Update on Medicinal Chemistry Collaboration

    RNS Number : 2229Y
  EiRx Therapeutics PLC
  03 July 2008
   


    EIRX THERAPEUTICS PLC
    ("EiRx" or "the Company")
    Update on medicinal chemistry collaboration with University College Cork
    Cork, Ireland - EiRx Therapeutics plc (AIM: ERX), the drug discovery company developing targeted therapies for cancer, is pleased to
update shareholders on the progress of its Innovation Partnership collaboration with Professor Anita Maguire, Chair of Pharmaceutical
Chemistry at University College Cork ("UCC"), Ireland.
    As previously announced, the parties entered the collaboration to establish a medicinal chemistry team in Cork, working under the
supervision of Professor Maguire to optimise compounds emerging from the Company's EnPADTM drug discovery platform and advance them towards
clinical trials. The refinancing undertaken by the Company in February 2008 enabled the Company to meet its financial obligations under the
collaboration, and thus to begin the process of recruitment and initiation of the project. The Company is pleased to advise that the
technical research programme has begun following a rigorous recruitment process resulting in the appointment of two experienced chemists, Mr
Andrew Osnowski and Dr Nicolas Brondel.

    Andrew Osnowski brings to the EiRx / UCC collaborative team a decade of experience in the chemical optimisation of new drug candidates,
earned in the commercial environment. Most recently he was Medicinal Chemistry Team Leader at Scottish Biomedical, where he was responsible
for the management of research teams engaged in the contracted development of new pharmaceutical agents for an international roster of
commercial clients. During this time teams under his management successful advanced a number of client projects from hit compounds through
to optimised "drug-like" products. Prior to his four years with Scottish Biomedical, Mr Osnowski held a series of research chemist positions
in biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies, including two years in the medicinal chemistry team at Cyclacel Pharmaceuticals, a developer
of kinase inhibitor drugs for the treatment of cancer. He holds a first-class honours degree in Chemistry from the University of
Strathclyde.

    Dr Nicolas Brondel comes to the EiRx / UCC partnership from a post-doctoral research position at UCC, where he spent two years
investigated the role of the sulphur atom on the solid state structure of pharmaceutical compounds. He gained his PhD in Organic Chemistry
from the Universitde Poitiers, France, for work on the synthesis of phosphatase inhibitor compounds with potential anticancer utility. His
considerable expertise in pharmaceutical synthetic chemistry is expected to have a decisive influence on the success of the Innovation
Partnership programme.

    Commenting on developments in the Innovation Partnership programme, Dr Colin Telfer, Chief Executive Officer of EiRx, said: "We are
delighted to have attracted two such experienced chemists to the project, and to see work begin in our collaborator Professor Maguire's
state-of-the-art laboratories. The combining of medicinal chemistry expertise with our EnPADTM cellular screening platform technology is a
watershed moment for EiRx, as an effective drug discovery engine requires both elements of biology and chemistry. We are already feeling the
benefit our medicinal chemists' input into our product development effort, and have high expectations for the programme over the two years
of the partnership project."


    For further information, please contact:

 EiRx Therapeutics plc                      [phone]
 Colin Telfer PhD, Chief Executive Officer
 Grant Thornton Corporate Finance           [phone]
 Philip Secrett / Colin Aaronson


    ENDS


    Notes for Editors


    About EiRx
    EiRx Therapeutics (AIM: ERX) is a research-driven healthcare company developing cutting-edge targeted therapies for the treatment of
cancer. Headquartered in Cork, Ireland, the Company conducts drug discovery focused on tumours arising due to anomalies in apoptosis and
cellular growth regulatory pathways, with particular relation to breast and colorectal tumours, currently two of the four leading causes of
death from cancer world-wide.

    EiRx is built on leading scientific expertise in the areas of apoptosis biology, cancer pathway biology, biomarker technologies and the
metabolic basis of drug resistance in tumours. It has established technical capabilities in target identification, validation and cell-based
screening, and is combining unique resources such as the ACCRI-BANK clinical tissue bank, the ALIBITM functional genomics platform and the
Engineered Pathway Dependence ("EnPADTM") isogenic cellular screening technology to create a product development engine specialising in
discovery and development of small-molecule targeted cancer therapies and the discovery and validation of cancer biomarkers.

    For further information please see our website at http://www.eirx.com


    About the ABCRF
    

    The Analytical and Biological Chemistry Research Facility (ABCRF) at University College Cork is a multi-disciplinary research
initiative, supported through the HEA PRTLI programme, focusing on all aspects of novel pharmaceutical drug design, development and
analysis. The ABCRF is located in laboratories in the new Cavanagh Pharmacy Building, together with the School of Pharmacy, at UCC. It
covers 1,200m2 and currently hosts 31 staff and 55 PhD students. Other industrial collaborators include Eli Lilly, GSK, Janssen, Merck,
Novartis, and Pfizer.

    For further information please see their website at http://abcrf.ucc.ie/


    About the Innovation Partnership Scheme
    The Innovation Partnerships Initiative is a non-competitive open call funding mechanism established to assist Irish Industry and Third
Level Colleges to work together on cutting edge research projects. The programme is supported under the National Development Programme and
is co-funded by the European Regional Development Fund.

This information is provided by RNS
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