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

To: nigel bates who wrote (58)	7/23/2003 11:56:21 AM
From: tuck	Respond to of 270

XNVA -- 38% Unclear to me if this one is in addition to the December cuts. >>LONDON -(Dow Jones)- Xenova Group Wednesday provided an update on the R&D reorganisation that followed the cessation of Phase III studies with tariquidar, which was announced on 13th May 2003. The implementation of this reorganisation, which included both headcount reduction and programme prioritisation, is now largely complete. As a result, Xenova will, going forward, focus on its key later stage clinical development programmes. These changes, mainly affecting the research functions in Cambridge and Slough, will result in a headcount of 66 (down from 107) by the end of Q3. More details will be made available at the forthcoming Interim Results Announcement. At the time of the announcement of 13th May, it was stated that a detailed review of the unblinded clinical data on more than 300 patients in the Phase III trials would occur, and that decisions concerning the further development of tariquidar in oncology would be made by QLT Inc and Xenova following this review. The evaluation is continuing and the analysis of P-glycoprotein expression in the lung cancer studies is still pending. QLT will also announce that enrolment in the Phase IIb trial for patients with chemo-refractory breast cancer, which is being carried out at the MD Anderson Centre, Texas, has now been sufficiently completed at 17 patients. Preliminary data on the first 11 patients was presented in a poster at this year's ASCO meeting. To date, one patient has experienced a partial response after tariquidar was used as an adjunctive treatment to the chemotherapy to which the patient had not been previously responding. In addition to the partial response, three patients have shown stable disease after the second cycle of treatment and one continues to be stable at the end of cycle four. QLT will not be enrolling new patients in this trial. Commenting on the impact of the reorganisation, David Oxlade, CEO of Xenova Group said, "We have prioritised resources on the most commercially attractive of the products in our clinical portfolio and substantially reduced operating costs. Currently we have nine products in clinical development, of which four are externally funded programmes. Going forward, we have de-prioritised the majority of our in-house preclinical programmes, except where externally funded, as is the case for the Genentech collaboration on OX-40." << Cheers, Tuck