Preclinical services news in brief

MIR Preclinical Services (MIR)​ has expanded its range of service offerings to include studies of inflammation and inflammatory pathways, including in vivo​ models of inflammation and autoimmune diseases, as well as complementary in vitro​ and ex vivo​ work. The firm said it will now also be providing custom model development and services to meet the specific needs of its clients. The contract research organisation (CRO) already offers preclinical services in the field of oncology and said that because inflammation is an "aspect of many diseases​", it wanted to take the opportunity expand its services into this broad area as well. Joe Cornicelli, MIR's director of Inflammation Services said: "I see a great deal of opportunity and overlap between oncology and inflammation. Many of the newer targets for oncology drugs also play a key role in inflammation​". "Our ability to add imaging modalities to our standard pharmacology studies makes us a unique provider within the CRO industry​", he added. Meanwhile, US-based Commonwealth Biotechnologies (CBI)​ has announced a new partnership with New Zealand Pharmaceuticals (NZP), under which the two firms will jointly provide their drug development services, in order to reach a wider market. NZP's managing director Dr Richard Garland said that the arrangement was formed to "enhance​" the product offering of both companies. Via an exclusive referral and co-marketing arrangement, the two firms will provide drug discovery companies with a range of small molecule chemistry products and services, focused on glycotherapeutic products, for use throughout the drug development spectrum, from research, to process scale-up and commercialisation. Under the alliance, CBI's subsidiary, Exelgen will provide customers with research products and services, while NZP will supply clients with identified preclinical lead candidates, as well as good manufacturing practice (GMP) standard products for clinical applications and beyond. In other news, Solvay Pharmaceuticals has extended its long-standing research collaboration with Innogenetics​ for another two years, until December 2010. The extended program will continue to explore potential biomarkers and develop diagnostic assays that could serve as companion diagnostic products for selected Solvay therapeutics programs. Under the deal, Innogenetics will retain rights for development of biomarkers for commercialisation in diagnostic kits. Since November 1997, the two firms have worked together on a joint research program to explore new targets for Solvay's drug development activities. The initial arrangement involved a payment to Innogenetics of €4m and annual research funding ranging from €1.5m to €2m, and the company was also eligible to receive clinical trial-related milestone payments and royalties on product sales. This original five-year contract was first extended in 2002 for three more years with the specific aim of validating the previously identified drug targets by molecular biological and immunohistochemical means. In 2006, the arrangement was again renewed and even expanded towards biomarker research, whereby Innogenetics was asked to use its "expertise in diagnostic assay development​." Les Turski, head of Global Drug Discovery in Solvay Pharmaceuticals said: "The previous collaboration with Innogenetics has contributed considerably to Solvay's target discovery programmes​." "The present collaboration and its extension should allow us to define several biomarker assays in support of our long-term pharmaceutical research activities, and could improve therapeutic decision-making through the use of companion diagnostics.​"