|
|
|
Glaxo Wellcome Welcomes Curagen
|
Business New Haven
11/30/1998
By: BNH
|
New Haven biotech firm inks partnership with major pharmaceutical company
On November 20 the New Haven-based Curagen Corp. announced a new drug-discovery collaboration with the North Carolina-based Glaxo Wellcome Inc., U.S. subsidiary of the $114 billion UK-based international pharmaceutical giant Glaxo Wellcome PLC.
The collaboration will use Curagen's genomics-processing technology to study and select from among Glaxo's compounds for clinical development to identify which will have the highest likelihood of success in clinical trials.
According to Glaxo's Robert Bell, vice president of U.S. research: “Curagen's genomics-process technology will help the company identify gene responses associated with compound efficacy and toxicity. Curagen has engineered a unique and efficient process for enhancing understanding of drug action.”
Under terms of the five-year agreement, Curagen will receive $2.75 million annually plus additional, undisclosed milestone and royalty payments for drugs emerging from the collaboration.
Curagen currently has collaborations with two “biopharmaceutical giants”: the $9 billion (market value) Genentech. and $6 billion Biogen, as well as an agricultural-based collaboration with Pioneer Hi-brid. All are investors in Curagen, as well. In July Curagen signed a new collaboration with a DuPont subsidiary to help develop “crop-protection” products.
However, the collaboration with Glaxo is Curagen's first with a major pharmaceutical company.
Said Curagen Executive Vice President Gregory Went: “This development agreement with Glaxo Wellcome, in addition to our existing discovery collaborations, underscores the breadth of opportunity we can realize from our integrated genomics technologies, enabling us to provide value to our partners throughout the drug discovery and development process.
Added Went: “This partnership also supports our business strategy of initiating collaborations with premier pharmaceutical and life-sciences companies to gain economies of scale and generate near-term capital for our internal product development activities.”
Added Curagen President Jonathan Rothberg: “This is the first time genomics technologies will evaluate drug activity in animals during pre-clinicals, specifically to guide the selection of appropriate drug candidates for human trials.''
Earlier the same week Curagen announced that through its proprietary “SeqCalling” process it had discovered greater than 60,000 human genetic variations that may be responsible for the development of certain diseases.
These single nucleotide polymorphisms (cSNPs) are DNA variations that have accumulated over time in the general population.
Said Richard Lifton, M.D., Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator and a professor at the Yale University School of Medicine: “SNPs are the most frequent type of genetic variation found in the human genome. Currently, there are approximately 5,000 publicly known SNPs, and these were derived from random genomic DNA. Therefore, by identifying vast numbers of cSNPs, Curagen is well-positioned for discovering key variations associated with specific human diseases and drug responses.''
Biotech investors seemed to agree with Lifton and were impressed by the new collaboration. Curagen's shares traded up to $8.5 preceding the announcements before settling at $7.33 on November 20. Curagen went public on March 18 at $11.50 per share, raising more than $44 million for the company.
Investor enthusiasm drove the stock up to $13.50 per share, but many abandoned the stock during the summer's market swoon. Curagen stock reached a low of $4.33 on September 1, the same day the Soros Fund (owned by famed investor George Soros, one of the company's largest investors) sold 30,000 shares. Soros by no means abandoned its investment: The fund still owns 1,776,480 shares of Curagen stock.
|
Go FirstGo PreviousGo
NextGo LastGo
to Index
|
|
