Entomed and NAEJA Pharmaceutical Enter Two-Way Agreement to Indentify New Leads in Infectious Diseases and Cancer
Strasbourg, France - ENTOMED SA, which discovers and develops novel medicines derived from insects' chemical diversity, and NAEJA Pharmaceutical Inc. (Edmonton,Canada), announced today that they have entered into a screening agreement.
According to this two-way agreement, NAEJA will have access to the EntomothequeTM for the screening of ß-lactamases inhibitors: ß-lactamases are enzymes responsible for bacterial resistance to common antibiotics such as penicillins and cephalosporins. The EntomothequeTM is a unique library of insect derived molecules and analogues developed by ENTOMED. This agreement also allows ENTOMED to investigate NAEJA's proprietary compounds library for anti-proliferative activities.
The deal aims to bring new lead compounds into both partners' products pipelines in two therapeutic areas of great medical needs: infectious diseases and cancer.
Under the terms of the agreement, both companies will share the intellectual property arising from the discoveries made. In addition, they will both have an option to progress the development of compounds with interesting biological activity in their respective fields of interest.
"NAEJA is pleased to be collaborating with ENTOMED, a company with proven abilities in discovering novel antibacterial compounds," said Dr. Ronald G. Micetich, CEO of NAEJA.
Dr Jean Combalbert, CEO of ENTOMED commented about today's agreement: "This collaboration with NAEJA is important for ENTOMED in two ways: it allows us to capture more value in the anti-microbial area from our EntomothequeTM, while at the same time it will give us access to further new leads to feed our anti-cancer drug discovery programme. Given the attractive "win-win" structure of this deal we expect to sign a number of similar deals in the near future targeted at other important therapeutic areas."
For further information please contact:
Entomed SA
Jean Combalbert, CEO
Tel: +33 (0)3 90 40 58 00
Media Relations
David Dible, Valérie Auffray,
HCC De Facto Group
Tel: +44 (0)207 496 33 00
NAEJA Pharmaceutical inc
Dr. Sameeh M. Salama
Sr. Director, Business Development
#2 4290-91A Street
Edmonton, Alberta, Canada T6E 5V2
Tel: +1-780-462-4044
Fax: +1-780-461-0196
About Entomed
ENTOMED was founded in January 1999. ENTOMED Strasbourg-based (France) company, is the world leader in the discovery and development of novel medicines derived from the biology and chemical diversity of insects. The Company's core technologies are built on the understanding and exploitation of the battery of molecules synthesized by the powerful defence and cellular control systems of insects. These molecules comprise both peptides and small molecules.
ENTOMED employs 45 scientific staff and the Company's strategy is to apply its core technologies and expertise to the molecular diversity of insect biology to discover and develop novel molecules as human therapeutic agents for a wide range of diseases with high medical needs including infectious diseases, cancer, ion channel effects and immunomodulation.
About naeja
NAEJA Pharmaceutical inc., a rapidly growing private Canadian company, was created from the acquisition od DrisCorp Inc. and assets from SynPhar Laboratories inc.
SynPhar's staff was resposible for the discovery of two drugs, Tazobactum® and Mofezolac®. Tazobactum is a ß-lactamase inhibitor marketed worldwide in combination with Piperacillin as Zosyn® by Weyth. Mofezolac® is a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory agent particularly useful for arthritis, and marketed in Japan by Welfide Corp. as Disopian®. Driscorp Inc.was contract research company performing pre-clinical lead optimization medicinal chemistry primarily for the major pharmaceutical company Warner Lambert.
NAEJA employs over 90 scientific staff and specializes in the areas of infectious diseases, cancer and inflammation. In addition to the above internal research, NAEJA utilizes its expertise in carrying out specialized pre-clinical contract research up to the IND stage.
