Alnylam, INEX expand RNAi systemic delivery research

By Elaine Rigoli

Tampa, Fla., July 17 - Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Inc. and Inex Pharmaceuticals Corp. said Monday that based on progress made to date, the companies are accelerating their collaboration focused on the systemic delivery of RNAi therapeutics.

"Very rapidly, our scientific teams have made tremendous progress in achieving systemic delivery of Alnylam siRNAs formulated in INEX liposomes," Alynlam president and chief executive officer John Maraganore said in a news release.

"Given the results to date, we are confident that we will be able to achieve potent and specific gene silencing with systemically delivered siRNAs, and we are thrilled to move forward into the next, expanded phase of our collaboration with INEX, whom we view as having leading intellectual property and capabilities in the area of lipid-based drug-delivery systems," he said.

In March, Alnylam and INEX formed an exclusive collaboration to evaluate the systemic delivery of RNAi therapeutic products using liposomes.

The results suggest that Alnylam's RNAi therapeutics can be efficiently encapsulated in INEX's liposomes and effectively delivered to disease sites in animal models to carry out the desired effect of silencing the gene target, the release said.

As part of the collaboration, Alnylam has the option to take worldwide exclusive licenses to use INEX's technology for RNAi therapeutics directed to specific gene targets. Any exclusive license agreement would include upfront license fees, future milestone payments and royalties on product sales.

Due to the rapid progress made so far, INEX and Alnylam have decided to move into the next phase of the collaboration, which includes looking at additional gene targets. In conjunction with this decision, Alnylam will make certain payments to INEX totaling about $1.9 million, $1 million of which relates to an option to take a broad exclusive license to INEX's technology.

The remaining payments are for license option fees for certain named targets and support for the expanded research program, the release said.

Alnylam is a biopharmaceutical company based in Cambridge, Mass.

Inex is a Vancouver, B.C.-based biopharmaceutical company.

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