* Protein Design Labs Inc., of Mountain View, Calif., has granted a worldwide nonexclusive license under its antibody humanization patents to Biogen Inc., of Cambridge, Mass., for a humanized antibody to a specific target antigen. Pursuant to the license grant, Biogen has agreed to pay a nonrefundable licensing fee of $1 million to Protein Design and will pay royalties on potential sales.
* Sheffield Medical Technologies Inc., of New York, has raised $3.5 million in proceeds through the private placement of 35,000 shares of 7 percent Series A Convertible Preferred Stock.
* Sibia Neurosciences Inc., of La Jolla., Calif., has signed a licensing agreement with Meiji Seika Kaisha Ltd., of Japan, for the development and commercialization of SIB-1508Y as a first-of-type treatment for Parkinson's disease. Under the agreement, Sibia will receive a licensing fee, milestone payments and royalties on future sales. Sibia will supply the product to Meiji for clinical use and will retain manufacturing rights.
* The Liposome Co. Inc., of Princeton, N.J., has been advised by the French regulatory authorities that Abelcet (Amphotericin B Lipid Complex Injection) has been approved for commercial sale in France. This is the first reported approval granted by French regulatory authorities for a lipid-based amphotericin B drug.
* Vyrex Corp., of La Jolla, Calif., has entered into a research collaboration with SeqWright, a gene sequencing company based in Houston. The research collaboration will focus on using Vyrex's CD-Tagging technology, which simultaneously tags gene, transcript, and protein in a single biochemical event to construct mouse and human functional genomic libraries.