Sareum Regulatory News (SAR)

27 Oct 2005 07:00

Sareum Holdings PLC27 October 2005 For immediate release 27 October 2005 SAREUM HOLDINGS PLC ("Sareum" or the "Company") Sareum Announces Collaboration with Schering AG Sareum Holdings plc (AIM: SAR), the specialist structure-based drug discoveryand services business, is pleased to announce that it has entered into acollaborative agreement with Schering AG, Germany (FSE: SCH, NYSE: SHR), aglobal research-based pharmaceutical company with sales in excess of $6 Billionin 2004. The aim of the collaboration is for Sareum to provide protein structuredetermination capabilities to accelerate drug discovery research at Schering. Sareum will utilise its expertise in high throughput protein expression,purification and structure determination to demonstrate how Schering's potentialdrug candidates interact with their target protein receptor. In return, Sareumwill receive research fees and success milestone payments. Financial terms of the agreement were not disclosed. Commenting on the agreement, Sareum's Chief Executive Officer, Dr Tim Mitchell,said: "We are delighted that Schering has chosen Sareum as their partner inprotein structure determination. This is a further important collaboration thatSareum has signed with a major international pharmaceutical company. Revenuesgenerated in collaborations such as this are valuable sources of financialsupport for our in-house cancer research programs. We look forward to successfuldelivery of this project to Schering and to closing additional partnerships suchas this." For further information: Sareum ContactsSareum Holdings 01223 497700Tim Mitchell, Chief Executive Officer Buchanan Communications 020 7466 5000Tim Anderson, Mary-Jane Johnson Notes for editors: About Sareum Holdings plc Sareum Holdings plc is a specialist structure based drug discovery and servicesbusiness headquartered in Cambridge, UK. The Company was formed in August 2003to discover new drugs for the treatment of cancer and to provide a range of drugdiscovery services to the pharmaceutical industry. Sareum's unique approach aimsto halve the time it takes to discover new drug candidates. Structure-based drug discovery involves the determination of a disease causingprotein's three-dimensional structure. Once the structure is known, novelchemical entities are designed to 'lock-in' to the protein with the aim ofreversing or arresting a disease's progression. Sareum's approach to structure based drug discovery is to produce multiplerecombinant proteins primarily through a baculovirus expression system;determine their structure using x-ray crystallography; and then use itsinnovative template-molecule x-ray screening technology to identify new chemicalentities designed to interact with the target protein. Sareum then uses itshigh-throughput medicinal chemistry platform to rapidly synthesise furthermolecules and develop the most promising into potential drug candidates. Sareum provides its specialist drug discovery capabilities to partners in thepharmaceutical and biotechnology industries. The Company aims to successfullydeliver: Programmes for complete gene-to-candidate structure-based discovery;projects to accelerate or improve the productivity of specific activities; anddrug candidates for licensing at the Phase I or Phase II clinical trials stage. Sareum joined the AIM Market of the London Stock Exchange in October 2004 andtrades under the symbol SAR. For further information, please visitwww.sareum.co.uk This information is provided by RNS The company news service from the London Stock Exchange