Ovid's $161.4m Cash Pile Stretches to 2029, Past Key Epilepsy Readout

Ovid Therapeutics ended September with $161.4 million in cash, and the company says that is enough to run the business into 2029. In its third-quarter update on 10 November, the US biotech tied that runway to a pipeline built around two epilepsy-focused assets, OV329 and OV4071.

The main value-defining event is the Phase 2 trial of OV329 in treatment-resistant focal epilepsy, which Ovid expects to report in the second half of 2027. The stated runway extends beyond that date, so the company would not need to raise money before the data arrive, on its own projections.

Sooner, in the first quarter of 2027, come two smaller readouts. One is topline data from a separate photosensitivity study of OV329. The other is topline data from the Phase 1 trial of OV4071, an oral KCC2 activator. Ovid said no serious adverse events have been reported in the OV4071 study so far; that is an early safety observation, with full data to follow alongside the topline results.

Ovid also intends to start a study of a paediatric formulation of OV329 in seizures linked to tuberous sclerosis complex before the end of 2026. That timing depends on regulatory clearances, and the company has not reported that they have been received, so the start date remains unconfirmed.