Head to Head Review: Athersys (NASDAQ:ATHX) vs. Turn Therapeutics (NASDAQ:TTRX)

Turn Therapeutics (NASDAQ:TTRX) and Athersys (NASDAQ:ATHX) are both small-cap manufacturing companies, but which is the better stock? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their valuation, analyst recommendations, profitability, dividends, institutional ownership, risk and earnings.

Analyst Ratings

This is a summary of current ratings and recommmendations for Turn Therapeutics and Athersys, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Turn Therapeutics	1	0	1	0	2.00
Athersys	0	0	0	0	0.00

Turn Therapeutics presently has a consensus target price of $8.00, suggesting a potential upside of 138.81%. Given Turn Therapeutics’ stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, equities research analysts plainly believe Turn Therapeutics is more favorable than Athersys.

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares Turn Therapeutics and Athersys”s revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Turn Therapeutics	N/A	N/A	N/A	($0.07)	-47.86
Athersys	$146,000.00	0.00	-$72.53 million	($2.03)	N/A

Turn Therapeutics has higher earnings, but lower revenue than Athersys. Turn Therapeutics is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Athersys, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

19.4% of Athersys shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.0% of Athersys shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Profitability

This table compares Turn Therapeutics and Athersys’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Turn Therapeutics	N/A	N/A	N/A
Athersys	N/A	N/A	-223.03%

Summary

Turn Therapeutics beats Athersys on 5 of the 9 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Turn Therapeutics

We are a pharmaceutical and medical device development company built around a proprietary platform technology designed to enhance drug performance. Our patented mixing process — commercially referred to as PermaFusion™ (“PermaFusion”) — enables stable suspension of polar, water-soluble active pharmaceutical ingredients (“APIs”) in oil-based carriers without the use of emulsifiers. This innovation reduces the quantity of required API inclusion by improving its bioavailability. Reduced API load reduces the likelihood of adverse events. Our proprietary platform has been validated across multiple FDA-cleared medical devices. Our primary development programs focus on dermatological diseases, including moderate to severe eczema and onychomycosis. Our company’s origin is rooted in the personal journey of our founder, who developed a topical ointment to heal his own chronic, treatment-resistant wounds using the PermaFusion platform he developed. His initial formulation, now known as Hexagen (“Hexagen”) suspends certain antimicrobial/anti-inflammatory compounds in petrolatum without known cytotoxicity, irritation or sensitization. This formula has received three FDA clearances and has been utilized extensively in humans, which we believe demonstrates both technical proof of concept and meaningful therapeutic effects. The formula also has been demonstrated to provide anti-inflammatory immunological signaling (IL 36, IL 31, IL 4 inhibition), in-vivo nail penetration with fungal pathogen elimination, and other potential therapeutic benefits. These products are not presently on the market, and we are not currently generating revenue from these devices, as we focus on drug development of our core technology. In addition to our dermatology and wound programs, we are exploring broader applications of our PermaFusion technology. In partnership with a leading global nonprofit organization, we are attempting to develop intranasal vaccines with sufficient thermostability to withstand distribution without deep-freeze. Our goal is to eliminate the need for frozen storage and, thus, enable deployment and delivery to low-resource settings that do not maintain suitable cold storage infrastructure required for administration of modern-day vaccines. Furthermore, if we are successful in this initial program, we believe there may be opportunities to develop additional vaccines in thermostable, intranasal form. By reducing cold-storage infrastructure requirements and therefore enabling standard shipping of such vaccines, we believe intranasal vaccines have the potential to enhance patient uptake by enabling immunization in a broader variety of settings including in clinic, hospital and home-health settings. We believe this initiative highlights our platform’s versatility and its potential to unlock new therapeutic categories beyond dermatology. We have also completed preclinical, in-vivo xenograft studies for herpes zoster ophthalmicus (shingles of the eye) and basal cell carcinoma. A mildly reformulated version of the Hexagen formula was employed for the ocular study and compared this reformulation with placebo as a topical ocular agent intended to reduce viral load of herpes zoster in an animal model. Results obtained showed an 85% reduction in viral load compared to placebo without adverse events. For the basal cell carcinoma xenograft study, the Hexagen formula was compared to both placebo and 5-Fluorouracil (standard of care topical chemotherapy) as a topical treatment intended to reduce basal cell tumor size. The Hexagen formula showed an approximate 29% comparative reduction in tumor size to the placebo and an approximate 20% comparative reduction in tumor size compared to 5-Fluorouracil. We believe these preclinical in-vivo studies suggest meaningful potential in these indications, which we may continue to explore at the conclusion of our lead drug programs. We believe such exploratory results further underscore the potential breadth of opportunity enabled by our platform. We were initially formed on January 6, 2015, as Global Health Solutions, LLC, a Delaware limited liability company. On October 12, 2018, Global Health Solutions, LLC converted to a Delaware corporation under the name Global Health Solutions, Inc., dba Turn Therapeutics. Immediately prior to the effectiveness of the registration statement of which this prospectus forms a part, we intend to change our name to Turn Therapeutics Inc. Our principal executive offices are located in Westlake Village, CA.

About Athersys

Athersys, Inc., a biotechnology company, focuses on the research and development activities in the field of regenerative medicine. Its clinical development programs are focused on treating neurological conditions, cardiovascular diseases, inflammatory and immune disorders, and pulmonary and other conditions. The company's lead platform product includes MultiStem cell therapy, an allogeneic stem cell product for the treatment of patients suffering from neurological damage from an ischemic stroke, as well as for acute respiratory distress syndrome, trauma complications, HSC transplant support, and other indications. It also develops MultiStem cell therapy to promote tissue repair and healing for animal patients. The company has license and collaboration agreements with Healios K.K. to develop and commercialize MultiStem cell therapy for ischemic stroke, acute respiratory distress syndrome, and ophthalmological indications, as well as for the treatment of liver, kidney, pancreas, and intestinal tissue diseases; and the University of Minnesota to develop MultiStem cell therapy platform. The company was founded in 1995 and is headquartered in Cleveland, Ohio.