Sareum Regulatory News (SAR)

10 Jan 2006 07:00

Sareum Holdings PLC10 January 2006 For immediate release 10th January 2006 SAREUM HOLDINGS PLC ("Sareum" or the "Company") HIV/AIDS Collaboration with Idenix Pharmaceuticals, Inc. 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 Idenix Pharmaceuticals, Inc (Idenix). Idenix isbased in Cambridge, Mass, USA, and is engaged in the discovery and developmentof innovative anti-viral therapeutics. Sareum will utilise its expertise and skills in high throughput proteinexpression, purification and structure determination to provide support forIdenix's program to discover new drug candidates for the treatment of patientswith HIV/AIDS. Sareum will seek to illustrate the precise nature and manner inwhich Idenix's potential drug candidates interact with an HIV virus protein thatis thought to be responsible for the development of viral resistance to manycurrently approved HIV/AIDS therapies. In return, Sareum will receive research fees and success milestone payments, themajority of which are expected to be recognized in the financial year to June2006. Financial terms of the agreement were not disclosed. This announcement follows the trading update issued by Sareum on 5th January2006 where the Company stated that it had entered into several collaborations inlate December, one of which is Idenix. Commenting on the agreement, Sareum's Chief Executive Officer, Dr Tim Mitchell,said: "We are delighted that Idenix has chosen Sareum as their partner forprotein structure determination. This collaboration, which is in an importantnew area of medicine to Sareum, validates the flexibility of our technologyplatform. Our track record in securing collaborations such as this demonstrateswe are a partner of choice for high-throughput protein structure determination." For further information please contact: Sareum Holdings 01223 497700Tim Mitchell, Chief Executive Officer Buchanan Communications 020 7466 5000Tim Anderson, Mary-Jane Johnson About Sareum Holdings plcSareum 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 About IdenixIdenix Pharmaceuticals, Inc. is a biopharmaceutical company engaged in thediscovery and development of drugs for the treatment of human viral and otherinfectious diseases. Idenix current focus is on the treatment of infectionscaused by hepatitis B virus, hepatitis C virus and human immunodeficiency virus(HIV). About HIV/AIDSAIDS, acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, is caused by the humanimmunodeficiency virus, or HIV. HIV destroys the body's ability to fightinfections by attacking cells of the immune system. Very soon after an individual becomes infected, the virus is spread throughoutthe body and reproduces itself at extremely rapid rates. As this happens, theimmune system detects the virus and makes antibody, usually within two to fourweeks of infection. The lymph system consists of nodes throughout the body thatcontain immune cells (T-lymphocytes) that trap, attack and destroy HIV (andother unwanted microbes). Eventually the cells in the lymph node becomethemselves infected and the lymph nodes begin to break down. This destruction ofthe nodes allows HIV and any other viruses, bacteria and fungi to "spill over"into the blood stream and attack more cells throughout the body. The destructionof infected lymphocytes by HIV eventually becomes so great that theT-lymphocytes are destroyed faster than they can be replaced, leading to amarkedly weakened immune response. At this point, clinical symptoms of HIVappear, which include opportunistic infections and cancers, a sign that thedisease is in an advanced stage. This entire course of events varies in durationamong individuals, but when untreated usually lasts about 12 years. Although efforts to develop a vaccine have failed to yield promising results,the significant investment in research has led to the development of a number ofdrugs to treat HIV infection. In the United States and Western Europe where there is generally broader accessto HIV drug therapy, many patients have developed drug resistant HIV renderingmultiple drugs ineffective. Resistance can develop whenever there is less thancomplete suppression of virus replication (100% efficacy), a goal that has notyet been achieved. Factors that contribute to lack of 100% efficacy include:sub-optimal potency of the treatment regimen, pharmacokinetics or druginteractions, and side effects and poor tolerance to therapy which can lead toless than optimal adherence to the complex regimens required for HIV treatment. HIV/AIDS Infection - Global Impact €40 million people worldwide are living with HIV infection or AIDS €2.5 million children are infected with HIV •Approximately 21.8 million people have died from AIDS •HIV/AIDS resulted in approximately 3.0 million deaths in 2003 This information is provided by RNS The company news service from the London Stock Exchange