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Biotech / Medical : HuMAB companies -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Icebrg who wrote (302)	1/18/2002 2:50:15 AM
From: Icebrg	Respond to of 1022

CAT in £55m bid for Canadian drug group By David Firn in London Published: January 17 2002 11:45 \| Last Updated: January 17 2002 16:08 Cambridge Antibody Technology, the UK biotechnology company, has offered C$126m (£55m) in an all-paper bid for Drug Royalty Corporation of Canada. The acquisition, which has the backing of DRC's management and largest shareholders, would double the loss-making company's revenues. CAT, which is still several years away from seeing its products on the market, will use royalties from DRC's portfolio of drug patents to fund development of its medicines. DRC had pre-tax profits of C$9.1m on revenues of C$21.1m in 2001. It also has cash reserves of C$26m. The acquisition frees CAT from a 1994 agreement to pay about 3 per cent of its revenues to DRC until 2009, further boosting cash flow. John Aston, finan ce director, said DRG could be easily integrated with CAT's own royalty gathering activities. "The kind of revenues we are getting here are the same we will be getting on D2E7 [an arthritis medicine licensed to Abbott]. The only difference is we did not originate the drugs," he said. Analysts said the acquisition was a surprise. People would have expected CAT to follow other biotech companies such as Celltech that acquired a profitable pharmaceuticals company. Emma Palmer, analyst at West LB Panmure, said the deal made as much sense as buying a drugs company. "They are using shares to buy cash and cash generation," she said. DRC's royalty portfolio includes blockbuster products such as Johnson & Johnson's arthritis antibody Remicade and Clarinex, a new allergy treatment from Schering-Plough. DRC also receives royalties from Acambis, the UK biotech company that recently won the contract to supply smallpox vaccine to the US government. CAT will not build up the patent portfolio and will not retain DRC's management. CAT is offering shares worth C$3-a-share for DRC, a 7.9 per cent premium on Wednesday's closing price. At that level CAT would issue 3.2m shares, expanding its equity by just under 10 per cent. The Canadian group's management together with MDS Capital and Canadian Medical Discoveries Fund DRC's two largest shareholders have accepted the offer. CAT is being advised by Merrill Lynch. DRC is being advised by HSBC Securities. CAT shares were down 10p at £16.90 on Thursday afternoon. DRC was up 12 cents at C$2.90 in afternoon trading in Toronto. news.ft.com

To: Icebrg who wrote (302)	1/22/2002 3:52:31 AM
From: Icebrg	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 1022

Sanofi in E600m alliance with IDM By Jo Johnson in Paris and Geoff Dyer in London Published: January 21 2002 19:57 \| Last Updated: January 21 2002 21:55 Sanofi-Synthelabo, the French pharmaceutical group, is investing up to E600m ($528m) in the late-stage development and commercialisation of 20 cancer drugs belonging to biotechology firm Immuno-Designed Molecules. As part of the 10-year deal, which is one of the largest ever struck by a European biotech group, Paris-based IDM said Sanofi would also increase its existing 3 per cent stake in the company to about 10 per cent when IDM lists its shares. Founded in 1993 by Jean-Loup Romet-Lemonne, IDM has developed a family of therapeutic drugs to target cancer cells. Since its creation, IDM has raised E73.9m in three rounds of financing. Other shareholders include Medarex, a Nasdaq-listed biotech company, with 29 per cent, Atlas Ventures and Apax. Sanofi will have the right of first refusal over 10 drugs for the first five years of the deal and then two drugs per year for the last five. It will pay an upfront fee of E2m per drug with further milestone payments at each stage of clinical testing as well as a final success fee. Over the past two years, biotechnology firms have been able to strike much better deals with pharmaceutical partners because of the problems the large drugs firms have had in developing new drugs of their own. Celltech, the leader of the biotech industry in the UK, sealed the biggest ever product deal in Europe last year when it licenced its new rheumatoid arthritis drug to Pharmacia of the US for an upfront payment of $50m, potential milestones of $230m and a "significant" share of the profits. Bristol-Myers Squibb of the US signed a deal in September for up to $2bn for a cancer drug being developed by ImClone. However the Food and Drug Administration rejected ImClone's licence application for Erbitux in December, causing the company's share price to plunge 64 per cent. While many deals have been driven by the weakness of the pharmaceutical company's pipeline for new products, Sanofi-Synthelabo is in a much stronger position than most of its rivals. Analysts predict that the Paris-based group will report a 38 per cent increase in net income in 2001 to E1.33bn, boosted by a 60 per cent rise in sales of Plavix, its drug to prevent blood clots. news.ft.com