International Isotopes on Tuesday reported a 118 percent spike in year-over-year net loss for the first quarter of 2016, which it attributed to a lower gross profit and rising research and development costs.
The Idaho company listed a $374,518 net loss for the three months ended March 31, up from $171,548 in the first quarter of 2015. Gross profit over the same period dropped from $810,538 to $747,137, while product sales were down from $1.9 million in first-quarter 2015 to just under $1.7 million in 2016.
International Isotopes is a producer of nuclear medicine calibration and reference standards, along with providing cobalt-60 products and radioisotopes and radiochemicals for medical, industrial, and other uses.
The firm’s quarterly operating expenses rose due to greater spending on R&D, primarily for product development in its radiochemical business, according to a press release. Total operating expenses hiked from $877,627 last year to $1.04 million in 2016. That R&D should pay off over the medium term, President and CEO Steve Laflin indicated in the release.
“We continue to make excellent progress towards the launch of our new radiochemical product, I3odine/MAXTM, our sodium iodide radiochemical product (I-131), to be supplied as an oral solution or capsule form for use in the treatment and diagnosis of diseases of the thyroid, thyroid cancer, and hyperthyroidism,” Laflin said. “We expect to submit this generic drug product application to the FDA later this year. I 3 odine/MAXTM should be just the first of several generic drug products we plan to submit to the FDA in the coming years. We believe this new business line of generic drug products will significantly increase sales in this business segment.”
Revenue from cobalt product sales jumped from $253,315 in first-quarter 2015 to $313,786 this year, an increase of about 24 percent. The company cited its ability to complete source manufacturing using recycled cobalt material.
“The Company continues to irradiate new cobalt targets and anticipates full scale resumption of both raw cobalt and cobalt product (sealed source) sales beginning late in 2017,” the release says, adding that gross profit for cobalt products in first-quarter 2016 increased 29 percent.
Quarterly revenue for nuclear medicine products showed a slight dip, from $869,982 in 2015 to $813,159 in 2016, a decrease of about 7 percent. The company attributed a small decline in revenue sales for partner RadQual to a 12 percent decline in sales by TI Services, a 50-50 venture the company formed with RadQual in December 2010 for distribution of nuclear medicine.
Radiological services’ quarterly revenue plunged from $354,895 in 2015 to $127,987 in the latest reporting period, a decrease of 64 percent. Most of this segment’s revenue is generated by field service activities under the Department of Energy’s Orphan Source Recovery Program, according to the company. International Isotopes attributed the drop to a delay for a major field service contract into second-quarter 2016 at the request of the company’s customer.
“The DOE awards these OSRP jobs on a random basis which causes significant fluctuations in field service revenue in the period-to-period comparisons,” International Isotopes said. “The Company expects revenue within this segment to improve significantly over the remainder of the year.”
