Abgenix And Curagen To Develop Up To 250 Antibody Therapeutic Candidates
Abgenix, Inc. (Nasdaq: ABGX), an antibody-based biopharmaceutical company and CuraGen Corporation (Nasdaq: CRGN), an integrated genomics-based drug discovery and development company, announced today the expansion of their strategic alliance to develop and commercialize genomics-based antibody drugs using XenoMouse™ technology and CuraGen’s suite of functional genomic technologies. The goal of this collaboration is to develop antibody therapeutics against the most promising antibody drug targets within the human genome. Throughout this five-year alliance, the companies intend to develop and test up to 250 fully human antibody therapeutic candidates, expanding upon their original agreement to develop up to 120 candidates. The antibody therapeutic candidates are intended to treat a broad range of diseases, including metabolic diseases, cancer, inflammation and autoimmune disorders. Under this new agreement, CuraGen will work exclusively with Abgenix to develop selected antibodies, and Abgenix will make an equity investment in CuraGen totaling $50 million. In addition, each company expects to invest an additional $100 million in support of this collaboration over the life of the agreement.
"Abgenix is pleased to be expanding its highly productive relationship with CuraGen, a leading genomics company with a very impressive collection of antibody drug targets derived from the human genome," stated R. Scott Greer, President and CEO of Abgenix. "Our scientists are very impressed with CuraGen’s genomics-based target discovery efforts, which we consider an ideal complement to our antibody product generation capability."
"CuraGen has systematically harvested and characterized 2,182 potential antibody drug targets from the human genome. Our expanded collaboration with Abgenix provides us with a breakthrough technology that is enabling us to turn these targets into drugs on a scale, and at a speed, not previously attainable," said Jonathan M. Rothberg, Ph.D., Founder, Chairman, and CEO of CuraGen Corporation. "In only nine months we have advanced from target discovery to potential targets based upon their relevance to human disease. CuraGen and Abgenix scientists will then select the most promising 250 targets to raise antibodies against, and test the resulting fully human antibodies in cell and animal disease models, prior to developing them as potential therapeutics," added Dr. Rothberg.
CuraGen is applying its suite of functional genomic technologies to identify, qualify, validate and deliver a total of 250 antibody drug targets to Abgenix over a five-year period. Through the application of its XenoMouse™ technology, Abgenix is accelerating the drug development process by rapidly generating fully human antibodies against CuraGen’s drug targets. This approach is designed to systematically produce antibody drugs to treat unmet medical needs in a shorter period of time than has been previously possible. CuraGen and Abgenix will then each select the most promising antibodies to complete preclinical testing and enter their respective clinical development programs.
Antibodies are naturally occurring proteins used by the body’s immune system to combat many diseases. As therapeutic products, antibodies have several potential advantages over other therapies. The highly specific interaction between an antibody and its target may, for example, reduce unwanted side effects that may occur with other therapies. Fully human antibodies are desirable because they avoid the risk of rejection present with mouse or partial mouse antibodies.
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