SENEXIS ENTERS INTO A COLLABORATION WITH BIOFOCUS TO DEVELOP NOVEL “SMALL MOLECULE” DRUGS FOR THE TREATMENT OF ALZHEIMER’S DISEASE

BioFocus medicinal chemistry capabilities to accelerate the lead discovery of Senexis novel “β-sheet breakers” to inhibit amyloidosis

Cambridge and Chesterford Research Park, UK, 7th March 2005 - Senexis Limited, a private drug development company, and BioFocus plc (AIM: BIO) a world leader in collaborative drug discovery, announced today that they had entered into a collaboration to accelerate the lead discovery of Senexis novel “β-sheet breakers” for the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease. The collaboration will expand Senexis’ growing pipeline of novel compounds for the treatment of ageing-related diseases, such as Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s Diseases and type II diabetes, which have all been linked to a common pathogenic process called “amyloidosis”.

"We are delighted to be collaborating with BioFocus," said David Scopes, Senexis’ Chief Scientific Officer. "Both companies have a wealth of complementary expertise and technologies. We look forward to building our clinical pipeline with BioFocus as collaborative partner."

Commenting on the collaboration David Phillips, BioFocus’ Chief Business Officer, added, “with the strength of Senexis’ discovery programmes I am confident we will make significant progress in the development of drugs to treat amyloidosis.”

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About Senexis

Senexis is a drug development company, dedicated to the discovery of effective treatments and diagnoses of at least 20 incurable, ageing-related diseases, such as type II diabetes and Alzheimer's dementia. These diseases are now widely believed to be caused by a common and fundamental pathogenic mechanism called “amyloidosis”, in which various proteins or peptides stick together to form toxic “soluble oligomers”. Senexis has discovered a highly potent and selective series of compounds for the potential treatment of these ageing-related diseases resulting from amyloidosis. Senexis has recently relocated its operations to Cambridge from Manchester, where the Company was established with £1.4m seed funding from BTG International Limited and The Wellcome Trust Limited in November 2002. Prior to relocation, the Company was awarded Northwest Biotech Start-up of the Year 2003. Further information on Senexis can be found at www.senexis.com .

About BioFocus

BioFocus offers a full range of pre-clinical expertise for discovery biology, medicinal chemistry and molecular informatics to pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies. Founded in 1997, BioFocus is now a recognized expert in three key areas of drug discovery – kinases, GPCRs and ion channels, and provides SoftFocus® libraries targeted at these gene families. Renowned for generating the highest rate of tractable hit series for onward development into pre-clinical candidates, BioFocus has provided its services and/or products to 17 out of the top 20 pharmaceutical companies worldwide. 

For further information, please contact:

Senexis

Mark Treherne, Chief Executive +44 (0)1223 496160

BioFocus +44 (0)1799 533500

David Phillips, Chief Business Officer

Buchanan Communications +44 (0) 020 7466 5000

Rebecca Skye Dietrich / Tim Anderson

De Facto Communications +44 (0) 020 7940 1000

Maria Payne