Xenova Ltd. of Slough, England, announced Wednesday that itreceived a second equity investment of $4.2 million fromGenentech Inc.

This raised Genentech's total investment in Xenova to $8.3million of a planned $12 million set under a collaborativeagreement announced last September.

The collaboration combines Xenova's screening technologies forisolating valuable small molecule drug leads frommicroorganisms with Genentech's (NYSE:GNE) proprietarytechnology for discovering and producing disease-specificmolecular targets, Xenova said. The agreement covers certainmolecular targets in hypertension, congestive heart disease,atherosclerosis, growth control and inflammation andautoimmune disease.

Founded in 1987, Xenova has raised a total of $27.3 million. Itsprevious investors include: Schroder Ventures, JAFCO, StandardLife, Biotechnology Investment Ltd. and MVH, an affiliate ofOppenheimer and Co. Inc.

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