“We are excited to regain full ownership and control of our promising renin program as we prepare to enter our lead compound into clinical trials in 2009,” said Jeffrey Hatfield, Chief Executive Officer of Vitae. “Renin continues to be a much sought-after target, and our team has been one of the few that has been able to generate highly potent and bioavailable inhibitors that we believe will lead to important drug candidates in this large market. This transaction presents us with an opportunity to accelerate our renin efforts and achieve our strategic goal of advancing our proprietary programs into the clinic independently.”
“We believe our renin program has the strong potential to deliver a best-in-class drug, and we plan to aggressively advance our lead towards the clinic in 2009,” said Richard Gregg, MD, Chief Scientific Officer of Vitae. “We expect to target hypertension, diabetic nephropathy, congestive heart failure and related cardiovascular indications after completing IND-enabling toxicity studies.”
Vitae is one of the first companies to break through the decades-old challenges associated with the renin target due to the success of the company’s novel structure-based drug discovery platform. Vitae created novel structures that led to highly potent, highly bioavailable inhibitors that demonstrated oral efficacy in multiple animal models less than 18 months after starting the program.
Vitae’s other research programs include a substantial collaboration with Boehringer-Ingelheim on a diabetes program targeting 11ß hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase (11ß HSD1), a BACE program for Alzheimer’s Disease and a multi-kinase cancer program.
About Renin
Renin is an enzyme secreted by the kidney in response to a decrease in blood pressure and circulating blood volume. It plays an important role in the regulation of blood pressure and vascular function, and has been a broadly pursued but extremely difficult drug to target within the pharmaceutical industry for many years. Within the bloodstream, renin initiates a series of reactions in the renin-angiotensin system leading to activation of cellular receptors. This induces vascular constriction and an increase in blood pressure as well as changes in blood vessel structure and function. Suppression of the renin angiotensin system using drug therapies has been shown to reduce blood pressure and associated renal and cardiovascular events.
Renin inhibitors offer a novel approach to blood pressure control because they act at the first step in the renin-angiotensin pathway, upstream of the currently available treatments. Renin inhibitors are likely to provide greater end organ (heart, kidney, brain) protection than currently available antihypertensive agents, based upon recently published clinical biomarker data. Many additional biomarker studies and multiple long-term morbidity / mortality trials are currently underway to further investigate these beliefs, making renin inhibition one of the most intensely studied therapeutic modalities in cardiovascular medicine today.
About Hypertension
Hypertension is a common disorder characterized by high blood pressure. Hypertension causes stress on the heart, blood vessels and vital organs such as the kidney and brain. Patients with high blood pressure have a significantly greater risk of heart attack, stroke, renal disease, aneurysms, retinal vascular damage, left ventricular hypertrophy and heart failure. Hypertension is a major contributing cause of disease and death worldwide. More than one in three Europeans and North Americans over the age of 35 have hypertension – an estimated 70 million people in the U.S. currently suffer from hypertension and the number is expected to grow to 100 million over the next decade. More than half of those on current therapies remain insufficiently controlled, indicating a clear need for new treatment options.
About Vitae Pharmaceuticals
Vitae Pharmaceuticals is an emerging pharmaceutical company with a unique and powerful structure-based drug design engine and a rapidly maturing portfolio of high value discovery programs. Vitae’s goal is to discover, develop and commercialize innovative new medicines, alone and in partnership, that will be best-in-class in important therapeutic areas such as cardiovascular and metabolic disease, inflammation and CNS. Vitae Pharmaceuticals is financed by leading corporate and venture capital investors and is headquartered in Fort Washington, Pennsylvania. For additional information, please visit the company’s website, www.vitaepharma.com.
