[That number includes Roche’s latest deal with PDLI (#msg-4050025, but it excludes separate partnership deals involving Roche’s majority-owned subsidiary, Genentech.]
>> ZURICH, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Roche Holding AG (ROG.VX: Quote, Profile, Research) will jointly develop a new asthma treatment with U.S. biotech firm Protein Design Labs Inc (PDLI.O: Quote, Profile, Research) in a move that continues the Swiss drug maker's strategy of co-developing drugs.
Roche will pay PDL $17.5 million upfront as well as $187.5 million in development and commercialisation fees for rights to Zenapax as a treatment for moderate to severe asthma, the companies said on Thursday. The two firms will share the development costs, with Roche marketing the drug outside the U.S. and paying PDL royalties. … Analysts welcomed the deal, noting that the treatment -- which recently produced positive Phase II data in asthma patients -- would complement Roche's other asthma therapy, R411, which is currently undergoing Phase II-b testing.
"Today's deal offers Roche an opportunity to get some profile in the asthma market ahead of progress with its promising Phase II drug R411," ABN AMRO analyst Adrian Howd said in a note.
Zenapax is already approved for preventing organ rejection following renal transplants, and Roche paid $26.6 million in 1989 to buy the worldwide rights to the drug for that indication.
"We see this news as a small positive for Roche today," Howd said. "Clearly Roche is interested enough in the asthma data to revisit the drug, and PDL appear to have negotiated a decent deal."
Roche has increasingly turned its attention towards smaller biotech firms in the search for new drugs in order to boost its product pipeline, signing over 43 development agreements with partner companies in 2003 alone.
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