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Mountain View, California (June 20, 2002) - SurroMed, Inc. today
announced that it has entered into a two-year collaborative research
agreement with Biogen, Inc. (Nasdaq: BGEN) to study patients with
multiple sclerosis (MS) and characterize patient responses to
Biogen's AVONEX® (Interferon-beta-1a). SurroMed will use its
proprietary, integrated platform for biological marker discovery
and comprehensive phenotyping to identify biological markers that
are useful for discovering and developing new MS drugs and that
can be commercialized as diagnostic tests to guide and improve
MS patient care and treatment.
Under the agreement, Biogen and SurroMed will undertake clinical
research, and SurroMed will analyze patient samples in its Biomarker
Discovery Laboratory using its proprietary systems and methods
for advanced proteomic, metabolomic and cytometric analysis. SurroMed
will integrate, analyze and mine study data using its proprietary
suite of informatics tools to identify biological markers and
disease pathways.
Under the terms of the collaboration, SurroMed will receive research
funding, a technology access fee, and success payments contingent
upon achievement of certain objectives. In addition, SurroMed
will receive revenues from sales of diagnostic tests discovered
under the agreement. Additional financial terms were not disclosed.
"We are delighted to have the opportunity to collaborate
with Biogen, the worldwide leader in MS therapeutics," said
Gordon Ringold, Ph.D., CEO and Chairman of SurroMed. "We
look forward to combining SurroMed's unique biomarker discovery
and comprehensive phenotyping capabilities with Biogen's extensive
expertise and experience in MS to better understand disease pathways
and individual patient response to therapy."
Burt Adelman, M.D., Biogen's Executive Vice President of Research
and Development, said "Biogen is committed to continuing
to provide and develop the best therapeutics for patients with
MS. We are pleased to access SurroMed's cutting-edge technology
in this collaboration, another example of our determination to
understand the basis of this disease and how best to treat it."
About SurroMed, Inc.
Headquartered in Mountain View, California, SurroMed focuses on
discovering and applying biological markers to (i) improve the
drug discovery and development process; and (ii) enable the precise
diagnosis and personalized treatment of disease. SurroMed uses
its platform for biological marker discovery and comprehensive
phenotyping to discover root causes of disease, the molecular
basis for patient-to-patient variations in disease presentation,
progression and response to therapy, and to understand how drugs
work. SurroMed's research process yields biological markers and
information that enable accelerated, cost-efficient discovery
and development of new therapeutic products, as well as development
of diagnostics tests for early disease detection, disease staging
and stratification, and guiding and monitoring therapy. SurroMed's
platform for biological marker discovery and comprehensive phenotyping
incorporates proprietary advanced technologies for profiling and
analyzing thousands of immune cell populations, proteins and low-molecular-weight
organic molecules (such as sugars, peptides or lipids) in small
volumes of blood and/or other biological samples. By capturing,
integrating and analyzing large amounts of clinical and biological
information-at the level of the cell, gene, protein, and low-molecular-weight
organic molecule-SurroMed identifies useful biological markers
and provides a complete picture of the pathways involved in disease
and therapeutic response.
Contacts:
SurroMed, Inc.
August J. Moretti
CFO and General Counsel
(650) 230-1961
email: [email protected]
Noonan/Russo Communications, Inc.
Ian R. McConnell
Senior Account Executive
415) 677-4455 ext. 233
email: [email protected]
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