Burcon Announces Year-End Results, Reviews Operations - Page 3

GlobeNewswire

Monday, June 25th 2012

General and administrative expenses decreased by about $993,000 over the prior year. Included in salaries and benefits is stock-based compensation expense of approximately $1,597,000 (2011 –$2,941,000). Options granted to directors this year were vested immediately and a related fair value of about $995,000 was recorded as stock-based compensation expense. Similarly, options granted to directors last year also vested immediately and a related fair value of about $538,000 was recorded as stock-based compensation. This increase was offset by a decrease in stock-based compensation expense of about $1.6 million for options granted in December 2009 that had completed vesting during this year.

The cash portion of salaries and benefits increased by about $529,000 over the prior year due to the full-year effect of two of the Company's officers that transferred their employment from a related party to Burcon in late fiscal 2011, the hiring of a director of corporate development and a business development analyst also late last year, and a salary increase, including a retroactive salary adjustment, for a senior officer. Directors' fees also increased by about $38,000 due to additional board and committee meetings held during this year. As a result of the transfer of employment of the two officers from the related party to Burcon, management fees charged by the related party decreased this year by $127,000 from the prior year.

Patent legal fees and expenses account for a significant portion of Burcon's professional fees. Burcon's patent strategy is to aggressively seek protection for new technologies as well as further protecting current technologies. During the year, Burcon capitalized about $651,000 (2011 - $2,000) of patent costs to deferred development costs. Total patent legal fees and expenditures (before capitalization) increased by about $674,000 over the prior year. As noted above, Burcon filed five new patents (2011 – six) during the year, and nine patent applications (2011 – five) entered national phase, which generated significant filing fees in various countries. Most of the patent applications that entered national phase in the prior year occurred during the last quarter, and the related expenditures continued into the early part of the current year. From inception, Burcon has expended approximately $7.5 million on patent legal fees and disbursements to strengthen its patent portfolio in various countries of the world and file patent applications for new inventions.

Burcon incurred about $230,000 in legal and audit expenses related to our NASDAQ listing. As well, audit fees increased by about $50,000 as a result of the NASDAQ listing. This was offset by legal fees of about $47,000 in the prior year relating to the ADM CLARISOY agreement.

The decrease in consulting fees is due primarily to the financial advisory fee of about $510,000 paid last year for the negotiation and finalization of the CLARISOY^™ agreement.

Included in investor relations expenses is approximately $7,000 (2011 - $67,000) of stock-based compensation expense. The cash portion of investor relations expenses increased by approximately $14,000. TSX and NASDSAQ fees accounted for about $39,000 of the increase, which was offset by a decrease in public relations fees of about $31,000. Travel expenses also increased by about $28,000, offset by a decrease in a newly-designed website last year of about $32,000.

At March 31, 2012, the Company's cash and short-term investment totaled approximately $6,159,000, as compared to approximately $11,932,000 at March 31, 2011. Management believes it has sufficient resources to fund its expected level of operations and working capital requirements to at least May 2013, excluding proceeds from outstanding convertible securities and royalty revenues that may be derived from the semi-works commercial facility. Burcon intends to raise additional capital to fund its operations and business objectives through an equity offering within the next twelve months.

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