Galapagos signs up to one billion euros deal with J&J
Posted by Dr.Osteo on October 25, 2007
BRUSSELS, Oct 24 (Reuters) - Belgian biotechnology company Galapagos (GLPG.BR: Quote, Profile, Research) said on Wednesday it had signed a deal potentially worth up to one billion euros with Johnson & Johnson (JNJ.N: Quote, Profile, Research) unit Janssen Pharmaceutica.
Galapagos, which specialises in bone and joint diseases, will enter into a global alliance with Janssen on rheumatoid arthritis research. Highlights include up to 430 million euros in development and regulatory milestone payments should more than one product be launched and up to 346 million euros of sales milestones as well as double-digit royalties.
“This deal gives the company access to the necessary funds and expertise to bring its RA products much closer to the market. Together with the GSK deals, this significantly improves Galapagos’s long-term potential and reduces the risk profile of the company”, KBC Securities said in morning research note.
Galapagos already has a major alliance with GlaxoSmithKline (GSK.L: Quote, Profile, Research) in osteoarthritis, with up to 186 million euros in milestone payments and potential double-digit royalties.
Van de Stolpe said he saw the Janssen deal as a model for its other programme for brittle bone disorder osteoporosis.
“We believe that pharma is looking for a risk-sharing alliance and is willing to pay big bucks and share the upside through royalty agreements,” he said. source
On 26 June 2007 – Galapagos NV announced today that Wyeth has exercised its right to license three proprietary bone anabolic drug targets from their 2003 research agreement in osteoporosis, resulting in a €1.05 million milestone payment to Galapagos.
This is the second milestone reached in the osteoporosis collaboration initiated in November 2003. In the collaboration, Galapagos has applied its osteoporosis disease expertise to discover and validate novel drug targets for Wyeth. In November 2004, Wyeth selected a set of these targets for internal validation. Today’s milestone announcement is the result of Wyeth licensing three targets for its internal drug discovery research efforts. Under the terms of the 2003 agreement, Galapagos could receive milestone payments of up to €30 million from the collaboration. The targets involved in the Wyeth collaboration are unrelated to the suite of proprietary validated targets in Galapagos’ own osteoporosis program.
“Wyeth licensing targets identified by Galapagos speaks to the strengths and uniqueness of our target discovery approach,” said Onno van de Stolpe, Chief Executive Officer of Galapagos. “The expertise which led to this milestone with Wyeth also forms the basis for our own portfolio of novel targets in osteoporosis.” source
