[July 24, 2008]

Other News To Note

(BioWorld Today Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) , of Berkeley, Calif., said Novartis Vaccines and Diagnostics Inc., an affiliate of Novartis International AG. of Basel, Switzerland, will supply the trivalent influenza vaccine necessary to make Dynavax's Universal Influenza Vaccine. Dynavax's product combines the trivalent vaccine with two conserved influenza antigens and a proprietary second-generation TLR9 agonist. Novartis also gained an exclusive option to negotiate a joint development and commercialization deal with Dynavax after the vaccine completes proof-of-concept trials. Terms were not disclosed.

? Emergent BioSolutions Inc., of Rockville, Md., was awarded two grants from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases totaling more than $4.5 million. The funding will support continued development of Emergent's rBOT serotype A and B recombinant botulinum vaccine program and NGAV next-generation anthrax vaccine program.

? Horizon Therapeutics Inc., of Palo Alto, Calif., named Timothy P. Walbert president and chief executive. He also will join the company's board. Most recently he was president and CEO of IDM Pharma Inc., and previously was a vice president and general manager of Abbott Immunology.

? Pharmacopeia Inc., of Princeton, N.J., identified a new lead product candidate under its 2006 discovery deal with GlaxoSmithKline plc, of London. The achievement triggers a $500,000 milestone payment to Pharmacopeia. The new lead, which will be evaluated for pain indications, is the fifth identified by Pharmacopeia under the deal. (See BioWorld Today, March 31, 2006.)

? Roche Holding AG, of Basel, Switzerland, has been sued by a pension fund that owns shares of Genentech Inc., of South San Francisco, claiming Roche's $44 billion offer to buy out Genentech is inadequate. The offer is an attempt to take advantage of market turmoil and a weak U.S. dollar, lawyers for the Montgomery County Employees' Retirement Fund said in a lawsuit filed Tuesday in Delaware Chancery Court in Wilmington. The lawsuit said the terms of the proposed acquisition are "grossly unfair . . . and the unfairness is compounded by the gross disparity between the knowledge and information possessed by the individual defendants and Roche by virtue of their positions of control." The suit seeks to be classified as a class-action lawsuit.

? Rosetta Genomics Ltd., of Rehovot, Israel, completed its $2.9 million acquisition of Parkway Clinical Laboratories Inc., a privately held CLIA-certified lab in Bensalem, Pa. An additional $300,000 will be payable upon the achievement of certain undisclosed milestones. Rosetta plans to use Parkway to expedite development and validation of its microRNA-based diagnostic tests.

? Santhera Pharmaceuticals AG, of Liestal, Switzerland, received a split decision on Catena (SNT-MC17/idebenone) in Friedreich's ataxia, a progressive muscle disease. The company received Health Canada approval for Catena, marking the first approval in the world for a Friedreich's ataxia drug. Santhera intends to launch the product in October. However, the Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use of the European Medicines Agency has informally advised the company that it would not support a positive opinion at this time. The agency said it cannot act until data from at least one of Santhera's advanced Phase III clinical programs in Europe and the U.S. are submitted. Health Canada has acted on the understanding that the Phase III data would be submitted when available. (See BioWorld Today, Oct. 1, 2007.)

? Symyx Technologies Inc., of Santa Clara, Calif., signed a one-year agreement to allow New York-based Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. to use its research services for solubility studies through May 2009. Financial terms were not disclosed.

? Synosia Therapeutics, of Basel, Switzerland, said the U.S. Department of Defense will provide $1.4 million to fund a Phase II trial of nepicastat (SYN-117) for the treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder. The six-week, prospective, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study will evaluate the drug in 90 veterans of Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom and will be followed by an eight-week extension phase. Nepicastat is a dopamine beta hydroxylase inhibitor, and Synosia also is planning trials in drug dependency.

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