Partnership Update
In September 2002 IDEC and Nippon Shinyaku Co., Ltd. signed a licensing agreement for a novel, small-molecule, anti-cancer therapeutic agent, known as HMN-214. Nippon Shinyaku has granted IDEC a worldwide license for the therapeutic agent, except in Japan and Asia.
The license agreement includes an up-front payment to Nippon Shinyaku. Additional payments are contingent upon successful completion of future milestones. Further payments to Nippon Shinyaku may be forthcoming in the form of royalties from future product sales in IDEC’s territories.
HMN-214 is an orally administered stilbene pro-drug which has shown anti-tumor activity in a broad spectrum of human tumor cell lines in pre-clinical studies.
Clinical Trial Update
NS Pharma, Inc., a U.S. subsidiary of Nippon Shinyaku, is conducting Phase I clinical trials of HMN-214 in patients within the U.S. with advanced or metastatic cancer who have progressed or relapsed from standard cancer therapies. IDEC will be responsible for further worldwide development of this product outside Asia.