CAMBRIDGE, Mass., Nov. 4, 2010 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Infinity Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (Nasdaq:INFI) today announced that it has been awarded three grants totaling approximately $750,000 under the U.S. Government's Qualifying Therapeutic Discovery Project (QTDP) program to advance the development of the company's Hedgehog pathway, Hsp90 chaperone and fatty acid amide hydrolase programs.
"We are pleased to be awarded these three grants and to have our innovative development programs recognized as having the potential to provide meaningful new treatment options for patients," said Adelene Q. Perkins, president and chief executive officer of Infinity. "We are committed to achieving our mission of discovering, developing and delivering to patients best-in-class medicines for difficult-to-treat diseases, and these grants augment our financial strength, enhancing our ability to advance a broad portfolio of product candidates."
Included as part of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010, the QTDP program provided tax credits to encourage investment in new therapies for areas of unmet medical need. Companies such as Infinity, that cannot currently use a tax credit, were allowed to apply for cash grants in lieu of tax credits. Qualifying projects were considered for, among other things, the potential to result in new therapies, reduce long-term health care costs, or significantly advance the goal of curing cancer within 30 years, as well as for the potential to create and sustain high-quality jobs in the U.S. and to advance U.S. competitiveness in the life sciences. For more information, please visit: http://grants.nih.gov/grants/funding/QTDP_PIM/.
About Infinity Pharmaceuticals, Inc.
Infinity is an innovative drug discovery and development company seeking to discover, develop, and deliver to patients best-in-class medicines for difficult-to-treat diseases. Infinity combines proven scientific expertise with a passion for developing novel small molecule drugs that target emerging disease pathways. Infinity's programs in the inhibition of the Hsp90 chaperone system, the Hedgehog pathway, fatty acid amide hydrolase and phosphoinositide-3-kinase are evidence of its innovative approach to drug discovery and development. For more information on Infinity, please refer to the company's website at http://www.infi.com.
Forward-Looking Statements
This press release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of The Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These statements involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to be materially different from historical results or from any future results expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Such forward-looking statements include statements regarding the use of grants to advance Infinity's product portfolio. Such statements are subject to numerous factors, risks and uncertainties that may cause actual events or results to differ materially from the company's current expectations. For example, there can be no guarantee that any of Infinity's product candidates will successfully complete necessary preclinical and clinical development phases, or that the company's strategic alliance with Purdue Pharma and Mundipharma will continue as planned. In particular, management's expectations could be affected by risks and uncertainties relating to: results of clinical trials and preclinical studies, including subsequent analysis of existing data and new data received from ongoing and future studies; the content and timing of decisions made by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and other regulatory authorities and investigational review boards at clinical trial sites; Infinity's ability to enroll patients in its clinical trials; and Infinity's ability to obtain, maintain and enforce patent and other intellectual property protection for any product candidates it is developing. These and other risks which may impact management's expectations are described in greater detail under the caption "Risk Factors" included in Infinity's quarterly report on Form 10-Q filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on August 4, 2010. Further, any forward-looking statements contained in this press release speak only as of the date hereof, and Infinity expressly disclaims any obligation to update any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.