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Biotech / Medical : Biotechnology Value Fund, L.P. -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: scaram(o)uche who wrote (3439)	3/18/2003 4:13:01 AM
From: nigel bates	Respond to of 4974

Another chunk... LONDON -(Dow Jones)- German biotechnology company Cellzome GmbH said Tuesday that it has raised EUR30 million in one of the biggest venture capital injections in the sector, and has been approached by several pharmaceutical companies keen to jointly develop its drugs. The fundraising round comes only a year after Cellzome, which is yet to bring a drug to market or even into clinical trials, raisedEUR34 million in a private placement. This takes the private company's fundraising total to more than EUR72 million since it was founded in May 2000. In contrast, many publicly listed biotech companies are struggling to raise enough funds to continue their research and development programs. Investors have been loathe to support fundraising rounds by public biotechs which have seen their share prices slump. Cellzome Chief Executive David Brown said the cash will fund operations in both Heidelberg and London through to the end of 2004. By then he expects to have secured a deal with at least one pharmaceutical company to jointly develop a drug in return for milestone payments and royalties. Cellzome's first drug is likely to enter clinical trials in 2004. Brown said drugs companies, which are finding it increasingly hard to discover new products, are particularly interested in Cellzome's research into Alzheimer's disease. Brown reckons Cellzome has identified up to 10 drug targets - or potential drugs - for the disease. Brown, formally global head of discovery at Roche Pharma in Basel, Switzerland, told Dow Jones Newswires that he plans to list Cellzome once equity markets are more supportive of biotech fundraising, which he reckons will be at least a year away. Among new Cellzome investors were Invesco, Biofrontier Partners, SG Asset Management, and Yamanouchi Venture Capital. Existing investors including Atlas Ventures, Advent International and Schroder Ventures Life Sciences also took part in the latest round. New investors accounted for more than half of the cash raised. Cellzome, which sprang out of the European Molecular Biology Laboratory in Heidelberg, says its chemistry and protein analysis technology helps cut down the time taken to track down new drugs for diseases including Alzheimer's, cancer and metabolic conditions. -By Susannah Rodgers, Dow Jones Newswires; 44 20 7842 9269; susannah.rodgers@dowjones.com