Astex Pharmaceuticals announced yesterday it has signed a five-year strategic drug discovery alliance with Cancer Research Technology Limited (CRT) and Newcastle University.
As partners, the three entities will discover and develop new cancer drugs in collaboration with researchers at the Cancer Research UK Drug Discovery Program at the Northern Institute for Cancer Research (NICR, Newcastle University).
Astex will provide Newcastle University with GBP1 million annual funding during the five-year alliance, supporting research across biology, chemistry, pharmacology, and imaging at the NICR in order to identify and develop new cancer drugs and associated biomarkers, to develop tests and to determine which patients to treat and whether new drugs are working. Astex will retain an option to an exclusive global license for developing and commercializing pharmaceutical products from each alliance project. CRT and Newcastle will be eligible to receive development and regulatory milestone payments on exercise of the options, as well as on products that Astex takes into development; they are also eligible to receive royalties on product sales. The financial terms relating to the milestone payments and royalties have not been disclosed.
This broad strategic drug discovery alliance will provide Astex with world-leading translational research in oncology. The alliance will also build on a previous collaboration between Astex, Newcastle and CRT for FGFr, which is a key cancer target that led to the development of a clinical candidate that Astex’s partners at Janssen have recently taken into a Phase I clinical trial.
This significant collaboration will build on the successes and track records of all involved partners, further developing Cancer Research UK’s world-class cancer treatment research.
Astex Pharmaceuticals is a company focused on the discovery and development of novel small molecule therapeutics with an emphasis on oncology. Currently developing a proprietary pipeline of novel therapies, Astex is creating de-risked products for partnership with leading pharmaceutical companies. The company developed Dacogen and receives significant royalties from its worldwide sales.
For more information, visit www.astx.com
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