ROCKVILLE, Md., June 1, 2009 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Nabi Biopharmaceuticals (Nasdaq:NABI) today announced that Biotest Pharmaceuticals Corporation has withdrawn and released a claim representing $50.4 million of the original $56 million indemnification claims made on March 31, 2009 against Nabi, and together with Nabi has instructed the escrow agent to release $4.5 million of the funds held in escrow to support indemnification claims. The withdrawn claim related to a contract assigned to Biotest when it purchased our biologics business unit in 2007.
The remaining indemnification claim made by Biotest in March relates to local permits for construction of our manufacturing facility in Boca Raton, which was transferred to Biotest as part of the biologics business sale. This claim, for which Biotest estimated its losses at approximately $5.7 million, remains outstanding. We believe that Biotest's estimated losses based on the permit-related claim are speculative and appear to be based on claimed delays that have yet to occur. We continue to deny any liability with respect to this claim and will vigorously contest and defend against this claim and seek release of the remaining $5.7 million of escrowed funds. Based on the information we have received to date from Biotest and after consultation with our outside legal counsel, we believe that Biotest's permit-related claim is unsubstantiated.
About Nabi Biopharmaceuticals
Nabi Biopharmaceuticals leverages its experience and knowledge in powering the immune system to develop products that target serious medical conditions in the areas of nicotine addiction and gram-positive bacterial infections. Nabi Biopharmaceuticals is currently developing NicVAX(r) (Nicotine Conjugate Vaccine), an innovative and proprietary investigational vaccine for treatment of nicotine addiction and prevention of smoking relapse, and PentaStaph(tm) (Pentavalent S. aureus Vaccine), a vaccine designed to prevent the most dangerous and prevalent strains of S. aureus bacterial infections. The company is headquartered in Rockville, Maryland. For additional information about Nabi Biopharmaceuticals, please visit our Web site:http://www.nabi.com.
Forward-Looking Statements
Statements in this release that are not strictly historical are forward-looking statements and include statements about products in development, results and analyses of clinical trials and studies, research and development expenses, cash expenditures, licensure applications and approvals, and alliances and partnerships, among other matters. You can identify these forward-looking statements because they involve our expectations, intentions, beliefs, plans, projections, anticipations, or other characterizations of future events or circumstances. These forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance and are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements as a result of any number of factors. These factors include, but are not limited to, risks relating to our ability to: successfully partner with third parties to fund, develop, manufacture and/or commercialize our products in development; defend against indemnification claims by Biotest; initiate and conduct clinical trials and studies; raise sufficient new capital resources to fully develop and commercialize our products in development; attract, retain and motivate key employees; collect further milestone and royalty payments under the PhosLo Agreement; obtain regulatory approval for our products in the U.S. or other markets; successfully contract with third party manufacturers for the manufacture and supply of NicVAX and PentaStaph; and comply with reporting and payment obligations under government rebate and pricing programs. Some of these factors are more fully discussed, as are other factors, in our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 27, 2008 filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission and our Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the period ended March 28, 2009 filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.