Neurocrine Biosciences Q2 2026 Earnings Call Transcript

Key Takeaways

  • Strong commercial performance: Q2 revenue exceeded $950 million, up nearly 40% year over year, with non-GAAP EPS of $2.85. INGREZZA sales rose 15% to $716 million, prompting the company to raise full-year guidance to $2.825 billion–$2.875 billion.
  • CRENESSITY sales reached $184 million, supported by steady new-patient additions, expanding prescriber adoption, favorable reimbursement, and high persistence. Management estimates approximately 15% of diagnosed patients have been prescribed the drug, indicating substantial remaining runway.
  • The newly acquired VYKAT XR generated $54 million in Neurocrine-recognized Q2 sales, while pro forma sales were $94 million. Management expects sequential growth beginning in Q4 as it completes integration and works through discontinuations among patients from the initial 2025 launch bolus.
  • The company highlighted major anticipated 2027 catalysts, including Phase III readouts for osavampator in major depressive disorder and direclidine in schizophrenia. Neurocrine also expects to advance its obesity, muscarinic, and Friedreich’s ataxia programs.
  • Neurocrine ended Q2 with roughly $500 million in cash and no debt after funding the approximately $2.9 billion Soleno acquisition with cash on hand. Future earnings could face variability from acquisition-related costs, potential increased commercial investment for successful pipeline launches, and uncertainty around INGREZZA pricing under the IRA in 2029.
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Earnings Conference Call
Neurocrine Biosciences Q2 2026
00:00 / 00:00

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Operator

Hello, welcome everyone joining today's Neurocrine Biosciences Reports Q2 2026 Earnings Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. Later, you will have the opportunity to ask questions during the question-and-answer session. To register to ask a question at any time, please press star one on your telephone keypad. Please note this call is being recorded, and we are standing by if you should need any assistance. It is now my pleasure to turn the meeting over to Todd Tushla, Vice President of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Todd Tushla
Todd Tushla
VP of Investor Relations at Neurocrine Biosciences

Happy Thursday, everyone. Welcome to Neurocrine Biosciences' second quarter 2026 earnings call. With me today on the call are Kyle Gano, Chief Executive Officer, Matt Abernethy, Chief Financial Officer, Eric Benevich, Chief Commercial Officer, Sanjay Keswani, Chief Medical Officer, and in his well-deserved new role as Chief Business Officer, Samir Siddhanti. During today's call, we will be making forward-looking statements. These statements are subject to certain risks and uncertainties, and our actual results may differ materially. I encourage you to review the risk factors discussed in our latest SEC filings. In addition, some of the information discussed today includes non-GAAP financial measures that have not been calculated in accordance with U.S. GAAP.

Todd Tushla
Todd Tushla
VP of Investor Relations at Neurocrine Biosciences

Reconciliations of these non-GAAP financial measures to the most directly comparable GAAP financial measures are presented in the tables at the end of our earnings release issued earlier today, which has been posted on the investor relations page of Neurocrine's website. After prepared remarks, we'll jump into Q&A. Now I'll hand the call off to Kyle.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

Thanks, Todd. Good afternoon, everyone. Neurocrine's second quarter performance demonstrates the power of a diversified growth strategy built to compound over time. Our commercial portfolio of first-in-class medicines, INGREZZA, CRENESSITY, and VYKAT XR, delivered another record quarter with net product sales exceeding $950 million, enabling more patients to benefit from our innovative medicines. This durable commercial performance provides the financial strength to continue investing in innovation, advance our industry-leading pipeline, and pursue strategic opportunities that further strengthen Neurocrine for long-term growth. Our strategy remains clear: execute our commercial portfolio to bring our medicines to patients, advance our innovation engine, and deploy capital with discipline. This quarter demonstrated meaningful progress across all three of these priorities. The commercial business continues to generate durable growth.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

The pipeline is advancing with one of the industry's strongest mid- to late-stage portfolios. Disciplined capital deployment was demonstrated through the successful acquisition and integration of VYKAT XR. Together, these efforts further strengthen our position in rare disease while building on our leadership in endocrinology. More importantly, these results reflected the continued evolution of Neurocrine. Just a few years ago, we were largely viewed as a single-product company. Today, we have multiple commercial growth drivers, an expanding pipeline across all phases of development, and the financial strength to invest through innovation cycles. Together, these strengths position us to create long-term value for patients, physicians, employees, and shareholders alike. Looking ahead, we remain on track to deliver multiple important clinical milestones in 2027, including phase III data readouts for osavampator in major depressive disorder and direclidine in schizophrenia.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

Together with the continuing integration of VYKAT XR, these milestones represent the next chapter in Neurocrine's growth and reinforce our confidence in the opportunity ahead. Before I turn the call to Matt, I'd like to recognize Samir Siddhanti on his recent promotion to Chief Business Officer. Since joining Neurocrine in 2017, Samir has played an integral role in shaping our corporate strategy and business development efforts. As a member of our executive leadership team, he will help guide the next phase of Neurocrine's growth and evolution. Samir, congratulations. We are excited for what's ahead. With that, I'll turn the call over to Matt.

Matt Abernethy
Matt Abernethy
CFO at Neurocrine Biosciences

Good afternoon, everyone. For the second quarter, we delivered over $950 million of total revenue, representing nearly 40% year-over-year growth. This reflects full-quarter contributions from INGREZZA and CRENESSITY, along with a partial-quarter contribution from VYKAT XR following the close of the Soleno acquisition. This revenue performance demonstrates accelerating top-line growth, delivering a financial profile with non-GAAP EPS of $2.85 per share. Starting with INGREZZA, second quarter net sales were $716 million, up 15% year-over-year, driven by another quarter of record new patient additions and sustained underlying demand. Given this performance, we are raising full-year INGREZZA guidance from $2.7 billion-$2.8 billion to a new range of $2.825 billion-$2.875 billion.

Matt Abernethy
Matt Abernethy
CFO at Neurocrine Biosciences

At the midpoint, this represents approximately 13% year-over-year growth. CRENESSITY's second quarter net sales were $184 million, reflecting continued strong launch execution, consistent new patient starts, and expanding prescriber adoption. Approximately 15% of the estimated diagnosed patient population has now been prescribed CRENESSITY, reinforcing our confidence in the significant runway for growth. Turning to VYKAT XR, second quarter pro forma net sales were $94 million, with $54 million recognized by Neurocrine from May 18th, the closing date of the Soleno acquisition. Integration has progressed well, and we expect to drive sequential quarterly growth exiting 2026. New patient demand remained fairly consistent with the first quarter, while discontinuation rates tracked in line with our expectations following the initial launch bolus in 2025.

Matt Abernethy
Matt Abernethy
CFO at Neurocrine Biosciences

We have more work to do in developing this market and remain optimistic in the opportunity to help many more patients with PWS over the years ahead. Pro forma total revenues were $998 million for the second quarter of 2026, when including full-quarter VYKAT XR sales. This performance underscores the strength and increasing scale of our commercial portfolio across three highly differentiated products. Turning to our financials. With the Soleno acquisition now complete, I'd like to briefly discuss the financial impact of the transaction, including the purchase accounting and the GAAP and non-GAAP adjustments reflected in our earnings release. We acquired Soleno for approximately $2.9 billion and financed the transaction with cash on hand. We ended the second quarter with approximately $500 million in cash and no debt. Strategically and financially, this is a highly attractive acquisition.

Matt Abernethy
Matt Abernethy
CFO at Neurocrine Biosciences

VYKAT XR adds another differentiated durable growth product to our portfolio and is immediately accretive to non-GAAP earnings. Accordingly, we updated operating expense guidance to include the Soleno operating expenses, transaction and integration costs, and the expected purchase accounting intangible and inventory fair value amortization impacts for the remainder of 2026. We expect approximately $150 million of acquisition-related costs, of which $130 million was recognized in the second quarter. Our GAAP second quarter results also include non-cash purchase accounting amortization of acquired intangible assets and inventory fair value step-up of approximately $20 million. Overall, our commercial portfolio continues to perform exceptionally well, generating close to $1 billion in pro forma quarterly sales, providing substantial financial flexibility to invest consistent with our capital allocation priorities to drive revenue growth, advance our expanding pipeline, and pursue additional strategic business development opportunities.

Matt Abernethy
Matt Abernethy
CFO at Neurocrine Biosciences

With growing sales, an improving financial profile, and meaningful data catalysts ahead, we feel quite fortunate to find ourselves in a position to continue to build a leading global biotech company. With that, I will now hand the call over to Eric Benevich, our chief commercial officer. Eric.

Eric Benevich
Eric Benevich
Chief Commercial Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

Thanks, Matt. Just five years ago, Neurocrine was a single-product commercial stage company celebrating INGREZZA achieving blockbuster status, surpassing $1 billion in annual sales. Today, our commercial portfolio includes three first-in-class medicines with combined quarterly sales approaching $1 billion and annualizing to approximately $4 billion. This transformation reflects the successful execution of our long-term growth strategy. Starting with INGREZZA, second quarter performance was outstanding, with record sales of $716 million, driven by another quarter of all-time highs in both new patient starts and total prescriptions. Based on our increased full-year guidance, we expect to help more patients than ever before who are living with tardive dyskinesia or chorea associated with Huntington's disease. CRENESSITY also delivered another excellent sales quarter, generating $184 million. The launch continues to follow a very consistent pattern: steady pace of new patient starts, high persistence and compliance, and favorable reimbursement.

Eric Benevich
Eric Benevich
Chief Commercial Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

Adoption remains balanced across both adult and pediatric patients, male and female patients, and across the business segments of CAH Centers of Excellence, pediatric endocrinologists, and community adult endocrinologists. Importantly, our prescriber base has nearly tripled compared to one year ago, providing a strong foundation for continued growth. Turning to VYKAT XR, while still very early in the integration of this franchise into our commercial platform, we were encouraged by second quarter trends. New patient starts remained steady on a sequential basis, the prescriber base continued to expand, and discontinuations tracked in line with expectations following the initial bolus of patients who began therapy last year. As with any acquisition, it will take a few quarters to get fully integrated, and we're excited to introduce Neurocrine's commercial, medical, and patient support capabilities to the VYKAT team and the PWS community.

Eric Benevich
Eric Benevich
Chief Commercial Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

We remain confident in driving sequential growth as we exit 2026 and continue our conviction that VYKAT XR has the potential to become the third blockbuster in our portfolio. Before I wrap, I'd like to extend a special thank you to our commercial and medical teams in neuropsychiatry and rare endocrinology, our internal cross-functional colleagues, and the VYKAT XR team from Soleno. Q2 was a quarter of significant transformative change for Neurocrine, where we both expanded our existing commercial footprint to better meet the needs of healthcare providers and patients, while we also began the integration of VYKAT XR into our company. We executed all these significant structural changes without missing a beat in terms of our mission to help more patients. My hat is literally off to our teams for pulling off such a tremendous transformation while simultaneously delivering such a strong quarter.

Eric Benevich
Eric Benevich
Chief Commercial Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

I'll turn the call over to our Chief Medical Officer, Dr. Sanjay Keswani.

Sanjay Keswani
Sanjay Keswani
Chief Medical Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

Thanks, Eric, good afternoon, everyone. I'll begin today with highlights from ENDO 2026, where we presented important new data for both CRENESSITY and VYKAT XR. Starting with CRENESSITY, we presented two-year data from the ongoing CATALYST open-label studies in pediatric and adult patients with classic congenital adrenal hyperplasia. These results demonstrated meaningful and durable improvements across multiple aspects of health, including cardiometabolic outcomes, bone health, quality of life, and pediatric growth, while continuing to reinforce CRENESSITY's favorable long-term safety profile. For VYKAT XR, we presented three-year HQ-CT and Prader-Willi syndrome profile data comparing treated patients with a natural history cohort. These analyses demonstrated significant and sustained reductions in hyperphagia across all evaluated time points, supporting the durability of treatment benefit. Additional data also showed meaningful improvements when patients who had previously discontinued therapy restarted treatment, underscoring the importance of continued treatment in maintaining long-term outcomes.

Sanjay Keswani
Sanjay Keswani
Chief Medical Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

Collectively, these data strengthen the growing body of evidence supporting both CRENESSITY and VYKAT XR and highlight the meaningful impact these medicines are having for patients and the endocrinology community. Turning to the pipeline, we continue to make steady progress. Notably, we remain on track to report phase III top-line data for osavampator in major depressive disorder in the second half of 2027. We also remain on track to report the first phase III readout for direclidine in schizophrenia in the second half of 2027 and for the second phase III study in 2028. Looking ahead, we look forward to hosting our neurology and immunology webinar in early December, where we will provide an update on our strategy and highlight key programs across both therapeutic areas. With that, I'll hand the call back to Todd.

Todd Tushla
Todd Tushla
VP of Investor Relations at Neurocrine Biosciences

Excellent. Chloe, let's jump into Q&A.

Operator

Thank you. If you'd like to ask a question, press star one on your keypad. To leave the queue at any time, press star two. Once again, that is star one to ask a question. We'll take our first question from Paul Matteis with Stifel. Your line is open.

Paul Matteis
Paul Matteis
Analyst at Stifel

Great. Thanks a lot, guys, and congrats on the execution and the great quarter. As it relates to INGREZZA, I was wondering at this point in the year, how much visibility do you have on pricing dynamics next year and any feedback you're getting or any insight you're getting into access dynamics, with the NASHP MFP being enacted? Thank you so much.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

Hey, Paul. This is Kyle. Thanks for the question. Maybe just to start where we are with 2026, great access this year with about 70% of all Medicare lives covered under the contracting that we executed last year. We expect that pricing to remain relatively consistent year-to-year as we think about the second half of 2026. In terms of 2027, obviously our discussions with payers are ongoing now. We should get a read on that later this year. I think where we are right now is we do see a process and a path moving forward. It's not just us, but others, that there'll be a place for MFP-adjacent products for Medicare beneficiaries.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

If you couple that with the fact that we're the market leader in the VMAT2 category, there's going to be ample opportunity for us to have the same access that we have here, moving forward, strong access through 2027 and 2028. Right now it's all leveraging what we can with our team. I would be remiss by not calling out that this market overall continues to grow double-digit year-to-year. There's a lot of room left in this market. We'll continue to focus there.

Paul Matteis
Paul Matteis
Analyst at Stifel

Kyle, any thought on how much additional costs maintaining this access might be next year or beyond?

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

No, I think it's too early to make a call on that, Paul. We'll have more to comment on that later in the year. Right now it's been a great first half. We'll continue to build on the momentum that we've seen.

Paul Matteis
Paul Matteis
Analyst at Stifel

Okay. Thanks very much.

Operator

We'll take our next question from Phil Nadeau with TD Cowen. Your line is open.

Phil Nadeau
Phil Nadeau
Analyst at TD Cowen

Good afternoon. Thanks for taking our question. Ours is on CRENESSITY, a really strong quarter with revenue up 20% quarter-over-quarter. It sounds from the prepared remarks like everything was steady as she goes. Steady patient adds: good reimbursement, no bolus. I'm curious whether that interpretation is correct. Were there any one-time issues in Q2 that made it particularly strong that we shouldn't extrapolate into the back half of the year? Or is this pace of revenue growth reasonable for the next couple quarters? Thanks.

Eric Benevich
Eric Benevich
Chief Commercial Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

Yeah, I think characterizing Q2 as really an extension of what we've seen earlier in the launch, a very steady and consistent pattern of new patient adds. We continue to see adoption across all the segments that we're focused on, the pediatric endocrinologists, the adult community endocrinologists, and those centers of excellence. Really pleased with the fact that we estimate now that we've got about 15% of the addressable patient population on treatment and certainly expect to see continued strong momentum as we move forward.

Phil Nadeau
Phil Nadeau
Analyst at TD Cowen

That's very helpful. Thank you.

Operator

We'll move next to Tazeen Ahmad with Bank of America. Your line is open.

Tazeen Ahmad
Tazeen Ahmad
Analyst at Bank of America

Hi. Thanks for taking my question. Mine's on VYKAT. This quarter's results of $94 million, it's roughly flat sequentially. You just took over this franchise. Can you maybe just talk to us about some of the things that you're doing in order to accelerate the launch trajectory now that the franchise is fully under your control? Maybe just give some specifics about some of the things that you're doing now that you think could have an effect in a quarter or two. Thanks.

Eric Benevich
Eric Benevich
Chief Commercial Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

Yeah. Hi, Tazeen. First of all, I'll say that the results that we saw in Q2 were aligned with our expectations coming out of diligence. Certainly, I think we're still learning a lot about the hyperphagia market opportunity. What we've learned so far just reaffirms our convictions about the potential for this medicine to be a blockbuster. We're still deep in the midst of our integration process here. Ultimately, I think the fundamentals are what matters. Continuing to find patients, to introduce VYKAT XR to the providers that care for them, primarily in endocrinology. Then provide good education and guidance around how to select appropriate patients, how to help them through the titration process, and to achieve good outcomes. I feel very good about the opportunity with VYKAT.

Eric Benevich
Eric Benevich
Chief Commercial Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

Everything that I've heard from the physicians that have experience with it is very positive, and I certainly look forward to continuing to drive the launch of this product that's still very early in its commercial ramp.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

Tazeen, this is Kyle. I'm just reminded as we talk about VYKAT XR; this is our first earnings call post-close, and we've had a discussion on this. I do want to bring up the merits of the acquisition and the product itself. There's a great strategic and financial fit here for us. VYKAT XR is a first-in-class, first-in-disease medicine for Prader-Willi syndrome, very much of the same category that we've seen for INGREZZA and CRENESSITY upon their launch. We're really excited about the strategic fit there. Obviously, we're able to expand on our endocrinology franchise moving forward.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

As a product that comes under the Neurocrine umbrella earlier in its launch, not only do we get to treat many thousands of patients under Neurocrine, which is exciting, we also get to reap the financial reward of maximizing all the revenue growth that gets added to our top line as well as diversification. There's a lot of financial fit there as well. Not to mention that we believe the IP estate goes out to the mid-2040s, so it's durable as well. Overall, we're really excited about what we have here. I think Eric called out some of the points that we're looking at now, and we're excited to bring this into the same blockbuster category that we see for CRENESSITY and INGREZZA moving forward.

Eric Benevich
Eric Benevich
Chief Commercial Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

The only thing I'd add is this was very much in line with our internal expectations. We knew what we were buying, and this has a tremendous amount of opportunity to help many more patients. We have a ton of confidence in the team, the product, and the opportunity to help many more patients with PWS. We're encouraged as we think forward.

Operator

We'll move next to Brian Skorney with Baird. Your line is open.

Brian Skorney
Brian Skorney
Analyst at Baird

Hey, afternoon, guys. Congrats on a great quarter. To jump in with a question on VYKAT as well. I think during the Soleno days, there was a lot of debate on the sort of differences between new start boluses and sort of dropouts, and you're sort of getting your head around things right now. Maybe you can just kind of characterize what you're seeing out there in terms of how much of initial bolus numbers are really kind of affecting the dropout rate that we see right now, and when do you think that there's an upwards equilibrium of new starts and dropout rates to think about in the coming quarters?

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

Yeah, no, I appreciate the question. This is Kyle. I think what we've seen on a new patient start basis is a pretty steady flow of new patient starts over the past couple quarters. That's good. That's right, along the lines of the expectation we had after completing diligence on the company. In terms of discontinuations, obviously, with a bolus of patients at the launch, we do see some of those discontinuations being pulled through as time has gone along. We expect to see the ultimate rate settling into what we would see with other orphan medicines in the 25%-30% range. That's what we'll be looking at moving forward. Ultimately, our goal here is you'll see sequential growth as we exit 2026 and looking at that in future years. We're right where we need to be right now.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

I think more importantly, I'm really excited to see our team bring its resources and the support to the Soleno team now under the Neurocrine brand, take all of our learnings collectively, and make this particular medicine be the best it can be moving forward.

Brian Skorney
Brian Skorney
Analyst at Baird

Great. Thanks, Kyle.

Operator

We'll move next to Mohit Bansal with Wells Fargo. Your line is open.

Mohit Bansal
Mohit Bansal
Analyst at Wells Fargo

Great. Thank you very much for taking my question, and congrats on a great quarter. Just wanted to understand your VYKAT XR commentary a little bit better for the next few quarters. You're saying that the new patient starts, and you expect it to be steady. Are you saying that the sales could be choppy a little bit? Again, what you are saying is that as you exit 2026, you can see you are confidently driving sequential growth. Just wondering, how would you characterize the next few quarters as you integrate the business into your own business? Thank you.

Matt Abernethy
Matt Abernethy
CFO at Neurocrine Biosciences

Yeah. As we move from Q3 to Q4, we would anticipate seeing some sequential growth. As you think about going into next year, it's really about that momentum. As we've talked about, it's that mix of new patient additions and being offset by the discontinuations, and we feel like we'll be through the bolus of the discontinuations here in this quarter. We would expect to be sequential growers, as we've said, in Q4 and beyond.

Mohit Bansal
Mohit Bansal
Analyst at Wells Fargo

[Non-English content] Thank you.

Operator

We'll take our next question from Anupam Rama with J.P. Morgan. Your line is open.

Anupam Rama
Anupam Rama
Analyst at J.P. Morgan

Hey, guys. Thanks so much for taking the question. Just wondering what some of the physician feedback has been on some of the two-year CRENESSITY data in both adults and peds and how these data could impact uptake of the product. Thanks so much.

Sanjay Keswani
Sanjay Keswani
Chief Medical Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

Thanks, Anupam. Yeah, we're really pleased about the feedback we're getting from the physicians with respect to our two-year data that were recently presented at Endo. Of note, this included both adult and pediatric data. Indicated long-term benefits with respect to both androgen reduction and also glucocorticoid steroid reduction as well. Really excited by that feedback. Also, this is in the context of a really nice safety tolerability profile. Of note, at this point, we have well over 35,000 patient weeks of exposure. Again, very important, bearing in mind the breadth of the population that we're treating with CRENESSITY.

Operator

We'll move next to Cory Kasimov with Evercore. Your line is open.

Cory Kasimov
Cory Kasimov
Analyst at Evercore

Hey, good afternoon, guys. Thank you for taking the question. Given the recent acquisition of a potential future competitor, CAH, can you just talk a little bit about the clinical plan and anticipated timelines for your next-gen CRENESSITY assets to the extent that they're needed to help defend the franchise in the future? Thank you.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

Yeah, thanks for the question. We do have our next-generation medicine going through clinical development right now. That's NBIP-1435. This is a protein-based therapeutic, a peptide that we're developing that would be a once- or less-frequent-dosed medicine for patients wanting that particular option of not having to worry about taking a medicine on a day-to-day basis. It may offer additional advantages above that, in addition to that, because of the PK profile. We have great phase I data that's come out of the program thus far, and we look forward to starting a phase II study shortly and bringing that to patients as quickly as we can. I will say, going back to CRENESSITY just for a moment, that it set a really high bar.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

It's got great efficacy, great safety, great tolerability, and what an outstanding label that we're able to get from the clinical program. We've got multiple formulations, a wide spectrum of age ranges that are applied to the medicine, and now, as Sanjay just mentioned, multiple years of clinical data that we'll be able to lean on in a multiple-year head start. I say this because this high bar not only makes it more difficult for our competitors but also even our own programs in our clinical portfolio. We're really excited about the position that we have right now with CRENESSITY. A lot of room still to grow. We got about 15% of the market currently under CRENESSITY's care, and we're going to continue growing that out over time to become that standard of care for patients.

Cory Kasimov
Cory Kasimov
Analyst at Evercore

Appreciate that perspective, Kyle.

Operator

We'll move next to Jay Olson with Oppenheimer. Your line is open.

Jay Olson
Jay Olson
Analyst at Oppenheimer

Hey, guys. Congrats on the quarter, and congrats to Samir. Our question is related to the future of your psychiatry franchise with data readouts for osavampator and direclidine expected next year. Do you have the commercial infrastructure that you would like to have to launch those two products? How are you thinking about building out that organization? Thank you.

Eric Benevich
Eric Benevich
Chief Commercial Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

Thanks, Jay. The way I would characterize it is that we have a really good foundation for a future infrastructure that would be required for either osavampator or direclidine or both. As you know, we have a substantial footprint today in psychiatry, as well as in long-term care, and a very strong reputation with those provider communities. If you look at the profile of either of those two medicines, it might require us to bolster our teams or to do some reorganization work. I think that we're in a very good place in terms of being able to leverage our existing foundation.

Eric Benevich
Eric Benevich
Chief Commercial Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

You may recall that when we were talking about the planned expansion of our INGREZZA team last fall, we said that the value of that expansion was not only to accelerate the growth of our INGREZZA business, but also to set us up nicely for future launches of our phase III psychiatry assets. I don't anticipate any near-term changes to our footprint. Certainly, I think we're well-positioned to accelerate those adjustments to our commercial platform on the other side of positive phase III data.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

I think that'd be a great day if Osa in particular is as positive as you think about going into primary care to be able to help those with major depressive disorder. That would require a step-up in overall investment within SG&A in the 2028-2029 timeframe. I think you'd agree with me; that would be something we'd all enjoy having the privilege of doing. In the near term, I think we're focused on executing, as Eric said, with INGREZZA and continuing to expand the impact we're having across the psychiatry community today.

Jay Olson
Jay Olson
Analyst at Oppenheimer

Great. Thank you.

Operator

We'll take our next question from Akash Tewari with Jefferies. Your line is open.

Akash Tewari
Akash Tewari
Analyst at Jefferies

Hey, thanks so much. A few questions on your obesity efforts. For the 2118 CRF2 asset, what do you expect for monotherapy weight loss and muscle preservation in your phase I trial when you get into obese patients? For 1968, your triple G—is that already in the clinic? I'm surprised you're able to start a combo trial with the CRF2 this year without any monotherapy data. Finally, when we think about the combo, is there any sense of when we'd be able to get the first full cut of data there? Thank you.

Sanjay Keswani
Sanjay Keswani
Chief Medical Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

Thanks so much for the questions. With respect to our CRF2 agonist, obviously, we're very excited about this molecule. This is our first obesity molecule in the clinic. We're currently accumulating phase I data, and we're due to have a signal-seeking study readout next year with respect to both weight loss and also lean mass preservation. That's really exciting for us. Clearly, we're looking for a robust effect, not just in weight loss, as I said, but also muscle mass preservation. We have other molecules behind CRF2 with respect to our obesity portfolio, which will be shortly entering the clinic.

Operator

We'll move next to Josh Schimmer with Cantor. Your line is open.

Josh Schimmer
Josh Schimmer
Analyst at Cantor

Great. Thanks for taking my question. How are you thinking about the ability to smooth top and bottom-line growth through the 2029 INGREZZA IRA implementation year? Does the answer to that question depend on your phase III readouts next year? How do you expect that to play out under various pipeline scenarios? Thank you.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

Thanks, Josh. This is Kyle. Obviously, we're keeping an eye on our MFP to IRA outcome. Those discussions will start next year; certainly we'll keep everyone updated once we know our MFP that will be applied to INGREZZA in 2029. I think what we see overarching in the evolution of our commercial portfolio are medicines that are growing over that timeframe as well. We think we'll end up being in a good position there to see continued top-line revenue growth through the end of this decade and beyond. On the earnings side, or I should say on the income or expense side of the equation, we also have phase III trials that will be sunsetting over that same timeframe as well, our pipeline switches more to an early- to mid-stage type on our pipeline, excuse me.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

I think that's going to be more or less a view into our steady-state portfolio as we get to the end of this decade. It all goes back to what we shared at the beginning of this year in terms of expectations around new phase I, phase II, and phase III starts. I like what we have in terms of the company and how we set it up. We'll keep people informed over the next couple of years as we get closer to 2029.

Matt Abernethy
Matt Abernethy
CFO at Neurocrine Biosciences

Yeah. EPS variability is really going to be based upon, as you said, the impact of the IRA implementation in 2029. On the expense side, as I said earlier, if osavampator is positive, we will spend in advance of sales to build up that sales force in that market. I think you'll have episodic investments that may lead to some earnings variability, but our North Star is to grow revenue over the long term. I think from those investments, we'll have very nice earnings growth as you look into the 2030s.

Operator

We'll move next to Brian Abrahams with RBC Capital Markets. Your line is open.

Brian Abrahams
Brian Abrahams
Analyst at RBC Capital Markets

Hey, guys. Thanks so much for taking my question. It seems like you're seeing really nice growth in the prescriber base for CRENESSITY. I guess I'm curious, what proportion of your target practices are still not using CRENESSITY at all? At this point, what are some of the barriers for them here at this stage of the launch, and how might you expect to overcome them? Thanks.

Eric Benevich
Eric Benevich
Chief Commercial Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

Yeah, it's an interesting question. I think the way I'd characterize it is that we're seeing really nice expansion of new prescribers each quarter. At this stage, we're still, I'd call it, early in the overall commercial ramp. There's a long way to go. The reason I sort of qualified my comments a little bit is that as we learn more about this market and with our patient-finding opportunity, there is some movement in and out of our target list over time. Overall, the feedback's been very positive. Most of the physicians that have tried CRENESSITY have only treated one patient so far, and I think that's a function of two things. One is the flow of patients into their practices. Especially in the adult setting, patients only come in maybe once a year.

Eric Benevich
Eric Benevich
Chief Commercial Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

It takes time, if they have more than one patient, to see them. The second thing is really this, what we call the long tail of this market. There are really not that many practices that have more than a handful of patients, and there are a lot of physician practices that have only one or two. Ultimately, I feel really good about the growth that we've seen, and we talked about this very steady and consistent pace that we're on. I think that's mostly a testament to the patient-finding efforts and, of course, the execution by our team.

Brian Abrahams
Brian Abrahams
Analyst at RBC Capital Markets

Thanks.

Operator

We'll move next to Sean Laaman with Morgan Stanley. Your line is open.

Sean Laaman
Sean Laaman
Analyst at Morgan Stanley

Good afternoon, Kyle and team. Hope everyone's well. My question's on the launch trajectory of CRENESSITY. You keep handily beating our numbers. I'm just wondering how the drug performs against your own internal expectations. Is it falling in line? If so, when will you be comfortable giving us guidance? If it's beating your expectations internally, what are some of the key areas that it's doing that?

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

I would say it's quite close to what our internal expectations have been. With that said, we're learning a tremendous amount each quarter. I'd say from the beginning of launch, we've been very encouraged by the feedback that we're getting by clinicians. Also, the high rates of persistency have been quite strong. We're seeing a lot of the benefits and hearing those back from clinicians in regard to the longer-term outcomes and the benefit there. We're still really quite early in launch, only six quarters in. It's premature for us to start thinking about giving a more formal guide. I would say our internal models are getting closer to the numbers that we're delivering.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

Still, I'd say to the team, Keep over-delivering. They've done an incredible job developing a new product that's in the market for the first time in over 70 years. A lot of learning going on and a lot of excitement. Kudos to the team. Well done. We'll address the guidance piece to your question as we get later in the year to next year.

Sean Laaman
Sean Laaman
Analyst at Morgan Stanley

Thank you, Kyle.

Operator

We'll move next to Marc Goodman with Leerink Partners. Your line is open.

Marc Goodman
Marc Goodman
Analyst at Leerink Partners

Yeah, on VYKAT, I just want to make sure I understand, Matt, what you're saying. Are you saying that we should expect sales to be roughly about the same in 3Q as 2Q, then 4Q should show some incremental growth versus 3Q, and the reason is because of this gating issue of timing issue, whatever you want to call it, of patients discontinuing from the bolus that occurred so-called 6 months ago or so, something like that? Just if I could, just another question. Just curious what the R&D team thinks about any learnings from the MapLight Therapeutics data that reported earlier this week. Thanks.

Matt Abernethy
Matt Abernethy
CFO at Neurocrine Biosciences

Yeah, regarding VYKAT. I think you said it correctly, but I would go back and just say we've only had the product for six weeks, and it's a market that we're incredibly excited about. We're hearing great feedback from clinicians alike. As you said, this is more of a function of getting through some of the bolus of discontinuations and then implementing some of the things that Eric laid out in terms of driving additional patients to being helped with their PWS. From an expectation perspective, I think what you said aligns with what I was trying to describe.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

I'll take the MapLight Therapeutics question. Maybe just to start with where Matt left off on VYKAT. Just want to make sure everyone appreciates that we are going through an integration of the company, and obviously that can be a little noisy as you work through that, just as a sales force expansion can be. But as you know, we are quite skilled in the art of sales force expansions across INGREZZA and CRENESSITY, and we've all come out on the other side much stronger, and we believe that will be the case for VYKAT. In terms of MapLight Therapeutics, we did see their data come out here the past couple of days. I think it's a good data point for further validating the orthosteric approach for using a muscarinic agonist. Their approach is entirely different than our own, and it's worth calling out those differences here.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

Very similar to COBENFY, the approved medicine that utilizes the muscarinic mechanism. The MapLight approach also requires an add-back muscarinic antagonist to manage side effects. Our approach with direclidine is the only approach, a first-in-class approach, using a selective M4 agonist that works just fine by itself. It doesn't require anything to add back for mitigating side effects. We know at the end of the day, efficacy gets your foot in the door. It's really what you do on the other factors that allow you to win. Things like safety and tolerability, things like ease of administration, and that's where direclidine is really going to shine. What we saw in our phase II trial: very clean GI profile, no weight gain, no food effect, once-a-day, no titration. That's how we're going to win here, just as we've seen with other antipsychotics across the spectrum from low to high efficacy.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

They all win on safety, tolerability, and ease of administration.

Marc Goodman
Marc Goodman
Analyst at Leerink Partners

Thanks.

Operator

We'll move next to David Amsellem with Piper Sandler. Your line is open.

David Amsellem
David Amsellem
Analyst at Piper Sandler

Thanks. A VYKAT question. Can you clarify how much of your discontinuations are from edema? Regarding the management of edema, what are you going to be doing to sort of help patients and practitioners manage through that so as to minimize discontinuations due to fluid retention? Thanks.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

This is Kyle. I don't think we're going to get into the nature of the discontinuations, I will say, just like any medicine, especially one that you're inheriting, acquiring, is that there's always the opportunity to improve messaging and education. I know that's going to be a big part of what our team looks at. The messaging in education is the same, again, across all medicines that we look at for caregivers, for patients, and for physicians. When it comes to VYKAT XR, obviously, you look at even something as simple as a dosing regimen. It's a titration schedule that's required through a weight-based mechanism. That's unique. Making sure that you can educate across that appropriately. Also setting the right expectations in terms of efficacy.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

This is not like a pain medicine where you see relief the same day you take the medicine. It can take months for the hyperphagia to improve. These are all things that we're working through right now, we'll continue to work with the team to get in a really good spot as we look to fully bring the Soleno team on board here to Neurocrine, and leverage the learnings on both sides to do what's best for patients here.

Operator

We'll take our next question from Ash Verma with UBS. Your line is open.

Ash Verma
Ash Verma
Analyst at UBS

Hey, guys. Thanks for taking my question. Maybe just from the perspective of CRENESSITY, I wanted to get your thoughts on the competitive dynamic here. For atumelnant, which Vertex acquired, they did note that there were seven LFT elevation cases versus the prior disclosure by Crinetics, which was two cases. They still ended up paying a pretty hefty premium. I just want to understand, from your perspective, what do you think drove that? Is that something that ultimately signals to you that CAH can be a very big market? Is it possible that the LFT elevation is actually a non-issue? Thanks.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

Thanks, Ash, for the question. It's really hard for us to comment on the competitor or any competitors in the spaces that we work in. All I can share with you is the excitement that we have around our own medicine. I'll go back to the CATALYST data that we have. Two-year data, 35,000 patient weeks of exposure, and accumulating over time where we're able to show 70% of patients at the two-year period were on a physiological dose of a GC and 70% of patients were at a physiological concentration of their androgens. That's a pretty good area to be in for CAH and really for any medicine. We'll continue to hopefully accumulate more data of that kind and type as time moves along to show the real benefits for patients.

Operator

We'll take our next question from Myles Minter with William Blair. Your line is open.

Myles Minter
Myles Minter
Analyst at William Blair

Hey. Congrats on the quarter, and thanks for taking the question. I just wanted to hear your thoughts on the CRENESSITY sort of peak opportunity here. Are you still describing that drug as a blockbuster opportunity? I only ask because a recent acquisition seems to put your competitor saying that that might be a $3 billion market or greater, and you're, on an annualized basis, the best part of three-quarters of a billion dollars already. Eric, you said you're really, really early on in the launch. I'm just wondering whether a blockbuster drug is the right way to think about this, or if that multi-billion-dollar sort of claim that the competitive acquisition made is more relevant here. Thanks very much.

Matt Abernethy
Matt Abernethy
CFO at Neurocrine Biosciences

We're going to take this to the highest number that we can and help as many patients as possible, Myles. I think you said it quite well. The trajectory so far has been very, very strong and very nice, and I think it reflects the great need in the market, the great product we have, and also the great team. When you look back over time at other rare disease launches like this, you can see peak penetration between 30% and 50% for chronic-type medicines. When you look at what the peak opportunity is, that's the ZIP code. I know that's a pretty broad range; we're going to work to get as high up in that range as possible. Yeah, you can get to a really nice figure quite quickly.

Matt Abernethy
Matt Abernethy
CFO at Neurocrine Biosciences

It really comes, at the end of the day, to focus on helping as many patients as possible for their CAH.

Myles Minter
Myles Minter
Analyst at William Blair

Makes sense. Thanks, Matt.

Operator

We'll move next to Rudy Li with Wolfe Research. Your line is open.

Rudy Li
Rudy Li
Analyst at Wolfe Research

Hey, thanks. Want to take my question. I have a question for the pipeline, just a quick follow-up. Given the trajectory of COBENFY and the feedback, I'm just curious about your thoughts on the muscarinic opportunity and maybe just talk about your overall strategy for building a muscarinic franchise, as you have multiple products, maybe targeting different indications. Thanks.

Samir Siddhanti
Samir Siddhanti
Chief Business Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

Hi. Thanks, Rudy. This is Samir here. I really appreciate the question on the muscarinic. We've got four shots on goal here with our muscarinic franchise. Direclidine NBI-568 is in phase III right now for the treatment of schizophrenia and phase II bipolar. A phase II study is right now ongoing in bipolar mania. All studies remain on track timeline-wise there. Our next generation, NBI-570, is an M4-preferring M1/M4 dual. Right now that's in a phase II study for the treatment of schizophrenia. Where we see opportunity, there is the potential for a long-acting injectable. This is a class of medicines that has generated significant commercial sales for other companies here, and we view this as the one and only potential LAI within the muscarinic space. NBI-569, that's earlier right now. It's an M1/M4 dual as well that we're studying in an early study in Alzheimer's disease.

Samir Siddhanti
Samir Siddhanti
Chief Business Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

The view there is to take that into Alzheimer's disease psychosis. We've got a fourth compound, NBI-567, that will soon be starting a phase II study in Alzheimer's cognition. Overall, we feel like we have a best-in-class muscarinic franchise here. Really looking forward to getting the direclidine data next year and going from there.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

The only thing I would add to that is that these are all orthosteric agonists that don't require any add-back to block side effects. They are selective on M1 and M4; they're unique in that regard and put us in a really unique space in the muscarinic category.

Rudy Li
Rudy Li
Analyst at Wolfe Research

Very helpful. Thank you.

Operator

We'll take our next question from Sumant Kulkarni with Canaccord. Your line is open.

Sumant Kulkarni
Sumant Kulkarni
Analyst at Canaccord

Good afternoon. Thanks for taking our question. This is a bit of a strategic one that has long-term financial implications. With each commercial product you now have, there's typically been an aspect of pioneering commercialization with the first approvals for the respective indications. Your pipeline includes candidates in large markets where not only do several products exist, but the competitors are typically much larger organizations as well. Could you share any targets for what a steady-state, longer-term operating margin target might look like for Neurocrine as you yourself grow a lot larger?

Matt Abernethy
Matt Abernethy
CFO at Neurocrine Biosciences

I'll let Kyle talk about the strategic aspect of how we're going to compete against larger guys in these markets. I also would comment that Eric and the team have done a heck of a job in developing markets and feel like we can compete quite well with medicines like the muscarinics and also the osavampator. We're not going to give long-term operating margin guidance, but you can see we're becoming quite a profitable company, where our operating income on a non-GAAP basis is over 30%. I think our focus right now is to invest in SG&A to grow sales as much as possible, also to advance the pipeline and be able to get to these opportunities where we can compete in some of the larger markets where we believe that we can win.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

Maybe just to add to that, this is Kyle. From the strategic perspective, what we're doing is setting up the pipeline to have a portfolio of not only first- but best-in-class medicines across neurology, psychiatry, and endocrinology, as well as immunology. These are areas that we think we can compete in in a number of ways, either through the molecules that we design or ultimately in ownership of particular mechanisms that are unique to Neurocrine. We've talked about obesity on this call as an example; we're leading in this category, we believe, with a CRF2 agonist, which is quite novel. Of course, we know a lot about the biology, this being the founding biology of the company. Ultimately, what we do by using this approach is diversifying risk across different therapeutic areas.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

We appreciate all the psychiatry programs that we have, and we believe we have all the winners there. We also know that the full profile of those assets is not fully known until the other side of phase III. We balance that by actually being in some of these larger disease states, like obesity, where we have biomarkers, objective endpoints, and the ability to see data in phase I-B studies. Overall, I think what we have done is we have really leveled out the portfolio and ability to play for some big wins on some larger opportunities, as well as stay within our wheelhouse of more traditional neuropsych programs as well, that you are used to seeing. Overall, it is going to set the company quite well up over the long term.

Operator

We will take our next question from Danielle Brill with Truist. Your line is open.

Danielle Brill
Danielle Brill
Analyst at Truist

Hi, guys. Good afternoon. Thanks so much for the question. A follow-up on CRENESSITY. You guys highlighted really strong growth in your prescriber base, but can you comment on trends in repeat prescribing? I think you noted roughly two-thirds of prescribers have only written a single prescription on your prior call. Are you seeing existing prescribers begin to treat more patients, or is growth still being driven primarily by adding new prescribers? And then, as you look forward, where do you see the bigger opportunity expanding prescriber breadth or penetration from the existing base? Thank you.

Eric Benevich
Eric Benevich
Chief Commercial Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

I guess the way that I would characterize that is a little bit of both in terms of depth versus breadth. We still are adding a substantial number of new prescribers each quarter. And to date, most of the prescribers that have tried CRENESSITY have only treated one or two patients. Now, this is a market that is an inch deep and a mile wide in the sense that there is a limited number of practices that have more than a handful of classic CAH patients. And then there are a lot of CAH patients that are out there in the community, and a lot of the physicians that treat them might only have one patient. I think that we will continue to see this dynamic of a lot of physicians having only one or two patients under treatment.

Eric Benevich
Eric Benevich
Chief Commercial Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

At this stage of the launch, only about a year and a half into it, essentially, we're still seeing a lot of adoption by new prescribers, and we think there's a ways to go in terms of building that prescriber base over time.

Operator

We'll move next to Yigal Nochomovitz with Citi. Your line is open.

Yigal Nochomovitz
Yigal Nochomovitz
Analyst at Citi

Hi. Great, thank you for taking the questions, and matt, congrats on a strong quarter. I had a curious question on CRENESSITY regarding the rarer subtypes, specifically the 11-beta-hydroxylase patients. What's the status in terms of progress getting the payers to cover that subtype? I'd be curious there. Quickly on VYKAT, do you have any comments with respect to ex-U.S. strategy, and where does that fit in terms of your relative prioritization with regard to the asset? Thank you.

Eric Benevich
Eric Benevich
Chief Commercial Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

Hi, I just want to reinforce that the coverage and reimbursement for CRENESSITY has been excellent and has really exceeded our expectations from the very beginning of the launch. From a coverage perspective, typically what's required, this is a specialty medicine, and the physician has to fill out a prior authorization.

Eric Benevich
Eric Benevich
Chief Commercial Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

Typically, they're required to attest that the patient has classic CAH, usually not defining what particular genetic subtype they have, that they're four years of age or older, and that they're currently on glucocorticoids. For the vast majority of patients, those are the coverage criteria. We've seen really high claim approval rates. We've seen that claims tend to get approved pretty quickly and that it's very affordable for patients, with the majority of patients, actually over 90%, paying $10 or less per month. Really good on the reimbursement side.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

Yeah, in terms of VYKAT XR in ex-U.S., our first priority right now is to fully integrate the team and make sure that we're doing everything that we can to help the patients here in the U.S. with the approval. As you may recall, Soleno did withdraw the EMA filing for review during the closing process of the transaction. I think once we get our hands around the integration and complete that and move the medicine forward here, we'll go back and revisit the opportunity in territories outside the U.S. In the meantime, for Europe, all patients that are currently on VYKAT XR will continue on their treatment, and we'll look at some named patient program types of vehicles to help other patients that may want to have access in that region.

Yigal Nochomovitz
Yigal Nochomovitz
Analyst at Citi

Thank you.

Operator

We'll move next to Delma Caiati with Guggenheim. Your line is open.

Delma Caiati
Delma Caiati
Analyst at Guggenheim

Hi, good afternoon, and thank you for taking my question. On Friedreich's ataxia program, what shall we expect from the 2027 phase I readout? More in detail. Which tissue compartments will you report for ataxia in protein levels from buccal cells, skin, or muscle? What would you view as proof of a mechanism? Will you also report clinical results together with the biomarker data? Thank you.

Sanjay Keswani
Sanjay Keswani
Chief Medical Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

No, I appreciate the question. We're excited about the Friedreich's ataxia gene therapy program here at Neurocrine. We'll be looking at starting clinical development later this year. Once we get that study up and running, we'll look for actual data in patients towards the end of next year. The nature of what we'll be sharing, I think, we'll determine over the next couple of months into the beginning of the year. Hopefully, we'll have some more commentary around our R&D day in December.

Operator

We'll move next to David Hoang with Deutsche Bank. Your line is open.

David Hoang
David Hoang
Analyst at Deutsche Bank

Hi there. Congrats on the quarter, thanks for taking my question. Was curious to get any feedback that you guys may have or your latest thoughts on the competitive dynamic and threat from your competitor in the VMAT inhibitor space. I think your competitor also printed a very strong quarter. They have talked about $3 billion in peak sales and a continued uptake of the AUSTEDO XR product. As you look over the next few years, recognizing there's some pricing dynamics there, just what's your, I guess, thoughts on how the market share may play out between two products and if the pie will continue to keep growing in PD or there'll be any share shifts between products. Thanks a lot.

Eric Benevich
Eric Benevich
Chief Commercial Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

Yeah, I'll just start off by saying that almost 10 years into the launch of INGREZZA, the TD market continues to grow very rapidly. We see that there's still a substantial number of untreated patients and even undiagnosed patients out there. Our focus remains on driving awareness, driving diagnosis, and then, obviously, being able to educate providers on the unique benefits of INGREZZA. Obviously also continuing to provide strong reimbursement support. The results speak for themselves. INGREZZA has been the most preferred and the most prescribed VMAT2 inhibitor since day one and continues to do so. Even looking at the most current quarter, with strong market growth for VMAT2s, INGREZZA outgrew the market. We can expect to continue to see that momentum carry forward through the balance of this year.

Eric Benevich
Eric Benevich
Chief Commercial Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

As Kyle said earlier, from a coverage and reimbursement perspective, we expect to have good coverage in 2027 and 2028 that will enable continued strong growth in terms of adoption. Overall, just very pleased with our performance, and we'll let the results speak for themselves.

Operator

We'll take our next question from Evan Seigerman with BMO Capital Markets. Your line is open.

Evan Seigerman
Evan Seigerman
Analyst at BMO Capital Markets

Hi, guys. Thank you so much for taking my question. I want to touch on osavampator. MDD is clearly a large market. You're very enthusiastic about it. Just walk us through kind of what you're solving for that the existing antidepressant strategies really don't do well. What do you need to show in a phase III for this truly to be viewed as differentiated rather than incremental? Thank you.

Sanjay Keswani
Sanjay Keswani
Chief Medical Officer at Neurocrine Biosciences

Thanks for the question. Just for context, osavampator is an AMPA potentiator. We think it provides unique advantages from a differentiation point of view from the existing standard of care. With respect to efficacy, we're expecting greater efficacy, particularly in individuals who have already been unresponsive or not so responsive to a whole slew of other antidepressants with different methods of action. Secondly, and also just as importantly, a really nice safety tolerability profile. That was one of the most impressive things, actually, with respect to our phase II SAVITRI data, which was the safety tolerability, and the implication is long-term compliance with this medication.

Operator

That does conclude the question-and-answer portion of today's call. I'd now like to turn it back to Kyle Gano for any additional or closing remarks.

Kyle Gano
Kyle Gano
CEO at Neurocrine Biosciences

Thanks, everyone, for joining us today. We appreciate your time and thoughtful questions. We look forward to continuing the conversation with many of you, certainly at the investor conferences and meetings throughout the remainder of the year. Until then, thanks again for your support and interest, and have a great afternoon, and goodbye for now.

Operator

Thank you. This brings us to the end of today's meeting. We appreciate your time and participation. You may now disconnect

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