MECHELEN, Belgium, Jan. 5, 2005 (PRIMEZONE) -- Galapagos today announced that it has entered into a target licensing and multi-year target identification collaboration in respiratory and inflammatory diseases with GlaxoSmithKline (GSK). Within the agreement, GSK gains an exclusive license to novel disease modifying drug targets that have been discovered by Galapagos in its asthma and allergy program using its siRNA based adenovirus discovery technology. In addition to the target licensing, GSK entered into a three-year partnership with Galadeno, Galapagos' reagents and services division, to discover further targets that are disease modifying in asthma and inflammatory diseases. Within this collaboration, Galadeno will use its assay development and screening expertise in combination with its SilenceSelect(TM) gene knock-down platform to discover and validate novel drug targets in multiple disease pathways. Under the terms of the agreement, Galapagos receives an upfront payment, research funding, and is eligible for milestone payments on targets taken into development by GSK. Full financial details of the collaboration were not disclosed.
"We are excited that we have now partnered our asthma program with the leading player in this disease area" said Onno van de Stolpe, CEO of Galapagos. "The licensing of our targets to GSK is a strong endorsement of our discovery platform and disease expertise".
"This long term alliance with one of the largest pharmaceutical companies in the world is an important milestone for our recently established service unit" said Andrea Grant, Managing Director of Galadeno. "We are looking forward to be working with GSK's disease experts over the coming years and we are confident that we will deliver a continuous stream of novel, well-validated drug targets to their compound screening programs".
About Galapagos & Galadeno
Galapagos is a genomics-based drug discovery company with programs in osteoporosis, rheumatoid arthritis, osteoarthritis, Alzheimer's disease and asthma. Proprietary targets and compounds resulting from Galapagos' programs are both developed internally and selectively out-licensed.
Galadeno, Galapagos' services unit, provides reagents and functional screens to leading pharmaceutical, biotech and nutraceutical companies for rapid identification and validation of novel drug targets.
Together they currently employ 70 people, including 22 PhD's, and occupy a discovery research facility in Mechelen, Belgium, and a reagent and services business unit in Leiden, The Netherlands. Partners include Bayer, Boehringer Ingelheim, Celgene, Johnson & Johnson, Pfizer, Procter & Gamble, Vertex and Wyeth. Galapagos was founded in 1999 by Crucell (Nasdaq, Euronext: CRXL) and Tibotec to exploit Crucell's unique PER.C6(R) technology for target discovery. The shareholders include Abingworth, Apax, Burrill, AlpInvest, Crucell and Tibotec-Virco.
More information can be found at www.galapagosgenomics.com.