MILFORD – Tuesday, July 12, 2011 – Governor Deval Patrick today visited the facilities of Biomeasure, Ipsen’s US subsidiary focusing on research, development and manufacturing in Milford, Massachusetts. The Governor met with company leaders and discussed the role that the Administration’s ten-year, $1 billion Life Sciences Initiative has played in advancing the company’s scientific research and product development. Ipsen Biomeasure was successful in applying jointly with Brigham & Women’s Hospital for one of the Massachusetts Life Sciences Center’s Cooperative Research Matching Grants in the program’s first round.
Dr. Richard Lee and Dr. Parth Patwari of Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School, in partnership with Ipsen Biomeasure Inc., were awarded a three year, $250,000/year Cooperative Research Matching Grant from the Massachusetts Life Sciences Center in 2008. Ipsen Biomeasure matched the Center’s grant dollar-for-dollar. Under the collaboration, in vitro and in vivo pre-clinical tests of the company’s IGF-1 heparin-binding protein invention have been performed. The new protein may enhance cartilage regeneration after traumatic injury and provide a new therapy for osteoarthritis.
“This grant program is an excellent way to encourage state government, industry, and our world-class academic institutions to collaborate in the development of new technologies that will create jobs, and improve human health,” said Governor Patrick. “I was pleased to have the opportunity to visit the company and learn from them how the state’s support has advanced their important work.”
The Center’s Cooperative Research Matching Grant Program funds collaborations between scientists, academic institutions and industry that promise significant commercial potential in the near term and are scientifically meritorious. Eight projects have been funded by the Center thus far. The grants are matched dollar-for-dollar by the industry partners involved with each collaboration.
“We are very pleased with the progress made in the collaborative program with BWH in the last two years,” said Claude Bertrand, EVP and CSO at Ipsen. “Public-private partnership is a key pillar of Ipsen’s R&D strategy to access top notch innovation. Our long-standing presence in Massachusetts is a clear competitive advantage in building relationships with the dense population of worldwide leaders in life sciences in this state.”
“Our Cooperative Research Matching Grant Program reflects the Center’s strategy of using public investments to leverage private sector resources as we pursue our dual mission of job creation, and support for good science,” said Dr. Susan Windham Bannister, President & CEO of the Center. “This project meets both of these objectives and we are pleased to have provided our support.”
“Ipsen Biomeasure is a great example of the cooperative efforts of state government and the private sector to create leading-edge Massachusetts jobs and to support important innovations in health care that will benefit all of us,” said State Senator Richard T. Moore.
“The joint Biomeasure - Brigham & Women’s Cooperative Research Grant is a perfect example of the fulfillment of the goal of the ambitious Massachusetts Life Sciences Initiative,” said State Representative John Fernandes. “The effort combines the best of economic development with cutting edge scientific and medical development, helping to maintain Massachusetts’ leadership in both areas, creating jobs and helping people. I am pleased to be a partner with the Patrick Murray administration in this effort.”
About the Massachusetts Life Sciences Center
The Massachusetts Life Sciences Center (“the Center”) is a quasi-public agency of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts tasked with implementing the Massachusetts Life Sciences Act, a ten-year, $1 billion initiative that was signed into law in June of 2008. The Center’s mission is to create jobs in the life sciences and support vital scientific research that will improve the human condition. This work includes making financial investments in public and private institutions that are advancing life sciences research, development and commercialization as well as building ties between sectors of the Massachusetts life sciences community. For more information, visit www.masslifesciences.com.
About Ipsen
Ipsen is a specialty driven global biopharmaceutical group with total sales exceeding €1.1 billion in 2010. Ipsen’s ambition is to become a global leader in the treatment of targeted debilitating diseases. Its development strategy is supported by four franchises: neurology / Dysport®, endocrinology / 2 /2 Somatuline®, uro-oncology / Decapeptyl® and hemophilia. The Group has an active policy of partnerships. R&D focuses on innovative and differentiated technological patient-driven platforms, peptides and toxins. In 2010, R&D expenditure totaled more than €220 million, above 20% of Group sales. The Group has total worldwide staff of close to 4,500. Ipsen’s shares are traded on segment A of Euronext Paris (stock code: IPN, ISIN code: FR0010259150) and eligible to the “Service de Règlement Différé” (“SRD”). The Group is part of the SBF 120 index. Ipsen has implemented a Sponsored Level I American Depositary Receipt (ADR) program, which trade on the over-the-counter market in the United States under the symbol IPSEY. For more information on Ipsen, visit www.ipsen.com.
Biomeasure, Inc., located in Milford, Massachusetts, is Ipsen’s US subsidiary focusing on Research, Development and Manufacturing.
