Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2001. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
PRNewswire - November 6, 2001
"We are delighted to have signed this collaboration with NeoGenesis. We are hopeful that NeoGenesis' robust high throughput screening capabilities and massive parallel ligand library will identify novel small molecule drugs that will interact with our novel cellular based HIV targets to produce clinically effective compounds to treat this deadly viral disease," said Dr. Jack Barber, VP of Research and Development at Immusol.
Satish Jindal, Ph.D., President and Chief Scientific Officer of NeoGenesis, commented, "This is an exciting opportunity to discover and co-develop drug candidates to novel HIV targets. The compelling aspect of this collaboration is how well our small molecule discovery capabilities fit with Immusol's method of discovering novel targets. We are impressed with their HIV R&D efforts and believe that there is a synergy between our two technologies."
Under the terms of the agreement, Immusol will provide novel, biologically validated HIV cellular drug targets to which NeoGenesis will apply its drug discovery technologies. The companies agreed to share equally in the development and potential profits from future drug candidates that they discover from the novel targets. These joint efforts would be co-managed by both companies and any successful HIV compounds could be jointly commercialized or licensed to third parties.
"One unique feature of this genomics based drug development alliance is that the drug targets are cellular genes. Using Immusol's proprietary Inverse Genomics(TM) platform technology we have developed effective assays that target cellular genes that are essential for virus replication but are not critical to the normal function of the cell," said Dr. Flossie Wong-Staal, scientific founder of Immusol and one of the pioneers in HIV research. "Rather than attacking the viral genome which is subject to rapid mutation, we target selected cellular genes for inactivation. This approach aims to produce pharmaceuticals that avoid the emergence of drug resistant viruses that limit the effectiveness of current treatments. We are impressed with NeoGenesis' expertise in small molecule discovery and in their commitment to working together in an effort to develop treatments for AIDS," added Wong-Staal.
About NeoGenesis
NeoGenesis develops drug discovery technologies that enable pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies to rapidly identify high-quality drug leads for drug targets from the human genome. Central to NeoGenesis' drug discovery platform is the company's core technology -- the Automated Ligand Identification System (ALIS). ALIS is a scalable, generic system for rapidly screening disease-associated targets. Coupled with NeoGenesis' NeoMorph compound library -- consisting of more than 10 million diverse drug-like compounds -- ALIS identifies small-molecule ligands of high affinity and high selectivity against many protein classes, resulting in an accelerated drug discovery process. NeoGenesis also exploits their technology platform to perform chemical genomics to overcome the most critical and complex barrier in genomics drug discovery by facilitating an efficient and highly scalable method for discovery of new drug targets from the thousands of potential target proteins that genomics and proteomics technologies yield.
Founded in 1997 and headquartered in Cambridge, MA., NeoGenesis has quickly developed partnerships and collaborative research agreements with many of the world's leading biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies, including: Biogen, Celltech, Merck, Oxford GlycoSciences, Schering-Plough and Tularik.
About Immusol
Immusol is a San Diego based biopharmaceutical company whose mission is to discover and develop biologically relevant and in vivo validated therapeutic targets. Immusol uses a proprietary drug target discovery, Inverse Genomics(TM) platform to discover and functionally validate therapeutic target genes in the areas of cancer, viral infection, obesity/diabetes, neurodegenerative disease and allergy/inflammation. Immusol uses this Inverse Genomics(TM) platform for functional genomics both internally and in collaboration with pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies. Immusol is a pioneer in the field of discovering de novo drug targets that have proven biological cause and effect therapeutic activity within a disease system.
This is the fourth deal concluded by Immusol in the last 12 months. Immusol's other recent deals include collaborations with Medarex, Chugai Pharmaceuticals, and most recently a $150M Oncology Research and Development Alliance with Novartis AG.
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