INCY and PFE substantially expand collaboration re genomic sequence analysis for drug targets; INCY "issued 79 new U.S. patents covering full-length genes during the third quarter" for a total of 453 issued and allowed full-length gene patents; 50,000 human gene patent applications filed; new licensing arangements: biz.yahoo.com
Company Press Release
SOURCE: Incyte Pharmaceuticals, Inc.
Incyte to Complete Patented Drug Target Portfolio in Collaboration With Pfizer; Portfolio to Be Licensed Broadly Through Incyte's Network of LifeSeq Gold Database Users
PALO ALTO, Calif., Nov. 22 /PRNewswire/ -- Incyte Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (Nasdaq: INCY - news), a leading provider of genomic information, announced today that they have expanded their collaboration with Pfizer Inc (NYSE: PFE - news), one of the world's leading pharmaceutical companies, that will provide Incyte with funding, scientific expertise and priorities for the completion of Incyte's patented drug target portfolio.
The joint effort calls for scientists at Incyte and Pfizer to analyze all available sequence data and develop full-length clones for many pharmaceutically relevant drug targets in the human genome. In addition, Incyte plans to file patent applications on these drug targets and license them broadly to LifeSeq® Gold subscribers and its In Silico Partnership Academic Program participants.
Incyte expects that this collection of high quality full-length clones, each of which is a physical copy of an entire gene, will be extremely valuable for high throughput screening of potential drugs. Based on Incyte's progress to date, the company expects the collaborative effort to be largely complete before the end of the year 2000.
''Incyte is committed to compiling a comprehensive set of drug targets from the human genome,'' said Roy A. Whitfield, Chief Executive Officer of Incyte. ''Incyte considers this latest agreement to be the cornerstone for the establishment of a pharmaceutical industry standard for drug target information and intellectual property.''
Whitfield added that the collaboration with Pfizer was prompted by the companies' longstanding relationship, and validates the importance of genomic databases in modern drug development.
Scientists for Pfizer and Incyte will focus on genes that are known to respond to existing drugs. Using its proprietary gene libraries and robotics, Incyte will isolate a full-length clone for each selected gene. These physical clones enable researchers to conduct meaningful laboratory work related to drug development.
To date, Incyte has filed patent applications covering an estimated 50,000 individual human genes. The company was issued 79 new U.S. patents covering full-length genes during the third quarter, bringing its total number of issued and allowed full-length gene patents to 453.
As part of the collaboration, Pfizer's scientists will share their extensive knowledge of drug targets with Incyte's scientists and the two groups will work together on setting priorities. Pfizer also has licensed an undisclosed number of potential, future pharmaceutical products developed using Incyte's proprietary sequences. In addition, Pfizer has agreed to expand its subscriptions beyond Incyte's LifeSeq Gold to the ZooSeq and PathoSeq databases. Furthermore, Pfizer has extended its LifeSeq Gold subscription to run through the end of 2002. Financial terms were not disclosed. [snip] |
