S R Pharma financial results reflect siRNA plans
2005, which show the continued consolidation of Research and
Development costs as resources were diverted to acquire contract
development services provider, Atugen.
The acquisition serves as an indication of S R Pharma's intention to establish third party collaborations in the RNAi field with biotech and pharmaceutical companies in order to accelerate the development and commercialisation of therapeutic products emerging from this technology.
"Whilst we intend to continue to generate contract research revenues as appropriate utilising our proprietary technology the primary focus will be to establish RNAi therapeutic product collaborations," the company said.
Figures for the six months detailed a post tax loss of approximately £725,000, and bank balances of £1.75 million,(€2.6 million).
As a result of these transactions there are now approximately 90.3m shares in issue, compared to 23.9m at 30 June, trading at 30p at the time of writing.
After running costs for both operational entities since June, the bank balances currently stand at approximately £10 million.
In June of this year, the company acquired Atugen for a total of £6.16 million in a deal that attempted to kickstart S R Pharma's intention to develop novel therapeutic applications based on the company's proprietary M. vaccae technology.
S R Pharma's work with Mycobacterium vaccae is based on the premise that this organism has immunoregulatory properties that can be exploited for the treatment of tuberculosis (caused by the distantly related Mycobacterium tuberculosis).
The organism, or materials and molecules derived from it, can also be used to correct immunoregulatory defects that underlie the increases in allergic disorders in developed countries, and that hamper the immune response to certain cancers.
An international programme of clinical trials has investigated two treatments based on the Mycobacterium vaccae organism.
SRL172 is a therapeutic agent for cancer and for the prevention and treatment of tuberculosis. A second product, SRP 299, has undergone clinical trials for the treatment of atopy. An oral formulation is currently being evaluated.
The area of siRNA as therapeutics is a sector that is currently experiencing a period of prosperity. Indeed functional genomics and systems biology is a very broad market that is experiencing large growth due to the introduction and widescale acceptance of siRNA technology.
RNAi/siRNA technology is currently the "hot property" in NA-based therapeutics, although it is still very much in its early stages of development with the challenge of commercialisation undertaken by a host of companies.
Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Sirna Therapeutics and Acuity Pharmaceuticals, Inc. as its major direct competitors in the therapeutic RNA interference area using synthetic siRNA molecules.
There are other potential competitors, e.g. Benitec, and Nucleonics, which are using a form of RNA known as "expressed short hairpin RNA" molecules.
However, these companies may face the same difficulties as those faced by gene therapy companies, namely delivery and persistent expression in the target cells.
