Avilex Pharma, a Spin Out Company From the University of Copenhagen, Announces Seed Investment From Novo Seeds

Copenhagen, April 15th, 2013 -- Avilex Pharma ApS today announced the raising of seed funding from Novo Seeds, the early stage financing arm of Novo A/S to support the development of novel dimeric ligands targeting PDZ domains. Based on the work of Professor Kristian Strømgaard, Dr. Anders Bach and their team at the University of Copenhagen, the lead compounds provide unprecedented potency against the protein PSD-95 involved in NMDA receptor signaling.

“PSD-95 is a highly attractive target that has been implicated in a range of conditions, but its structure has hampered development of drugs against this target using conventional approaches. The innovative work of Professor Strømgaard and his team provides compounds of unprecedented potency. Based on PSD-95’s interaction with the NMDA receptor, our initial focus will be on the treatment of neuropathic pain” says Dr Robert Tansley, Avilex Pharma’s CEO.

“The use of dimeric ligands has proven very successful in targeting PSD-95. Given the similarities in the structure of PSD-95 to other disease relevant proteins, this approach provides many opportunities in developing compounds against other targets” said Professor Strømgaard, CSO and Board member of Avilex Pharma.

Avilex Pharma’s Board will be chaired by Mrs. Ingelise Saunders, former CEO of Action Pharma. She will be joined on the Board by Dr. Raymond Hill, ex-head of neuroscience R&D at MSD and Dr. Henrijette Richter of Novo Seeds.

For further information contact:

Dr Robert Tansley

E-mail: robert.tansley@avilexpharma.com

Phone: +44 (0)7950 018871

About Avilex Pharma Aps

Avilex Pharma is a Danish biotech company with technology developed at the Department of Drug Design and Pharmacology of the University of Copenhagen. Through the use of innovative dimeric ligands we can target well established intracellular targets with unprecedented potency with the aim of developing novel medicines for a range of areas of unmet medical need.

About Novo A/S

Novo A/S, the holding company in the Novo Group, was established prior to the demerger of Novo Nordisk in 2000. Novo A/S is a private limited liability company fully owned by the Novo Nordisk Foundation. Besides being the majority shareholder in Novo Nordisk A/S and Novozymes A/S, Novo A/S provides seed, venture and growth capital to development stage companies within life science and biotechnology, as well as manages a broad portfolio of financial assets. For further information visit www.novo.dk