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ABLYNX IS AWARDED EUR 1.9 MILLION GRANT TO EXPLORE
NEW THERAPEUTIC USES OF NANOBODIES
GHENT, Belgium, 25 September, 2007 - Ablynx the
biopharmaceutical company focused on the discovery and development of
Nanobodies®, today announced that it has been awarded a grant worth EUR
1.855M by the Institute for the Promotion of Innovation by Science and
Technology in Flanders (IWT).
The grant allows Ablynx to accelerate the speed of exploring a number of new
therapeutic Nanobody® applications, in which their unique properties would
be exploited. These properties include their exceptional stability allowing
pulmonary delivery, small size and exceptional format flexibility and
ability to access targets, so far inaccessible to conventional antibodies,
with the potential to provide a highly efficient virus neutralization
capability. Importantly, this grant will enable Ablynx to expand its
dominant intellectual property portfolio.
Research under the grant will be conducted in collaboration with leading
research groups, including teams at Utrecht University, the Netherlands, led
by Professor Verrips, and with a wide network of academic collaborators in
Belgium (VIB, VUB and KUL), Norway, Germany, the UK, Spain and France.
“We are extremely pleased to tap into world class biological and disease
expertise to exploit new applications for Nanobodies®” said Dr Hans de Haard,
Senior Director Discovery Research at Ablynx. “This research will build on
the data from a concurrent programme in which Nanobodies® have been produced
against a wide variety of targets grouped into target families according to
structural homology or biological links. The target families addressed
include extracellular targets such as transmembrane proteins and receptors,
enzymes, serum proteins and soluble signaling factors.”
Dr Hennie Hoogenboom, Chief Scientific Officer at Ablynx commented: “IWT’s
continued support of Ablynx’s Nanobody® technology platform is very
encouraging. We believe the grant will allow us to explore a number of
innovative therapeutic Nanobody® applications and will help to maintain the
groundbreaking progress we are making, accelerating the exploitation of
Nanobodies® across multiple target classes, whilst continuing to ensure our
IP is protected from ever increasing competition.”
-Ends-
About Ablynx – http://www.ablynx.com
Ablynx is a biopharmaceutical company focused on the discovery and
development of Nanobodies®, a novel class of therapeutic proteins based on
single-domain antibody fragments, for a range of serious and
life-threatening human diseases. The Company began operations in 2001 in
Ghent, Belgium and currently employs over 100 employees.
Ablynx is developing a portfolio of Nanobody®-based therapeutic programmes
in a number of major disease areas, including inflammation, thrombosis,
oncology and Alzheimer’s disease. Already Ablynx has generated Nanobodies®
against more than 100 different disease targets. In vivo efficacy data has
been obtained in 16 in vivo models for Nanobodies® against a range of
different targets.
Ablynx has established a broad patent estate around its Nanobody® technology
platform. It has filed many patent applications describing further aspects
of the Nanobody® technology and its therapeutic applications. Ablynx has
in-licensed intellectual property describing Nanobody® libraries, their
immobilization and use. It also developed and patented a proprietary
procedure for discovering and generating Nanobodies®: the Nanoclone®
technology.
Ablynx has ongoing research collaborations and significant partnerships with
several major pharmaceutical companies, including Boehringer Ingelheim,
Wyeth Pharmaceuticals, Novartis, and P&G Pharma. Ablynx is building a
diverse and broad portfolio of therapeutic Nanobodies® through these
collaborations as well as through its own internal discovery programmes.
Ablynx announced interim phase I data from its first programme, an anti-thrombotic
(ALX-0081) in July this year and another programme is in advanced
preclinical development.
Nanobody® is a registered trademark of Ablynx NV.
About IWT-Flanders – http://www.iwt.be
The Institute for the Promotion of Innovation by Science and Technology in
Flanders (IWT-Flanders) was established in 1991 by the Flemish government as
a regional public institution to provide R&D and innovation support in
Flanders. For this IWT has several financial tools and an annual budget of
EUR 250 million available to support projects for companies, research
institutes as well as for innovation-actors. In addition to direct funding,
a variety of services is provided to the local industry in the field of
technology transfer, partner search, information about international subsidy
options, etc. IWT has also an important co-ordination mission, aiming at a
strong co-operation between all organisations in Flanders, offering
technological innovation services to companies. Over the years IWT has
expanded into the knowledge center for R&D and innovation in Flanders.
Contacts at Northbank Communications:
Sue Charles, Annabel Entress, Justine Lamond, Tony Stephenson
t: +4 (0)20 7268 3002
m: +44 (0)7968 726 585 (SC)
e:
ablynx@northbankcommunications.com
Contacts at Ablynx:
Dr. Edwin Moses
Chairman and CEO
t: +32 (0)9 262 00 07
m: +44 (0)7771 954 193 / +32 (0)473 39 50 68
e: edwin.moses@ablynx.com
Eva-Lotta Allan
Chief Business Officer
t: +32 (0)9 262 00 75
m: +32 (0)475 78 36 21 / +44 (0)7990 570 900
e: eva-lotta.allan@ablynx.com
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