A closely-held UK company with an early-stage oncology programme has reached agreement to be acquired by Roche for up to $175 million. The deal, which was announced on 15 April 2008, includes an upfront cash payment of $160 million plus a milestone payment of $15 million which is due upon the start of Phase 2 trials of its oncology programme.
The privately-held Danish company, NsGene A/S, said that it has successfully implanted a biodelivery device that secretes nerve growth factor into the brain.
A closely-held German company with financial support from the Max Planck Society is looking at a new formulation for a therapy based on raft technology, following the product’s achievement of clinical proof of concept in February 2008.
Evotec AG, the German developer of treatments for nervous disorders, is forecasting a revenue increase of 3 to 9 percent in 2008 before any income from out-licensing.
In 2007, Silence Therapeutics Plc chose its present name and recruited a new chief executive officer and a vice president for intellectual property in order to sharpen its focus on RNAi-based therapeutics. These are compounds made up of double-stranded fragments of RNA that can silence genes that lead to disease
The German drug developer, 4SC AG, said it has advanced negotiations with a number of pharmaceutical companies about licensing out its lead product for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis, SC12267.
Newron Pharmaceuticals S.p.A. expects to increase spending on research and development in 2008 as its two lead products, safinamide and ralfinamide, progress through the clinic, and it absorbs the pipeline of Hunter-Fleming, its recent UK acquisition.
GPC Biotech AG has confirmed that its cash reserves are sufficient to cover about three years of business operations following a regulatory setback in 2007 that affected its lead cancer product, satraplatin. On 31 December 2007, cash and cash equivalents amounted to €65.2 million, which is enough to cover development of the company’s most promising oncology programmes, GPC said in a statement on 27 March 2008.
Pharming Group NV said it will apply to market its human protein, Rhucin, in Turkey as part of a broader strategy to tap markets outside the European Union following the European Medicine Agency’s refusal to overturn a negative opinion on its marketing authorisation application for the product.
Silence Therapeutics Plc has concluded a second collaboration with AstraZeneca in the field of RNA interference, a relatively new technology which is being investigated for the treatment of a number of major diseases.