A Medical Device Daily

Aradigm (Hayward, California) and CyDex (Lenexa, Kansas) said they have entered a two-year collaboration for the development of combination products containing inhaled corticosteroids, anticholinergics and beta-2 agonists for the treatment of asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary diseases (COPD).

Aradigm is the developer of the AERx Essence inhalation delivery system, which is utilized for lung diseases and the AERx insulin Diabetes Management System, which has been licensed to Novo Nordisk (Copenhagen, Denmark) for development for insulin delivery for both Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes (Medical Device Daily, Nov. 21, 2001/Sept. 4, 2002).

The costs of the Cydex collaboration projects will be borne 60% by Aradigm and 40% by CyDex, with third-party licensing and sales revenues to be shared in the same ratio.

“There is a lot of interest in inhalation products containing a combination of drugs as these have proven to be very popular with millions of asthma and COPD patients,” said Igor Gonda, PhD, Aradigm’s president/CEO.

John Siebert, CEO of CyDex and a member of Aradigm’s board, said: “Putting together Cydex’s aqueous formulation capabilities with Aradigm’s palm-size AERx Essence inhalation delivery system has the potential to generate a family of attractive novel therapies for asthma and COPD patients. We believe that the products containing CyDex’s formulations delivered by the AERx Essence technology could become a new treatment of choice for many of these patients.”

Aradigm is focused on the development of drugs delivered by inhalation for the treatment of severe respiratory diseases by pulmonologists.

In other agreements news:

• Clarity Imaging International (San Diego) has launched its mobile DEXA program in Texas. Additionally the company said it has amended its service agreement with Genesis Physician Group (Dallas), an independent physician association with more than 1,500 participating physicians that provide services throughout North Texas and will include this service.

John Relic, president of Clarity, said, “Adding the mobile DEXA service to our existing agreement with Genesis fulfills our strategic goals of offering primary care physicians’ services. These services are provided by the physician to the patient, therefore reducing the need to refer.”

Clarity introduces diagnostic and imaging technologies, providing in-office diagnostic services and offering medical imaging center development, consultation and management.

Genesis is a developer of collaborative business and clinical initiatives.