Joint grant awarded

GPC Biotech and Ingenium Pharmaceuticals have received a joint grant totaling Euro 2.2m in committed funding from the BMBF (German Ministry for Education and Research) through its BioChancePLUS programme. Each company is to receive grant money totaling €1.1m until the year 2007.

This funding will support collaborative drug discovery efforts with the goal of rapidly advancing novel drug targets toward clinical testing. The grant was transferred from Axxima Pharmaceuticals to GPC Biotech and involves collaborative work initiated between Axxima and Ingenium. The goal of the collaboration is to establish proof of concept for the activity of specific kinase inhibitors in animal models covering several disease areas.

Dr Bernd Seizinger, chief executive officer of GPC Biotech, said: 'We are very pleased with the value already being generated by the new employees we hired and the expanded capabilities brought in through the Axxima acquisition. The BioChance Plus funding will help us to further optimize the value of the expertise we acquired when we purchased the Axxima assets. In addition, the program offers significant upside potential if any compounds discovered under the collaboration move forward in development or eventually make it to the market'

'Ingenium sees great potential that this joint research continues with the capabilities and commitment of GPC Biotech,' commented Dr Michael Nehls, chief executive officer at Ingenium. 'As part of the work to date, Ingenium has applied its disease-specific in vivo expertise to advance several high-value kinase discoveries that have strategic potential for Ingenium's therapeutic research or provide the option for generating value with a third party. We are pleased to have government support for these exciting projects and the further collaboration with GPC Biotech.'