Innovative Vector Control Consortium Announces Discovery Project With SCYNEXIS, Inc.

RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, NC and LIVERPOOL, UNITED KINGDOM--(Marketwire - July 12, 2011) - The Innovative Vector Control Consortium (IVCC) announced today that it has signed an agreement with drug discovery and development company SCYNEXIS, Inc. to find potential candidate compounds suitable for development into new insecticide active ingredients to protect public health. New active ingredients are urgently needed to combat insecticide resistance which is a growing problem in the global fight against malaria.

Under the agreement, SCYNEXIS will screen its extensive chemical library, which was specifically targeted as insecticides, for activity against adult mosquitoes, and create a platform for screening other chemical libraries from companies and groups around the world. The project will aim to deliver a target list of compounds suitable for taking forward for further development.

Dr. Tom McLean, IVCC’s chief operating officer, said: “We look forward to working with SCYNEXIS and are hopeful that their expertise in insecticide discovery research will yield further candidates for development as new active ingredients. Disease control programmes rely on effective insecticides for vector control and resistance to all the insecticides currently approved for vector control is already present in some mosquito populations, posing a major threat to recent gains in malaria control. This project joins our other discovery programmes aimed at developing three new active ingredients unaffected by known resistance mechanisms by 2020.”

“SCYNEXIS is pleased to participate in this important project and looks forward applying its technology and expertise to the delivery of compound candidates for effective mosquito control,” said Dr. Yves Ribeill, president & chief executive officer of SCYNEXIS, Inc. “Through the SCYNEXIS Global Health Alliance, we are committed to providing advanced screening technology to identify compounds that can potentially be useful in global health to control protozoans, helminths and insect vectors and to advancing these compounds through integrated discovery programs to the clinic.”

About The Innovative Vector Control Consortium
The IVCC is a Product Development Partnership (PDP) established as a not-for-profit company and registered charity to overcome the barriers to innovation in the development of new insecticides for public health vector control and to develop information systems and tools which will enable new and existing pesticides to be used more effectively.

For further information, please contact:
Tom McLean IVCC COO tom.mclean@ivcc.com +44 151 705 3202

About SCYNEXIS
SCYNEXIS delivers integrated, efficient and innovative drug discovery and development solutions to our global health and pharmaceutical partners. Our record of success is exemplified by the delivery of eleven pre-clinical drug candidates over the last five years. SCYNEXIS’ teams are tailored to be especially effective in moving customer projects from concept to clinic, utilizing powerful proprietary technologies such as the HEOS® SaaS Software Platform for comprehensive drug discovery information management and the MEDCHEM-FACTORY® High-Throughput Synthesis and Purification Platform.

Our fully-integrated contract research solutions include medicinal chemistry, advanced biological screening, in vitro pharmacology and ADMET, DMPK, bioanalytical and analytical chemistry, process chemistry, and cGMP manufacturing. Founded in 2000, SCYNEXIS is located in Research Triangle Park, N.C.