Christopher U. Missling, MS, PhD, MBA, President and CEO of Anavex Life Sciences Corp. Dr. Missling, President and CEO of Anavex, has over 20 years of healthcare industry experience within large pharmaceutical companies,

Christopher U. Missling, MS, PhD, MBA,

President and CEO of Anavex Life Sciences Corp.

Dr. Missling, President and CEO of Anavex,

has over 20 years of healthcare industry experience within large pharmaceutical companies, the biotech industry and investment

banking. Prior to joining Anavex, he served as the Chief Financial Officer of Curis and ImmunoGen. In addition, at Aventis (now

Sanofi), Dr. Missling served as head of financial planning on all aspects of financial strategy and M&A. His career experience

also includes working as an investment banker in the healthcare practice at Deutsche Bank, serving pharmaceutical, biotech, and

diagnostic companies, as well as serving as the head of healthcare investment banking at Brimberg & Co. in New York. Dr. Missling

has an MS and PhD from the University of Munich in Chemistry and an MBA from Northwestern University Kellogg School of Management.

TWST: Can you tell us what Avanex is?

Dr. Missling: Anavex is a precision

medicine company specializing in the development of small molecule technologies for the treatment of neurodevelopmental and neurodegenerative

diseases. Neurodegeneration is the largest unmet medical need and includes Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease. Neurodevelopmental

indications, which are caused by genetic dysfunction, include autism, autism spectrum disorder, Fragile X, Rett syndrome and epilepsy.

TWST: Before we go on to other things,

can you tell about the SIGMACEPTOR Discovery Platform is? Also, is this something that you are just using internally in the company

or is it something that you outlicense or seek to outlicense?

Dr. Missling: SIGMACEPTOR is a high-throughput

screening for discovering small molecule drugs with different affinity for targeting the sigma-1 receptor, and yes, it indeed can

be outlicensed. SIGMACEPTOR is the core of the company because this is the basis for discovering compounds that target the sigma-1

receptor, among other important targets, which are relevant and involved in restoring cellular functions and homeostasis. This

might be critical to improving the lives of patients suffering from both neurodevelopmental and neurodegenerative indications.

TWST: When you call it a discovery platform,

can you provide a little more insight into what the platform consists of? Is it a screening system or a particular process?

Dr. Missling: We focus on small

molecules, which are orally available, versus biologics, which typically must be injected. If you can give a patient a pill or

oral formulation to take, then that is easier to administer compared to an injection for which you will need a physician or a nurse.

Also, some people just don't like or tolerate injections. But the focus indeed is on small molecules.

TWST: What drug candidates are the farthest

along in the pipeline? Where are they and when could they potentially be commercialized?

Dr. Missling: The most of advanced

compound in our pipeline is ANAVEX 2-73, which is now in a Phase 2a clinical trial in 32 mild-to-moderate Alzheimer's patients.

The next most advanced compounds are ANAVEX 3-71 and ANAVEX 1-41, which are both at the pre-IND stage. The next stage of clinical

trials is in preparation for ANAVEX 2-73: a larger Phase 2/3 study as well as another Phase 2 in an orphan indication, and it could

TWST: Is this for Alzheimer's?

Dr. Missling: We will conduct the

Phase 2/3 for Alzheimer's.

TWST: Tell us, if you could, a little

bit of a science behind the Alzheimer's candidate, as it seems there is new information on ways to intervene in this disease

process. Could you tell us how it works?

Dr. Missling: The underlying pathology

of Alzheimer's is not fully understood. The most studied hypothesis is the over-expression of beta amyloid. However, the

disease is likely more complex, there are also other pathological manifestations like tau overexpression, but also inflammation,

mitochondrial dysfunction and calcium imbalance in parallel. Irrespective of that, we are focusing on restoring cellular homeostasis,

by activating the sigma-1 receptor, a protein that we all have in our body that is not utilized unless cells are not functioning

well or out of balance, i.e. out of homeostasis. If and when cells are impaired, the sigma-1 receptor activation might help those

cells to regain functionality through restoring homeostasis. We believe Alzheimer's is a chronic neurodegenerative disease

directly correlating with age, and it is similar in that way to Parkinson's and other chronic dementia diseases. On the other

hand when you have a genetic predisposition where the cells are constantly stressed or proteins are misfolded, or out of homeostasis,

the body's own repair system is probably over-challenged, overburdened, but with small molecules, you can increase the expression

of the sigma-1 receptor, potentially restoring homeostasis and potentially reducing those dysfunctions. The difference would be

the positive features mentioned before; we are seeing a reduction in amyloid beta but also in tau and inflammation. Calcium balance

is restored and oxidative stress and mitochondrial dysfunction are improved. So our approach is not one hypothesis-dependent approach.

It is utilizing a more comprehensive approach. It is more macro-management of disease rather than a micro-management approach to

the disease stage. So, we are basically in sync with any hypothesis because the sigma-1 receptor is reacting independently to whatever

form of dysfunction is caused by the disease. Possibly, an analogy is immuno-stimulation in oncology, where you similarly harness

the body's own existing armoire of defense by activating the body's own immune system to help to fight the disease,

and we are essentially utilizing a similar approach by activating the sigma-1 receptor, which restores cellular homeostasis.

TWST: Is ANAVEX 2-73 potentially a drug

that somebody could take and an early stage when they are pre-symptomatic in order to arrest the disease? I know many of these

medications ideally should be taken pre-symptomatically if and when we can get the appropriate diagnostic tools.

TWST: But can you elaborate on the stage

that this could be taken?

Dr. Missling: We presented preclinical

data that ANAVEX 2-73 could halt the disease and it could improve cognitive function. It was also published that ANAVEX 2-73 might

be able to prevent the symptoms of Alzheimer's in a pre-clinical animal model. So the answer to the question is, it could

be both; it could be possibly utilized for either situations or time points.

TWST: Forgive me if I'm overstepping

my bounds here, but it almost sounds like something that, if it had a clean safety profile, you could even take as a prophylactic

or a vaccination because you just alluded to the fact that it improved cognitive function in people. Is this at all possible do

Dr. Missling: We would have to prove

that in clinical trials before claiming that.

TWST: Right, you're saying it's not

out of the question at this stage?

Dr. Missling: It is not out of the

question, but we cannot claim that at this point.

TWST: If all goes well, when might be

the earliest timeframe ANAVEX 2-73 could be on the market? I'm assuming, given the disease it's targeting, that the FDA would want

to expedite approval.

Dr. Missling: It's too early for

us to give a time point for that because we are really thinking step by step to establish safety first, and the current study is

running for 52 weeks. But today, it's really hard to tell because it depends on the data.

TWST: Do you have the financing you

need to get through the development of ANAVEX 2-73 at this current stage?

Dr. Missling: Yes, we believe that

sufficient financing in place and also because we are working with several foundations on specific diseases like the Michael J.

Fox Foundation that has supported us very strongly for exploring ANAVEX 2-73 in a pre-clinical study of Parkinson's disease,

for which positive data was recently reported on September 22nd. And we also received support from the Rettsyndrome.org foundation,

which also supported exploring ANAVEX 2-73 in a pre-clinical study in Rett syndrome, a rare disease for which Anavex received FDA

orphan designation this year. We might continue these collaborations if the data continues to be promising.

TWST: Do you have any other agreements

in place that you wanted to mention to the investor community? Also, are you seeking any agreements in order to move the company

forward? And, if so, can you elaborate on what you might be seeking at this time?

Dr. Missling: We announced on September

28th that Biogen has signed a material transfer agreement with Anavex to explore ANAVEX 2-73 for a completely different indication,

multiple sclerosis, which is the main focus of Biogen's portfolio. We obviously are excited to work with Biogen to explore

the potential of ANAVEX 2-73 in multiple sclerosis. On October 5th, we announced a collaboration with Ariana Pharma

under which we'll use Ariana's proprietary KEM (Knowledge, Extraction, Management) patient stratification technology

to potentially accelerate ANAVEX 2-73's Phase 2/3 Alzheimer's clinical development timelines. KEM is

a comprehensive and FDA-tested clinical data analysis system that enables full exploitation of complex datasets of smaller numbers