ALK-Abelló and Torii Pharmaceutical enter agreement
The two companies recently announced that they have entered into an exclusive license agreement to develop and commercialize ALK’s house dust mite allergy immunotherapy products for asthma and allergic rhinitis in Japan.
Under the agreement ALK will receive an upfront payment of EUR 30 million and up to EUR 30 million in development and market registration milestone payments. ALK will also receive royalty payments and sales milestones on the net sales of the products. Torii will be incurring all the costs of clinical development, registration, marketing and sale of the products, while ALK will be responsible for production and supply of the products.
The agreement gives Torii exclusive license rights for the development, marketing and distribution of ALK's tablet-based immunotherapy product against house dust mite allergy - MITIZAX. The agreement also covers an injection-based immunotherapy product, Alutard, and diagnostic products against house dust mite allergy. The agreement also includes a research and development collaboration targeting a tablet-based immunotherapy product against Japanese cedar pollen allergy.
"The agreement with Torii is a quantum leap in our efforts to launch modern, effective allergy immunotherapy products globally. We consider Torii to be the best partner for ALK on the Japanese market, and we expect our collaboration to accelerate the introduction of MITIZAX® and other products onto one of the most important medical markets,” said Jens Bager, President and CEO of ALK.
Orion and Endo enter novel collaboration
Orion Corporation and Endo Pharmaceuticals enter into novel R&D collaboration. The collaboration concerns discovery, development and commercialization of assets in oncology. The partnership allows the companies to bring forward a total of eight discovery phase candidates by combining an equal number of programs. It also allows the companies to exclusively license the other’s development-ready programs at pre-determined stages and share all development costs.
“I am very pleased with the collaboration agreement with Endo. This will immediately extend the Oncology R&D pipelines of both companies. The agreement is also perfectly in line with Orion's R&D strategy to focus on risk-sharing partnerships. We look forward to developing new cancer therapies for the patients jointly with Endo,” said Reijo Salonen, Senior Vice President of Orion Corporation’s Research and Development.
Sentoclone sells technology and IP rights
The Swedish cancer therapy company Sentoclone has sold its technology and IP rights to the Chinese company Jiangsu Sinorda Biomedicin. The development for the Western market will still be performed in Sweden, but then as a complementary medicine.
The company recently went bankrupt partly due to significantly increased costs for their clinical trials, due to new legislations about transfusion therapies being classified as pharmaceuticals. However, in China these do not apply and transfusion therapies are classified as healthcare methods. Similar cancer therapy methods are already established in China and demands less studies for marketing and sales. It is also easier to find trial persons due to China’s much larger population.
Santaris Pharma in strategic alliance with Pfizer
The Danish clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company focusing on mRNA and microRNA targeted therapies has announced an expanded worldwide strategic alliance with Pfizer. The alliance is directed to development and commercialization of RNA-targeted medicines using Santaris Pharma’s Locked Nucleic Acid (LNA) drug platform.
Under the terms of the expanded agreement, Pfizer will make a payment of $14 million for access to Santaris Pharma A/S LNA technology for the development of RNA-targeted drugs. Santaris Pharma A/S is eligible to receive milestone payments of up to $600 million as well as royalties on sales of products that may be developed for up to 10 new RNA targets selected by Pfizer.
The newly expanded alliance builds on the original collaboration formed in January 2009 between Santaris Pharma A/S and Wyeth, which was acquired by Pfizer Inc.
"The expanded alliance with Pfizer is a result of our successful collaboration over the last two years and provides further evidence that our LNA Drug Platform is rapidly becoming the technology-of-choice for partners interested in developing RNA-targeted medicines,” said Søren Tulstrup, President and CEO of Santaris Pharma A/S. “The LNA Drug Platform is well positioned to deliver viable drug candidates today, and we are excited to expand our relationship with Pfizer to pursue our goal of making RNA-targeted drugs for important diseases a reality.”
RaySearch Laboratories forms US subsidiary
The Swedish medtech company RaySearch Laboratories has formed a US subsidiary named RaySearch Americas Inc. The new company will be located in New York and will market RaySearch's treatment planning system RayStation in the North American market.
This will include sales as well as service, clinical support and input into product development based on the North American experience. RaySearch Americas will also support the first clinical implementation of RayStation® in the US, which is currently taking place at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.
“There is a place for best-in-class solutions in radiation therapy departments. Given the right products that meet customer needs, combined with world class customer service and true clinical partnership, RaySearch Americas can fill a much needed role in our business,” said Johan Löf, CEO of RaySearch. "We started marketing RayStation from Sweden in 2010 when we received 510(k) clearance. As we now have the first reference customer up and running and see considerable interest from other clinics in North America, we feel the timing is right to set up our own US sales and service organization to fulfill our customers' needs in the best possible way. This is a logical step in our evolution but nevertheless a significant strategic milestone for RaySearch."
NeuroSearch announces re-structuring
The Danish biopharmaceutical company has announced a re-structuring of the organization to ensure full support to the strategy of becoming a profitable speciality pharma company focused on diseases of the central nervous system (CNS). The re-structuring is planned to include a staff reduction of approximately 20%. Combined with a number of other initiatives, this is expected to reduce the annual cost base of the NeuroSearch organization by approximately DKK 100 million, with full benefits being realized in 2012.
The lead asset to realize this strategic objective is Huntexil, an orphan product which holds promise as an important therapeutic advance for patients with Huntington's disease.
“The re-organization of NeuroSearch into two separate business units with individual business models will enable us to make better use of our resources in support of our corporate strategy. We remain fully committed to bringing Huntexil to the market as soon as possible to benefit patients with Huntington's disease. We look forward to the planned dialogue with regulators in the months to come and to defining the best path towards registration of the drug as the first product to be commercialised by NeuroSearch,” said Patrik Dahlen, CEO of NeuroSearch. ”I regret that as part of our effort to conserve cash we expect to reduce the number of our highly skilled and dedicated NeuroSearch employees, all of whom have played such an important role in the development of the company. We will now work together with our staff to provide those leaving with the best possible prospects for a future career outside NeuroSearch.”
Careers: Nordic life science careers enter a new era
Life science careers have entered a more demanding phase as the life sciences industry undergoes fundamental change to remain dynamic and competitive.
Read the article by Amy Brown, click here
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