Mechelen, Belgium; 12 January 2010 - Galapagos NV (Euronext: GLPG) announced today that its BioFocus service division has achieved success in its oncology target discovery collaboration with Ortho Biotech Oncology Research & Development, a division of Janssen Pharmaceutica N.V. (Janssen). The success of the program has resulted in EUR 1.6 million in target acceptance payments to BioFocus.
In the two-year target discovery collaboration initiated in January 2008, BioFocus performed assay development using cancer cells, target discovery with the SilenceSelect® adenoviral collection as well as target validation. Today’s success involved BioFocus developing advanced cellular assays using high-content imaging, and identifying and validating novel drug targets for cancer areas with unmet medical need. The collaboration has been extended into 2010, to enable BioFocus to further develop complex screening assays for additional targets. BioFocus may receive success-based payment of up to an additional EUR 4.5 million should certain downstream criteria be reached by Janssen.
“This latest success in discovering new cancer drug targets using advanced cellular assays illustrates the versatility of our target discovery platform,” said Onno van de Stolpe, Chief Executive Officer of Galapagos.
About BioFocus
BioFocus aims to expand its partners’ drug pipelines by accelerating the gene-to-drug candidate discovery process. This is achieved through a comprehensive discovery platform, which includes target discovery in human primary cells, focused as well as diverse compound libraries, in vitro and cell-based screening, structural biology, medicinal chemistry, ADME/PK services, supported by unique chemogenomic and informatics tools, and compound library acquisition, storage and distribution services. As the service division of Galapagos, BioFocus has over 250 employees in four countries worldwide. More info at: www.biofocus.com
About Galapagos
Galapagos (Euronext: GLPG; OTC: GLPYY) is a drug discovery and development company with small molecule programs in bone and joint diseases, bone metastasis, cachexia, anti-infectives and metabolic diseases. It has established risk sharing alliances with GlaxoSmithKline, Eli Lilly, Merck & Co. and Roche. Through an alliance with MorphoSys, Galapagos is also developing new antibody therapies in bone and joint diseases. Its division BioFocus offers a full suite of target-to-drug discovery products and services to pharmaceutical and biotech companies and to patient foundations, encompassing target discovery and validation, screening and drug discovery through to delivery of pre-clinical candidates. Galapagos has more than 500 employees and operates facilities in six countries, with global headquarters in Mechelen, Belgium. More info at: www.glpg.com
