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Receptor BioLogix Licenses Proprietary Technology to Incyte Corp.
New Company Aimed at Novel Drugs to Treat Cancer and Other Diseases
SAN FRANCISCO, September 22, 2003 — Receptor BioLogix Inc., a newly founded biopharmaceutical company focused on developing a recently discovered class of protein therapeutics to treat cancer, autoimmune, metabolic and other diseases, today announced it has licensed selected applications of its technology to Incyte Corp. (Nasdaq: INCY) for Incyte’s small-molecule cancer program. Under the terms of the agreement, Palo Alto, Calif.-based Incyte will make an upfront investment along with undisclosed future milestone payments and royalties in return for access to Receptor BioLogix proprietary technology outside of the company’s core business involving Intron Fusion Proteins. Receptor BioLogix is based here and in Portland, Oregon. Financial terms of the agreement were not disclosed.
“Establishing our first corporate alliance within three months of founding represents a key milestone for Receptor BioLogix,” said H. Michael Shepard, Ph.D., co-founder, chairman and chief executive officer. “We are very gratified Incyte shares our appreciation for the value of our technology for discovering new cancer treatments.” Dr. Shepard is a Genentech alumnus who co-discovered the breast-cancer treatment Herceptin®, and also is the founder of several other biotechnology ventures.
About Receptor BioLogix: Dimercept™
Founded in July with initial seed capital from Oregon Health Sciences University (OHSU), Receptor BioLogix’s lead clinical product is Dimercept™, a broad-spectrum anticancer agent that represents a new class of receptor modulator called Intron Fusion Proteins (IFP) and one of two discovery platforms it is commercializing. The company has identified several IFP candidates using its IFP/SCAN technology. These novel biologics act as receptor antagonists and prevent activation of key biochemical pathways involved in a disease process. Receptor BioLogix will enter into partnerships with other companies to advance this technology.
“Intron fusion proteins are an exciting area of research that holds tremendous promise for drug discovery,” said Marc Feldmann, Ph.D., director of London’s Kennedy Institute of Rheumatology. “Receptor BioLogix is at the forefront of a unique category of receptor-blocking proteins that may lead to a new family of drugs to treat cancer, autoimmune, and metabolic diseases.”
Dimercept’s discovery by researchers at OHSU led to the development of the Receptor BioLogix IFP/SCAN technology, which capitalizes on the enormous progress that has been made in human genome DNA-sequencing and bioinformatics. Unlike Herceptin that targets only HER-2 receptors on the surface of tumor cells, preclinical studies have shown Dimercept selectively blocks signaling of the entire EGF family of receptors — including the HER-2 receptor — that play a role in about half of all cancers.
Newly Discovered Form of Gene Expression
Licensed exclusively to Receptor BioLogix from OHSU, Dimercept is a naturally occurring protein that inhibits the function of a family of cancer genes (oncogenes), including the receptor genes HER-1 and HER-2, associated with several cancers. These include cancers of the prostrate, breast, lung, colon, brain and pancreas. Dimercept is readily produced by standard gene expression methods, and is likely to be non-immunogenic which could facilitate its development and regulatory approval.
Dimercept is an alternative product of the HER-2 gene that contains part of the HER-2 protein receptor. The receptor is fused to novel amino acid sequences encoded by an intron, a genetic code variation that is selectively expressed in normal cells and represents a newly discovered alternative means of gene expression.
Epidermal growth factors (EGF) comprise a large family of signaling proteins and corresponding cell receptors that execute such diverse cellular responses as survival, proliferation, migration, differentiation and cell death. Abnormal regulation of EGF signaling is associated with many forms of cancer and other diseases where cell growth has gone awry.
Based upon annual incidence, the total number of new patients that could be candidates for Dimercept treatment each year is more than 500,000 in the United States alone. By comparison, Herceptin which is approved only for HER-2 over-expressing breast cancer, can be potentially applied to about 53,000 new patients per year. Total revenues for Herceptin in 2001 were $385 million; Dimercept has the potential of exceeding $1 billion in annual sales.
Herceptin™ is a registered trademark of Genentech, Inc.
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