Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

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

To: Miljenko Zuanic who wrote (915)	4/1/2004 11:19:39 PM
From: Miljenko Zuanic	Respond to of 3559

Free money, free loan (~$18M). Novartis looks silly here. Even IF IL-1 Trap does not move from where it is now (new formulation), $60M can be spent on some new development program. On the other hand REGN so far have excellent record on spending money without visible results, so ... Press Release Source: Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Inc. Regeneron to Receive $42.75 Million from Novartis to Satisfy Novartis' Remaining Funding Obligation for Development of the IL-1 Trap Thursday April 1, 4:07 pm ET Regeneron Also Achieves Development Milestone, Resulting in Loan Forgiveness TARRYTOWN, N.Y.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--April 1, 2004-- Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (Nasdaq: REGN - News) announced today that Novartis Pharma AG has agreed to pay Regeneron $42.75 million to satisfy its obligation to fund development costs for the Interleukin-1 (IL-1) Trap for the nine-month period following notification of Novartis' decision to forgo its right to jointly develop the IL-1 Trap and for the two months prior to that notice. A payment of $34.25 million has been received, and a second payment of $8.5 million will be made on or before April 15, 2004. In addition, Novartis forgave all its outstanding loans to Regeneron based on Regeneron's achieving a development milestone, as contemplated in the collaboration agreement entered into by the two companies in March 2003. The companies agreed that their collaboration with respect to the IL-1 Trap would end on April 15, 2004 and all rights to the IL-1 Trap will then revert to Regeneron. Regeneron and Novartis each retain rights under their agreement to elect to collaborate in the future on the development and commercialization of certain other IL-1 antagonists. Regeneron plans to initiate a Phase IIb study of the IL-1 Trap in patients with rheumatoid arthritis later in 2004. It also intends to conduct studies of the IL-1 Trap in a variety of other inflammatory diseases where interleukin-1 is believed to play a critical role.

To: Miljenko Zuanic who wrote (915)	4/2/2004 8:23:53 PM
From: Miljenko Zuanic	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 3559

Early, and somewhere here at SI I mentioned that Trap bind at least three VEGF form (A-C), due to fact that it is construct of the R1 and R2 receptor. Seams that I was wrong in my assumption. At least not as potently as for VEGF-A,B Trap does not bind C and D at lower conc. jci.org Table1. and graph indicate no binding for VEGF-C/D jci.org jci.org While article deal with VEGF-A rule in corneal hemangiogenesis and lymphangiogenesis, is it possible to translate finding in cancer model field, cancer biology? Interesting that Avastin (which bind C and D even with lower potency relative to Trap, again my assumption) did not generate benefit in late stage metastatic breast cancer (highly lymphangiogenic). Now the question is why Avastin did work in naive metastatic CRC and will it work in metastatic NSCLC????? Miljenko