Addex Therapeutics Ltd. (fka ADDXF)

[tykundegex]

News: Addex Regains Rights to Parkinson’s Drug Candidates from Merck

Unclear what "regains" means... did Merck give it back, or did they have a call option on the rights and claimed it back? Either way, shares off 10% on light volume this morning in Zurich.

http://www.addexpharma.ch/press-releases/press-release-details/article/addex-regains-rights-to-parkinsons-drug-candidates-from-merck/


Geneva, Switzerland, 2 September 2011 – Addex Pharmaceuticals (SIX:ADXN), a leading biopharmaceutical company pioneering allosteric modulation-based drug discovery and development, announced today that it will regain all rights to its metabotropic glutamate receptor 4 (mGluR4) positive allosteric modulator (PAM) program from Merck, known as MSD outside the United States and Canada, due to further pipeline prioritization.

"We continue to strongly believe that mGluR4 is a highly attractive target for treating Parkinson’s and other serious diseases,” said Bharatt Chowrira, CEO of Addex. “We recognize the substantial challenges for the pharmaceutical industry today and we thank our partner for this collaboration and the significant advances we made together in targeting this important receptor. We remain committed to pursuing mGluR4 PAM for Parkinson’s and other diseases.”

Under the agreement, Addex will regain rights to intellectual property and know-how and can pursue the program independently.