CYTOPIA COLLABORATES WITH CANCER THERAPEUTICS
May 10th 2008 06:14
Thursday May 8, 2008
Daily news on ASX-listed biotechnology companies
* ASX UP, BIOTECHS DOWN: PHYLOGICA UP 29%; PORTLAND DOWN 18%
* CYTOPIA COLLABORATES WITH CANCER THERAPEUTICS CRC
* LIVING CELL TO LIST ON INTERNATIONAL OTCQX
* WILSON HTM TAKES 13% OF UNIVERSAL BIOSENSORS
* CORRECTION: AVANTOGEN
* PHYLOGICA CURES OPES PRIME HANGOVER
* ANZ SELLS 3.2m OP BIOPROSPECT SHARES, BELOW 5% IN INCITIVE
THE MARKET
Thirteen of the Biotech Daily Top 40 stocks were up, 15 fell, eight were unchanged and four were untraded.
Phylogica was best, up two cents or 28.57 percent to nine cents on modest volumes, followed by Living Cell up five cents or 20.83 percent to 29 cents and Cytopia up four cents or 14.81 percent to 31 cents.
Portland led the falls down 0.9 cents or 18 percent to 4.1 cents on modest volumes followed by Bionomics down 2.5 cents or 7.04 percent to 33 cents.
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CYTOPIA
Cytopia says a drug discovery and development collaboration with Cancer Therapeutics CRC Pty Ltd will increase its anti-cancer drug pipeline and develop existing compounds.
Cytopia chief executive officer Andrew Macdonald told Biotech Daily that by licencing the technology to the government-funded cooperative research centre the company would gain further development on its compounds at no further cost to the company.
Mr Macdonald said that if the CRC development work was successful, Cytopia could elect to commercialize the results.
“Most importantly, the agreement leaves us with an option to unlock value for our investors if a new cancer drug is taken to market,” Mr Macdonald said.
Cytopia has licenced specific proprietary drug technology and the intellectual property protecting those compounds to Cancer Therapeutics for an undisclosed kinase enzyme target with potential for treating metastatic cancers.
Cytopia said the agreement leveraged its early stage drug discovery pipeline of kinase inhibitors, a class of targeted therapeutics and the development of an inhibitor of this particular kinase could have “blockbuster potential in the cancer market”.
Under the project plan, Cancer Therapeutics will conduct and fund further development of the Cytopia compounds for at least two years.
Cytopia will retain an option over exclusive commercialization rights for any drug candidates delivered by the collaboration.
If Cytopia doesn’t exercise the option, Cancer Therapeutics can proceed with commercialization activities.
If all milestones to registration are achieved, both Cancer Therapeutics and Cytopia will share partnering revenues, as well as royalty payments from a marketed drug.
In a release to the ASX Mr Macdonald said his company’s drug discovery engine had generated opportunities for new cancer therapies.
He said the partnership gave the company the freedom to focus investment on its later stage pipeline while allowing the very early pipeline to move forward.
It will undertake responsibility for the further development of Cytopia’s early compounds towards a preclinical candidate compound which is capable of further development into and through clinical trials.
Cancer Therapeutics chief executive officer Dr Tony Evans said his company was founded “with the vision to aid in the further development of [the] Australian biotechnology industry by applying drug discovery and development capabilities to early research findings and take on projects that are in the high risk category from commercial organizations or academic institutions to unlock their commercial potential”.
Cancer Therapeutics was formed under the Australian Government’s cooperative research council scheme to discover and develop cancer drugs from Australia’s research base.
The Cancer Therapeutics cooperative research centre is composed of the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute, Peter MacCallum Cancer Institute, St Vincent's Institute of Medical Research, Griffith University, the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Organisation, Monash University, Cancer Research Technology, Bionomics, Millipore Australia and the Cancer Council of Victoria.
Cytopia said its advanced anti-cancer drug program includes four drug applications in phase I and phase II clinical programs in calendar 2008.
Trials are advanced for both oral and injectable vascular disrupting agents, multiple myeloma and an aggressive brain tumor glioblastoma multiforme.
Cytopia climbed four cents or 14.81 percent to 31 cents.
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