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Dyax Corp. and Five Prime Therapeutics, Inc. Enter Into Research Agreement for Discovery of Therapeutic Antibodies

^{Published on 2011-04-26 09:55:51 - Market Wire}
 

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. & SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO--([ BUSINESS WIRE ])--Dyax Corp. (NASDAQ:DYAX) and Five Prime Therapeutics, Inc. (FivePrime) announced today that they have entered into an antibody funded research agreement for the discovery of therapeutic antibodies.

"We believe that the combination of FivePrimea™s unique engine for the discovery of innovative biologics with the proven phage display technology of Dyax will generate important human antibodies to modulate FivePrimea™s proprietary targets"

Under the terms of this agreement, Dyax will utilize its proprietary agold-standarda phage display technology to identify therapeutic antibodies for multiple targets from FivePrime, with an option to expand the scope of the collaboration to include additional targets. Dyax will receive technology license fees and full-time employee payments from FivePrime for the funded research as well as clinical and sales milestone payments and royalties on net sales that may result from FivePrimea™s development and commercialization of antibodies from Dyaxa™s libraries.

aThis collaboration holds tremendous potential given the clear fit between Dyaxa™s phage display technology, which enables the rapid identification of drug candidatesto targets of therapeutic interest, and the technology FivePrime employs to identify medically relevant antibody targets,a commented Gustav A. Christensen, President and CEO of Dyax Corp. aOur Licensing and Funded Research Program is a franchise which continues to deliver significant value both in the near-term, through collaborations like the one announced today, and long-term, through its portfolio of 17 clinical product candidates including eight in late-stage clinical trials.a

aWe believe that the combination of FivePrimea™s unique engine for the discovery of innovative biologics with the proven phage display technology of Dyax will generate important human antibodies to modulate FivePrimea™s proprietary targets,a stated Julia P. Gregory, President and CEO of FivePrime. aFivePrime is focused on the innovation of protein and antibody drugs. Dyaxa™s expertise in antibody therapeutic discovery accelerates these efforts, allowing us to expand our growing pipeline of product candidates.a

About Dyaxa™s Phage Display

Dyaxa™s proprietary drug discovery technology, phage display, provides an efficient means to identify compounds that interact with a wide array of therapeutic targets. Dyaxa™s discovery capabilities have been further enhanced through automation, which has enabled the Company to evaluate a large number of molecules binding to each target. In this way, Dyax is able to rapidly identify and select a specific antibody, peptide or small protein with the desired biochemical and biological characteristics. Dyaxa™s state-of-the-art antibody phage display libraries allow for the rapid isolation of fully human target-specific antibodies from a library of billions of unique antibodies. These extensive libraries are screened using in vitro selection strategies that are tailored to increase the yield of lead candidates with the desired therapeutic properties.^1,2

About Dyax

Dyax is a fully integrated biopharmaceutical company focused on discovering, developing and commercializing novel biotherapeutics for unmet medical needs. The Companya™s lead product, ecallantide, has been approved under the brand name KALBITOR^® in the United States for the treatment of acute attacks of hereditary angioedema (HAE) in patients 16 years of age and older.

Dyax is commercializing KALBITOR in the United States independently, and establishing strategic partnerships to develop and commercialize ecallantide for the treatment of HAE in key regions worldwide. Currently, Dyax has partnership agreements for regions including Europe, Japan, Russia, the Middle East, Israel, North Africa, Australia and New Zealand. The company is also exploring other potential indications for ecallantide, either alone or through partnerships, including drug-induced angioedema and retinal vein occlusion-induced macular edema.

Ecallantide and other compounds in Dyaxa™s pipeline were identified using its patented phage display technology, which rapidly selects compounds that bind with high affinity and specificity to therapeutic targets. Dyax leverages this technology broadly as part of its Licensing and Funded Research Program (LFRP), which has 75 revenue generating licenses and collaborations for therapeutic discovery, as well as for affinity separations, diagnostic imaging, and research reagents. The success of the Companya™s LFRP royalty portfolio is illustrated by the programa™s advanced licensee pipeline that includes 17 candidates in clinical development. Of them, four candidates are in Phase 3 clinical trials, four are in Phase 2 and nine are in Phase 1.

About FivePrime

FivePrime Therapeutics, Inc. is a clinical-stage, privately held, biotechnology company discovering and developing innovative protein and antibody therapeutics. Using its novel, high-technology discovery platform, FivePrime is building a strong pipeline of oncology, immunology and metabolic disease drug candidates. FivePrime mines its comprehensive library of secreted and extracellular human proteins to screen for medically relevant new therapeutic proteins and antibody targets. FivePrime has active collaborations with Pfizer, Inc. in the fields of oncology and diabetes and GlaxoSmithKline for skeletal muscle disorders and Human Genome Sciences, Inc. for development and commercialization in the United States, Canada and the EU of FP1039 for solid tumors. For more information about FivePrime, please visit FivePrimea™s web site at [ www.fiveprime.com ].

Dyax Disclaimer

This press release contains forward-looking statements, including statements regarding the expected benefits of Dyaxa™s licensed technology in its license to Five Prime. Statements that are not historical facts are based on Dyaxa™s current expectations, beliefs, assumptions, estimates, forecasts and projections about the industry and markets in which Dyax competes. The statements contained in this release are not guarantees of future performance and involve certain risks, uncertainties and assumptions, which are difficult to predict. Therefore, actual outcomes and results may differ materially from what is expressed in such forward-looking statements. Important factors which may affect the expected benefits of Dyaxa™s license to Five Prime include the risks that: Dyaxa™s future benefits from its non-exclusive licensing program depend on the efforts and priorities of its licensees, which may be subject to changes in the licenseea™s business direction or priorities; others may develop technologies or products superior to Dyaxa™s phage display technologies; Dyax may not be able to obtain and maintain intellectual property protection for its products and technologies; and other risk factors described or referred to in Dyaxa™s most recent Annual Report on Form 10-K and other periodic reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Dyax cautions investors not to place undue reliance on the forward-looking statements contained in this release. These statements speak only as of the date of this release, and Dyax undertakes no obligations to update or revise these statements, except as may be required by law. Dyax specifically disclaims responsibility for information describing Five Prime and its business other than the license with Dyax.

Dyax, the Dyax logo and KALBITOR are the registered trademarks of Dyax Corp.

1. Hoet RM et al. (2005). Generation of high-affinity human antibodies by combining donor-derived and synthetic complementarity-determining-region diversity.Nature Biotechnology, 23(3):344-8.

2. Wassaf D. et al. (2006). High-throughput affinity ranking of antibodies using surface plasmon resonance microarrays.Analytical Biochemistry. 351(2):241-253

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