15th May 2006 07:06
Vectura Group PLC15 May 2006 VECTURA AND UNILEVER VENTURES ANNOUNCE THE SPIN OUT OF PHARMAKODEX, A NEW SPECIALITY PHARMACEUTICAL COMPANY Chippenham/London - May 15 2006: Vectura Group plc (LSE: VEC) ("Vectura") andUnilever Ventures Ltd today announced that they have jointly established a newspeciality pharmaceutical company, PharmaKodex Ltd ("PharmaKodex"), to develop apipeline of pharmaceutical prescription (Rx) and consumer health (OTC) productsutilising a range of proprietary oral and transdermal and enabling technologiesfrom Vectura and Unilever. With its concentration on pulmonary technologies, Vectura transferred its oraland dermal technologies to a 100% owned Vectura subsidiary, PharmaKodex Ltd, in2005 In addition, the Unilever Group companies have licensed to PharmaKodex twoenabling technologies for use in pharmaceutical products. PharmaKodex Ltd willbenefit from Unilever's technical and industrial know how. PharmaKodex is developing a pipeline of improved medicinal products, focusing onre-purposing existing drugs for new indications or combinations, or to providean improved route of administration. The PharmaKodex development pipelinecurrently comprises 7 prescription products and 6 OTC products. PharmaKodex has initiated operations with a strong management team. ChiefExecutive Officer, Mr Rod Richards, held senior management roles in business andcommercial development at Glaxo and SmithKline Beecham, and most recently wasCEO at Microscience PLC where he led the business from start up to a successfultrade sale in 2005. Prof. John Staniforth, currently Chief Scientific Officer atVectura, will move to PharmaKodex whilst maintaining a scientific advisory roleat Vectura. Technologies assigned to PharmaKodex by Vectura include a novel 'solid syrup'technology capable of rapid dissolution as well as controlled drug delivery anda 'patchless' unit dose transdermal delivery system capable of delivering highdrug payloads with controllable skin fluxes. Unilever has licensed a particleformulation / solubilisation nanotechnology from Iota NanoSolutions Limited, aUnilever Ventures spin-out and a novel encapsulation technology from Unileverplc to PharmaKodex. Both the Unilever technologies were developed by itsCorporate Research Group. Vectura and Unilever Ventures will each retain a significant shareholding inPharmaKodex. Further equity financing will come from specialist venture capitalinvestors. Dr Chris Blackwell, Chief Executive of Vectura, said: "Vectura has alwaysbelieved there to be value in its oral and dermal technologies. While our focusis now on the development of our own inhaled drugs for local and systemic use,we believe that the spin-out of these technologies to PharmaKodex is the idealway to retain a share in that value. We look forward to the strong growth ofPharmaKodex and our good wishes go to the management." Andrew Lane of Unilever Ventures said: "Unilever makes a significant investmentin developing formulation and delivery technologies which have broad utilityacross its range of consumer brands. We identified the potential for some ofthese technologies to provide unique benefits when applied in pharmaceuticalapplications. By aligning our technologies with the assets, drug deliverycapabilities and expertise of Vectura and the first rate management team atPharmaKodex, we have created what I believe will be a strong new investeecompany." Enquiries: Vectura Group Plc Tel + 44 (0) 1249 667700Dr Chris Blackwell, Chief ExecutiveAnne Hyland, CFO Unilever Ventures Ltd Tel: +44 (0) 20 7321 6199Andrew Lane, Director PharmaKodex Ltd Tel + 44 (0) 1249 667 667Rod Richards, Chief Executive Financial Dynamics Tel: + 44 (0) 20 7831 3113David Yates / Sarah MacLeod/John Gilbert Notes for Editors: About Vectura Vectura's principal focus is the development of a range of inhaled drugs for thetreatment of both lung diseases and other conditions where optimised deliveryvia the lungs can provide significant benefits, such as a rapid onset of action,improved efficacy and improved tolerability compared with current therapies. Vectura's strategy is to combine its proprietary, innovative, pulmonaryformulation and device technologies (PowderHale(R), Aspirair(R) and GyroHaler(R)) with existing, off-patent drugs either for use in new indications or toprovide inhalation as an improved route of administration. The Company seeks tolicense its lead products to pharmaceutical companies with established sales andmarketing infrastructures for the later stages of development and forcommercialisation, typically prior to Phase III clinical development. TheCompany has development collaborations with a number of companies, includingBoehringer Ingelheim Novartis, GSK, Chiesi and an unnamed leading internationalpharmaceutical company. For further information, please visit Vectura's websiteat www.vectura.com About Unilever Ventures Unilever Ventures is the London-based venture capital arm of the Unilever Group.It provides venture capital funding and management skills to start-up and earlystage companies. The company is 4 years into investing its first fund of €66mand has 13 investee companies. Technology spin-outs from the Unilever Groupcomprise a significant part of its portfolio, leveraging Unilever's scientificexpertise into different industries. Unilever Ventures also focuses onconsumer-facing businesses in Europe where it can draw upon the Unilever Group'sexpertise in Food and Home & Personal Care products and services. For further information, please visit www.unileverventures.com. About PharmaKodex PharmaKodex Ltd is a speciality pharmaceuticals company exploiting proprietarydrug delivery technologies to develop improved medicinal products (IMPs). IMPsprovide a well accepted reduced risk business model from which PharmaKodex willcreate value in both the Pharmaceutical and Consumer Healthcare/OTC sectors. PharmaKodex will commercialise its products and technologies in an overlappingtwo-stage process. Initially the company will bring forward a small number ofOTC products. PharmaKodex aims to develop these proprietary OTC developments forrapid product introductions as extensions to branded goods franchises, incollaboration with global partners. In parallel PharmaKodex will develop its Rxpipeline to Phase II before partnering. For further information, please visit PharmaKodex's website atwww.pharmakodex.com. This information is provided by RNS The company news service from the London Stock ExchangeRelated Shares:
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