Company* (Country; Symbol)

University/Non-Profit

Type Of Agreement

Product Area

Details (Date)

Abgenix Inc. (ABGX)

Duke University Medical Center and Johns Hopkins University

Licensing agreement

EGFrvIII target to treat cancer

Abgenix receives worldwide exclusive rights to develop and commercialize antibody-based therapeutics to EGFrvIII (11/27)

Acambis Inc. (subsidiary of Acambis plc; UK; LSE:ACM)

U.S. Centers for Disease Control

Contract

To produce smallpox vaccine

The contract is to produce 155 million doses of smallpox vaccine within the next 12 months at a fixed price of $428M (11/29)

Alexion Pharmaceuticals Inc. (ALXN)

University Medical Center of Nijmegen, the Netherlands 

Worldwide commercial rights agreement 

DC-SIGN, cell surface proteins

Alexion received rights related to these molecules and any associated therapeutic product candidates; products are expected to have applications in auto-immune diseases, inflammation, cancer, transplantation and infectious diseases (11/5)

American Biogenetic Sciences Inc. (MABA)

Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation 

Agreement for 10 years 

Human vaccines for anthrax, smallpox, botulism and other diseases 

A second agreement with the Russian Agricultural Academy extends ABS's rights for livestock vaccines; the agreements govern vaccine distribution to specified territories including North America, South America, Europe and the Pacific Rim (11/26)

AxCell Biosciences Corp. (subsidiary of Cytogen Corp.; CYTO) 

Mount Sinai School of Medicine 

Research agreement 

Protein interactions in the WW protein domain family, which are involved in signal transduction 

The principal goals of the program will be to research the binding of ligands to the WW protein domain family (11/15)

Axonyx Inc. (AXYX)

U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Chemical Defense

Agreement 

Acetylcholinesterase-and butyrylcholinest-erase-inhibiting compounds 

The Army gains access to Axonyx's compounds for testing against chemical warfare agents such as Sarin gas (10/23)

Beyond Genomics Inc.*

Advanced Research & Technology Institute at Indiana University

Licensing agreement

Ion Mobility Mass Spectrometry

Beyond licensed the technology from Advanced; the two parties also will work to form commercial relationships to fully develop IMMS (10/31)

BioNumerik Pharmaceuticals Inc.*

The Cancer and Leukemia Group B 

Alliance

To use advanced information technologies to improve clinical trial data and information management

BioNumerik will create new software for facilitating the conduct of clinical trials in oncology; CALGB is providing oncology clinical trial data management (11/27)

Cepheid Inc. (CPHD)

U.S. Department of Agriculture 

Cooperative research and development agreement 

To develop DNA tests for rapid field diagnosis of plant diseases threatening major cash crops 

The tests will be developed and optimized for use on Cepheid's portable Smart Cycler TD and its next-generation GeneXpert systems (11/29)

Dyax Corp. (DYAX)

Kari Alitalo of the University of Helsinki

Research collaboration

To identify human antibodies or other compounds that specifically bind to an angiogenesis target

Dyax will use its phage display technology to identify the antibodies (11/27)

Egea Biosciences Inc.*

Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency 

Contract

To develop sensing and identification techniques to counter bioterrorism

The $707,000 contract is the second part of a Small Business Innovation Research grant (10/30)

Genta Inc. (GNTA)

U.S. National Cancer Institute 

Expanded agreement

Genasense

Agreement is for new clinical trials involving Genasense (11/14)

GPC Biotech AG (Germany; FSE:GPC)

Arizona State University 

Licensing agreement

Bryostatin-1

GPC acquired rights to Bryostatin-1, as well as an exclusive worldwide license from Stanford to develop and commercialize synthetic analogues of Bryostatin-1, known as Bryologs (11/5)

ID Biomedical Corp. (Canada; IDBE; TSE:IDB)

U.S. Army Medical Research and Material Command 

Collaboration

To develop a nasal vaccine against the plague 

The collaboration will focus on developing a vaccine to prevent plague pneumonia (11/15)

IntegraGen (France)*

University of Marburg and University of Heidelberg 

Scientific collaborations

Obesity and Type II diabetes

The collaboration with Marburg will focus on obesity, and the deal with Heidelberg will focus on Type II diabetes (10/18)

Isis Pharmaceuticals Inc. (ISIP)

Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency 

Two-year development contract

Sensor to detect infectious agents used in biological warfare

The contract is valued at up to an additional $7.1M for the research program (10/26)

Lynx Therapeutics Inc. (LYNX)

University of California at Davis 

Collaboration

To study gene expression in the model plant, Arabidopsis

Agreement is a two-year, $1M study supported by the U.S. National Science Foundation (11/15)

MedImmune Inc. (MEDI)

Purdue Research Foundation 

Licensing agreement

EphA2 technology

MedImmune licensed worldwide rights to the technology; it will be responsible for developing, manufacturing and commercializing therapeutics that target EphA2; Purdue will receive upfront payments and potential milestones and royalties (10/25)

Nastech Pharmaceutical Company Inc. (NSTK)

Center for Neurodegenerative Disease Research at the University of Pennsylvania 

Research collaboration

Beta-sheet breakers

Collaboration is to explore the potential of nasally administered beta-sheet breakers in inhibiting or reversing the formation of brain plaque associated with Alzheimer's disease (11/7)

Neurome Inc.*  

California Institute of Technology 

Access agreement

Magnetic resonance imaging technology for neuroanatomy research

Neurome will use the institute's MRI technology to obtain 3-dimensional images of mouse brains for its neuroanatomy research (11/27)

Oncotech Inc.*

The Johns Hopkins Cancer Center 

Collaborative study agreement

Genetic factors that can be used to save uterine cancer patients from unnecessary exploratory surgery

The study's pupose is to determine genes and proteins that can stratify uterine cancer patients according to their risk of metastasis (11/5)

Palatin Technologies Inc. (AMEX:PTN)

U.S. Army 

Experimental agreement

To test the LeuTech system to detect the inhaled form of anthrax

The initial study will be conducted at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington (11/5)

Prima Biomed (Australia)*

Austin Research Institute 

Technology agreement

Immunization technology for infectious diseases, DCtag

Prima Biomed acquired the technology, which may immunize against malaria and treat people for certain cancers (11/13)

Protea Biosciences Inc.*

West Virginia Research Corp. and the West Virginia University Health Sciences Center

Development and commercialization agreement

For discoveries made in the core proteomics laboratory at the center

The laboratory is an advanced technology center that rapidly identifies proteins in human cells, providing new potential targets for drug development in cancer and other human diseases (11/14)

ProteEx Inc.* 

Texas Medical Center 

Projects and research collaborations

Processing of tumor suppressor proteins involved in nuclear regulation

The proteins are involved in nuclear regulation in colon cancer, proteomic analysis of phospho-proteins involved in immuno-suppressive disorders and proteomic analysis of nitrosylated proteins involved in renal and cardiovascular disease (11/12)

ReGen Therapeutics plc (UK; LSE:RGT) (Poland)

Ludwik Hirszfeld Institute 

Acquisition agreement

Colostrinin

ReGen acquired full ownership from Colostrinin's inventors at Ludwik for US$160,000 (11/7**)

Synthon Chiragenics Corp.* 

The Brigham and Women's Hospital 

Research agreement

Antibacterial candidates to treat highly  resistant germs

The collaboration involves the preliminary screening of hundreds of antibacterial candidates (11/16)

Therion Biologics Corp.*

U.S. Public Health Service  development

Licensing agreement

Patents related to immunotherapy and cancer vaccine

The intellectual property covers technologies, methods of use and specific vaccines (11/27)

Notes:

This chart does not include grant agreements (unless they are also part of a larger collaboration) or agreements between biotech companies and clinical trial centers.

* Denotes privately held company.

** Denotes the date the item ran in BioWorld International.

Unless otherwise noted, shares are traded on the Nasdaq exchange.

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