Galapagos announces
natural compounds collaboration with LEO Pharma
Mechelen, Belgium
and Ballerup, Denmark; 1 November 2006 – Galapagos
NV (Euronext & LSE: GLPG) announces a first collaboration
with privately-held LEO Pharma, a leader in dermatology
treatments and critical care. BioFocus DPI, Galapagos’
service division, will use a subset of its natural compound
collection for high throughput screening, hit verification,
and profiling of selected compounds for LEO Pharma’s
antibacterial research program. In return, Galapagos stands
to receive up to €400,000 in project fees and up to
€3 million in milestone payments. Galapagos may also
receive royalties on sales of commercial products resulting
from the collaboration.
Today’s agreement
with LEO Pharma marks Galapagos’ first for its natural
compound collection, acquired with the drug discovery activities
of Discovery Partners International in July 2006. It focuses
on the discovery of new antibacterial agents using specific
targeted screens. Screens for new antibiotics are particularly
appropriate for natural product discovery.
“We are pleased with
this new collaboration in many ways. Not only do we initiate
a relationship with LEO Pharma, but we also confirm the
interest from the market for our newly-acquired natural
compounds collection and technologies by landing this high-value
deal within only a few months after closing the DPI transaction,”
said Onno van de Stolpe, Chief Executive Officer of Galapagos.
“We at LEO Pharma
are delighted to enter into this collaboration with BioFocus
DPI and expect that gaining access to their significant
repository of natural product subfractions will strengthen
our antibiotic drug discovery program. We trust this will
be the start of a successful and long term arrangement to
discover new pharmaceutical natural products,” said
Dr. Tore Duvold, Vice President for Drug Discovery at LEO
Pharma.
BioFocus DPI natural
compounds
Natural compounds are a
major source of new medicines, as nearly half of drugs brought
to market in the last 20 years originated from compounds
derived from nature. With their unique organic characteristics,
natural compounds are especially important for drug development
against certain target classes. BioFocus DPI’s natural
compound collections are based on bacterial and fungal sources,
offering characteristics differentiating these from synthetic
chemistry collections, including high chemical and functional
diversity, potent pharmacological activities over a broad
range of biological targets, and desirable physicochemical
properties.
About Galapagos
Galapagos is a publicly traded, genomics-based drug discovery
company (Euronext Brussels, GLPG; Euronext Amsterdam, GLPGA,
London AiM: GLPG) that has drug discovery programs based
on proprietary, novel targets in bone and joint diseases
- osteoarthritis, osteoporosis and rheumatoid arthritis.
Galapagos offers a full suite of target-to-drug discovery
products and services to pharmaceutical and biotech companies
through its division BioFocus DPI, encompassing target discovery
and drug discovery services through to delivery of pre-clinical
candidates. In addition, BioFocus DPI provides adenoviral
reagents for rapid identification and validation of novel
drug targets and compound libraries for drug screening.
Galapagos currently employs more than 330 people, including
144 PhDs, and operates facilities in seven countries, with
global headquarters in Mechelen, Belgium. More information
about Galapagos and BioFocus DPI can be found at www.glpg.com.
About LEO Pharma
LEO Pharma A/S is a research-based,
fully integrated pharmaceutical company among the world’s
leading players in dermatology and critical care. The foundation-owned
company is headquartered in Denmark, employs 3,000 people
in 40 countries and markets its products in 90 countries.
Further information about LEO Pharma can be found at www.leo-pharma.com.
CONTACT
Galapagos NV
Onno van de Stolpe, CEO
Tel: +31 6 2909 8028
ir@glpg.com
LEO Pharma A/S
Adam Estrup
Director, Corporate Communications
Tel: +45 72 26 23 53
adam.estrup@leo-pharma.com
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