Metabolex To Advance Diabetes Drugs With Two Lucrative Partnerships
June 28, 2010 - VentureWire
By Sari Krieger
Paris - Drug Therapies
Metabolex Inc. said it has signed a licensing agreement worth up to $375 million with French pharmaceutical company Sanofi-Aventis SA and one with Johnson & Johnson's Ortho-McNeil-Janssen Pharmaceuticals Inc. worth up to $330 million, boosting its ability to develop its diabetes treatments.
The Hayward, Calif.-based company focuses on drugs for Type 2 diabetes.
Under both agreements, Metabolex will receive an upfront payment and further payments pending the achievement of certain milestones. Metabolex Chief Financial Officer Donald Hill wouldn't disclose the amounts of the payments or specific milestones.
Hill said his company hadn't worked with Sanofi before. The companies will work together to develop MBX-2982, an oral antidiabetic to treat type II diabetes.
"As part of our development we have done three Phase I trials," Hill said. "We are currently in the midst of a Phase II trial. Sanofi came to us, as they were very interested in obtaining access to the compound before the Phase II trial was completed, and came to us with a very compelling development plan. They were very interested in getting this compound developed as quickly as possible."
Hill said the deal was necessary because his company needs to partner with larger pharmaceutical companies to conduct larger clinical trials.
The Ortho-McNeil-Janssen deal is a pretrial collaboration, Hill said.
"This is where we had more preclinical assets than resources to move them forward so this is an opportunity to accelerate their development," Hill said.
In April, Metabolex said it is working with Takeda San Francisco Inc., part of Takeda Pharmaceutical Company Ltd., to evaluate and validate protein targets.
Metabolex has raised more than $170 million from investors, including an $8.6 million round November 2009, according to VentureWire archives. Investors include Alta Partners, Bay City Capital, Birchmere Ventures, Charter Ventures, KBC Funds, Merlin Nexus, Next Chapter Holdings, Novo Ventures, Pictet, VantagePoint Venture Partners, Venrock and Versant Ventures.
http://www.metabolex.com
