sheet as of December 31, 2020, were derecognized. Finance lease assets and liabilities were not material. The adoption of ASC 842 did not have a material impact to the Company’s condensed statements of operations and condensed statements of cash flows. Please see Note 7 for additional information regarding the Company’s leases.

Accounting policies

Leases

The Company determines if an arrangement is or contains a lease at contract inception by assessing whether the arrangement contains an identified asset and whether the lessee has the right to control such asset. The Company is required to classify leases as either finance or operating leases and to record a ROU asset and a lease liability for all leases with a term greater than 12 months regardless of the lease classification. The lease classification will determine whether the lease expense is recognized based on an effective interest rate method or on a straight-line basis over the term of the lease. The Company determines the initial classification and measurement of its ROU assets and lease liabilities at the lease commencement date and thereafter, if modified. The Company does not have material finance leases.

For leases with a term greater than 12 months, the Company records the related ROU asset and lease liability at the present value of lease payments over the term of the lease. The term of the Company’s leases equals the non-cancellable

period of the lease, including any rent-free periods provided by the lessor, and also includes options to extend or terminate the lease that the Company is reasonably certain to exercise. The ROU asset equals the carrying amount of the related lease liability, adjusted for any lease payments made prior to lease commencement and lease incentives provided by the lessor. Variable lease payments are expensed as incurred and do not factor into the measurement of the applicable ROU asset or lease liability.

The Company has elected, for all classes of underlying assets, not to recognize ROU assets and lease liabilities for leases with a term of 12 months or less. Lease cost for short-term leases is recognized on a straight-line basis over the lease term. The Company has also elected to not separate lease and non-lease components for its leases and, as a result, accounts for lease and non-lease components as one component.

The Company’s leases do not provide a readily determinable implicit rate. Therefore, the Company estimates its incremental borrowing rate to discount the lease payments based on information available at lease commencement. The Company determines its incremental borrowing rate based on the rate of interest that the Company would have to pay to borrow, on a collateralized basis over a similar term, an amount equal to the lease payments in a similar economic environment.

Lease payments may be fixed or variable; however, only fixed payments are included in the Company’s lease liability calculation. Lease costs for the Company’s operating leases are recognized on a straight-line basis within operating expenses over the lease term. The Company’s lease agreements may contain variable non-lease components such as common area maintenance, operating expenses or other costs, which are expensed as incurred.

Cash, Cash Equivalents and Restricted Cash

The following table provides a reconciliation of cash, cash equivalents and restricted cash reported within the balance sheets that sum to the total of the same amounts shown in the statements of cash flows.

Investments in Equity Securities

Subsequent to the closing of the initial public offering (“IPO”) of Vaxcyte, Inc. in June 2020, the fair value of Vaxcyte’s common stock became readily determinable. As a result, beginning June 2020, Vaxcyte common stock held by the Company is measured at fair value at each reporting period based on the closing price of Vaxcyte’s common stock on the last trading day of each reporting period, with any unrealized gains and losses recorded in the Company’s statements of operations.

Fair Value Measurements

Fair value is defined as the exchange price that would be received for an asset or paid to transfer a liability, or an exit price, in the principal or most advantageous market for that asset or liability in an orderly transaction between market participants on the measurement date and establishes a fair value hierarchy that requires an entity to maximize the use of observable inputs, where available, and minimize the use of unobservable inputs when measuring fair value. The Company determined the fair value of financial assets and liabilities using the fair value hierarchy that describes three levels of inputs that may be used to measure fair value, as follows:

Level 1—Quoted prices in active markets for identical assets and liabilities;

Level 2—Inputs other than Level 1 that are observable, either directly or indirectly, such as quoted prices for similar assets or liabilities, quoted prices in markets that are not active, or other inputs that are observable or can be corroborated by observable market data for substantially the full term of the assets or liabilities; and

Level 3—Unobservable inputs that are supported by little or no market activity and that are significant to the fair value of the assets or liabilities.

The carrying amounts of accounts receivable, prepaid expenses, accounts payable, accrued liabilities and accrued compensation and benefits approximate fair value due to the short-term nature of these items.

The fair value of the Company’s outstanding loan (See Note 6) is estimated using the net present value of the payments, discounted at an interest rate that is consistent with market interest rate, which is a Level 2 input. The estimated fair value of the Company’s outstanding loan approximates the carrying amount, as the loan bears a floating rate that approximates the market interest rate.

Revenue Recognition

The Company has no products approved for commercial sale and has not generated any revenue from commercial product sales. The total revenue to date has been generated principally from collaboration and license agreements and to a lesser extent, from manufacturing, supply, services and materials the Company provides to its collaboration partners.

Collaboration Revenue

The Company derives revenue from collaboration arrangements, under which the Company may grant licenses to its collaboration partners to further develop and commercialize its proprietary product candidates. The Company may also perform research and development activities under the collaboration agreements. Consideration under these contracts generally includes a nonrefundable upfront payment, development, regulatory and commercial milestones and other contingent payments, and royalties based on net sales of approved products. Additionally, the collaborations may provide options for the customer to acquire from the Company materials and reagents, clinical product supply or additional research and development services under separate agreements.

The Company assesses which activities in the collaboration agreements are considered distinct performance obligations that should be accounted for separately. The Company develops assumptions that require judgement to determine whether the license to the Company’s intellectual property is distinct from the research and development services or participation in activities under the collaboration agreements.

At the inception of each agreement, the Company determines the arrangement transaction price, which includes variable consideration, based on the assessment of the probability of achievement of future milestones and contingent payments and other potential consideration. The Company recognizes revenue over time by measuring its progress towards the complete satisfaction of the relevant performance obligation using an appropriate input or output method based on the nature of the service promised to the customer.

For arrangements that include multiple performance obligations, the Company allocates the transaction price to the identified performance obligations based on the standalone selling price, or SSP, of each distinct performance obligation. In instances where SSP is not directly observable, the Company develops assumptions that require judgment to determine the SSP for each performance obligation identified in the contract. These key assumptions may include FTE, personnel effort, estimated costs, discount rates and probabilities of clinical development and regulatory success.

Upfront Payments: For collaboration arrangements that include a nonrefundable upfront payment, if the license fee and research and development services cannot be accounted for as separate performance obligations, the transaction price is deferred and recognized as revenue over the expected period of performance using a cost-based input methodology. The Company uses judgement to assess the pattern of delivery of the performance obligation.  In addition, amounts paid in advance of services being rendered may result in an associated financing component to the upfront payment.  Accordingly, the interest on such borrowing cost component will be recorded as interest expense and revenue, based on an appropriate borrowing rate applied to the value of services to be performed by the Company over the estimated service performance period.

License Grants: For collaboration arrangements that include a grant of a license to the Company’s intellectual property, the Company considers whether the license grant is distinct from the other performance obligations included in the arrangement. For licenses that are distinct, the Company recognizes revenues from nonrefundable, upfront payments and other consideration allocated to the license when the license term has begun and the Company has provided all necessary information regarding the underlying intellectual property to the customer, which generally occurs at or near the inception of the arrangement.

Milestone and Contingent Payments: At the inception of the arrangement and at each reporting date thereafter, the Company assesses whether it should include any milestone and contingent payments or other forms of variable consideration in the transaction price using the most likely amount method. If it is probable that a significant reversal of cumulative revenue would not occur upon resolution of the uncertainty, the associated milestone value is included in the transaction price. At the end of each subsequent reporting period, the Company re-evaluates the probability of achievement of each such milestone and any related constraint and, if necessary, adjusts its estimate of the overall transaction price. Since milestone and contingent payments may become payable to the Company upon the initiation of a clinical study or filing for or receipt of regulatory approval, the Company reviews the relevant facts and circumstances to determine when the Company should update the transaction price, which may occur before the triggering event. When the Company updates the transaction price for milestone and contingent payments, the Company allocates the changes in the total transaction price to each performance obligation in the agreement on the same basis as the initial allocation. Any such adjustments are recorded on a cumulative catch-up basis in the period of adjustment, which may result in recognizing revenue for previously satisfied performance obligations in such period. The Company’s collaborators generally pay milestones and contingent payments subsequent to achievement of the triggering event.

Research and Development Services: For amounts allocated to the Company’s research and development obligations in a collaboration arrangement, the Company recognizes revenue over time using a cost-based input methodology, representing the transfer of goods or services as activities are performed over the term of the agreement.

Materials Supply: The Company provides materials and reagents, clinical materials and services to certain of its collaborators under separate agreements. The consideration for such services is generally based on FTE personnel effort used to manufacture those materials reimbursed at an agreed upon rate in addition to agreed-upon pricing for the provided materials. The amounts billed are recognized as revenue as the performance obligations are met by the Company.