• Furiex Pharmaceuticals Inc., of Morrisville, N.C., said Takeda Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd., of Osaka, Japan, launched two dosages of Liovel, a fixed-dose combination tablet of Nesina (alogliptin) and Actos (pioglitazone HCl) in Japan for Type II diabetes. Furiex, which collaborated on the development of Nesina, a dipeptidyl peptidase-4 inhibitor, is entitled to receive royalty payments on sales of the new combination product.

• MediGene AG, of Martinsried, Germany, reported preclinical data showing that particles derived from its AAVLP vaccine technology, comprising peptides from human papillomavirus (HPV) serotypes 16 and 31, induced neutralizing antibodies against a broad range of HPV serotypes in mice vaccination studies. MediGene said the in vivo studies provided evidence of the technology's potential in creating a prophylactic vaccine against infections of cancer-inducing HPV serotypes. Those data were presented at the International Papillomavirus conference in Berlin.

• Nuevolution A/S, of Copenhagen, Denmark, entered a drug discovery collaboration with Boehringer Ingelheim GmbH, of Ingelheim, Germany. The collaboration will use Nuevolution's Chemetics DNA-labeled fragment-based technology to screen hundreds of millions of small molecules and develop drug candidates against undisclosed targets of interest to Boehringer. Nuevolution will receive an up-front payment, research funding, milestone payments and royalties, but specific details were not disclosed.

• Pfizer Inc., of New York, said it completed its cash tender offer for the outstanding shares of common stock of Icagen Inc., of Durham, N.C., for $6 per share. When the subsequent offering period expired at 6 p.m., New York time, on Sept. 19, 5.4 million shares of Icagen's common stock had been tendered. Pfizer already owned about 1.1 million shares of Icagen's common stock, bringing Pfizer's total stake in Icagen to 70.2 percent of outstanding shares. Icagen becomes a wholly owned subsidiary of Pfizer, and its stock will cease to be listed on Nasdaq. Remaining publicly held shares of Icagen common stock that were outstanding immediately prior to the effective time of the merger will be converted into the right to receive $6 per share in cash. (See BioWorld Today, July 21, 2011.)

• Rib-X Pharmaceuticals Inc., of New Haven, Conn., presented 14 posters at the Interscience Conference on Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy meeting in Chicago from its RX-04 program focused on antibiotic compounds. Among the data presented were preclinical results showing that RX-04 compounds demonstrated in vivo efficacy in models of Gram-positive and Gram-negative infections and the compounds could deliver efficacy and 100 percent protection with a single dose. Another preclinical study showed RX-04 compounds demonstrated efficacy in a murine skin and soft-tissue infection model.

• SomaGenics Inc., of Santa Cruz, Calif., presented data on the efficacy of RNA interference (RNAi) therapeutics against hepatitis C virus (HCV) based on the company's sshRNA platform. SomaGenics' synthetic sshRNAs, formulated with lipid nanoparticles (LNP) from collaborator Tekmira Pharmaceuticals Corp., of Vancouver, British Columbia, demonstrated reduced circulating HCV load by more than two orders of magnitude. LNP-formulated sshRNAs were efficiently taken up by human liver cells in a chimeric mouse model, HCV reduction was achieved with a single intravenous dose and viral load remained depressed three weeks after dosing. The LNP-formulated sshRNAs were well tolerated with no evidence of liver toxicity. The findings, presented at the Oligonucleotide Therapeutics Society meeting in Copenhagen, Denmark, represent the first demonstration of in vivo efficacy of RNAi against HCV infection, according to SomaGenics.

• Valeant Pharmaceuticals International Inc., of Mississauga, Ontario, said it received separate requests for additional information from the Federal Trade Commission in connection with its pending acquisitions of Dermik Laboratories Inc., a dermatology unit of Sanofi SA, of Paris, that operates in the U.S. and Canada, and the acquisition by subsidiaries Valeant Pharmaceuticals North America LLC and VIB of Ortho Dermatologics, a division of New Brunswick, N.J.-based Johnson & Johnson subsidiary Janssen Pharmaceuticals Inc. Valeant and subsidiary Valeant International (Barbados) SRL (VIB) also are seeking to acquire the rights to Dermik's Sculptra Aesthetic (injectable poly-L-lactic acid) worldwide, outside France. Although the requests extend the waiting period until 30 days after Valeant and its counterparts have complied, Valeant expects to close both transactions by the end of this year.

• Vertex Pharmaceuticals Inc., of Cambridge, Mass., said partner New Brunswick, N.J-based Johnson & Johnson's Janssen Pharmaceutica NV division received European approval of telaprevir for use with pegylated-interferon and ribavirin for treatment-naïve and treatment-experienced patients with genotype 1 chronic hepatitis C virus infection. The protease inhibitor, marketed as Incivek in the U.S. and Canada, will be sold as Incivo in Europe. (See BioWorld Today, May 24, 2011.)