LONDON – The £400,000 (US$626,624) milestone payment Vernalis plc triggered last week in its drug discovery collaboration with H. Lundbeck A/S may look modest. But added to two other milestones reached in the past four months, the company has made £1.2 million, demonstrating that in addition to providing validation of the company's fragment and structure-based discovery technology, those early stage collaborations can provide a meaningful resource.

• Arecor Ltd., of Cambridge, UK, entered into a collaboration agreement with Indianapolis-based Eli Lilly and Co. to assess Arecor's advanced protein formulation technologies for possible use with Lilly's growing pipeline of biological-based drugs. Arecor will develop stable aqueous or higher concentration formulations of emerging protein and peptide drug candidates developed by Lilly. In addition, Arecor will work with Lilly to potentially offer improved formulations of Lilly's existing therapeutic proteins in several therapeutic areas. Arecor specializes in stabilization of biologic molecules. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

LONDON – Scil Technology GmbH has signed up Sanofi SA as commercialization partner for its protein therapy for osteoarthritis in a €180 million (US$235.9 million) plus royalties deal that will see the French pharma company take on all responsibility for further development of the program.

Shares in Sygnis Pharma AG plunged more than 62 percent Friday on news that its lead drug AX200 failed to demonstrate efficacy in a 328-patient Phase IIb trial in acute ischemic stroke.

LONDON – Erythropoietin (EPO), the hormone that stimulates the formation of new red blood cells, is released in response to tumors and helps provide them with a more favorable environment for growth and spread, a new study has found.

Clinuvel Pharmaceuticals Ltd. plans to complete a European regulatory filing for its lead drug Scenesse (afamelanotide) in the coming weeks, following a Phase III trial in patients with erythropoietic protoporphyria (EPP), which met its primary endpoint.

LONDON – NeuroSearch A/S is spinning out two start-ups to take forward programs that were parked in September when the company announced it was restructuring and would be focusing all resources on its Phase III Huntington's disease product, Huntexil.

LONDON – Oxford BioMedica plc can now boast three years' safety data and a sustained improvement in symptoms in all 15 patients treated in the Phase I/II trial of its ProSavin gene therapy for Parkinson's disease, but needs to progress to a higher dose "to provide more certainty" that this is not just a placebo effect, and to be competitive against deep brain stimulation treatment.

• Apeiron Biologics AG, of Vienna, Australia, said GlaxoSmithKline plc, of London, exclusive, worldwide licensee for Apeiron's new investigational recombinant human Angiotensin Converting Enzyme 2 (GSK2586881, formerly APN01), has initiated a Phase IIa study in patients suffering from acute lung injury.

As crunch time looms for TopoTarget A/S's lead pipeline molecule belinostat, which is undergoing a pivotal Phase II trial in 129 patients with relapsed or refractory peripheral T-cell lymphoma (PTCL), the company is cutting almost 40 percent of its Danish workforce in order to conserve cash and focus its resources.