LUND, Sweden & SURESNES, France--(BUSINESS WIRE)--BioInvent International AB (OMXS: BINV) (Bioinvent) and Les Laboratoires Servier (Servier) have entered into an antibody collaboration on an oncology target involved in tumour cell metabolism provided by Servier. BioInvent will receive a licensing fee, research support and potential milestone payments of more than EUR 11m, as well as royalty on future sales of the product.
Under the terms of the agreement Servier will engage BioInvent to screen its proprietary n-CoDeR® library for antibodies specific to the undisclosed target. Servier will also have access to BioInvent's in-house pre-clinical capacities in selecting an antibody candidate for development.
Svein Mathisen, President and CEO of BioInvent, said: “We believe Servier is an excellent partner for this research project in antibody discovery and research. Oncology is a prioritized area for BioInvent as for Servier and we look forward to joining our knowledge to theirs in this area.”
“The Bioinvent n-CoDeR® library will be used in combination with a functional assay set up at Servier to select antibody candidates. This is expected to enable us to develop one of the first monoclonal antibodies targeting tumour cell metabolism, an approach anticipated to have major therapeutic potential”, said Stéphane Depil, MD, PhD, in charge of Oncology R&D at Servier.
Emmanuel Canet, MD, PhD, President of Servier R&D, said : “ With this new collaboration Servier will reinforce its capacity of using biologics to address very innovative targets for treating cancer and we are looking forward to benefiting from Bioinvent’s experience in the field. “
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To the editors:
About n-CoDeR®
The n-CoDeR® library contains more than 20 billion (2 x 10¹º) highly diverse, fully human antibody fragments that have been created using BioInvent's patented technology platform, generating antibodies with high affinity and selectivity. Owing to the strict use of in vivo proof-read CDR sequences without insertion of synthetic genetic building blocks it is expected that n-CoDeR antibodies will show an improved immunogenicity profile.
About BioInvent
BioInvent International AB, listed on the NASDAQ OMX Stockholm (BINV), is a research-based pharmaceutical company that focuses on developing antibody drugs. The Company currently has four clinical development projects within the areas of thrombosis, cancer and atherosclerosis. The Company has signed various strategic alliances to strengthen the product pipeline and increase the likelihood of success. These partners include Genentech, Human Genome Sciences, Roche and ThromboGenics.
The company’s competitive position is underpinned by an in substance patented antibody development platform. The scope and strength of this platform is also utilised by partners, such as Bayer HealthCare, Daiichi Sankyo, Mitsubishi Tanabe, UCB and XOMA. More information is available at www.bioinvent.com.
About Servier
Servier is the leading independent French pharmaceutical company with a 2011 turnover of €3.9 billion. The Servier Group is established in 140 countries with its main therapeutic products used to treat diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, CNS disorders, oncology and rheumatological diseases. More than 25% of Servier's revenue is invested in Research & Development. Servier has 20,000 employees worldwide, including nearly 3,000 in R&D. For further information, please visit www.servier.com.
Legal disclaimer
The press release contains statements about the future, consisting of subjective assumptions and forecasts for future scenarios. Predictions for the future only apply as the date they are made and are, by their very nature, in the same was as research and development work in the biotech segment, associated with risk and uncertainty. With this in mind, the actual outcome may deviate significantly from the scenarios described in this press release.
Information disclosed in this press release is provided herein pursuant to the Swedish Securities Markets Act and/or the Swedish Financial Instruments Trading Act. The information was submitted for publication at 8.45 a.m. CET, on 4 January, 2012.