Galapagos Announces Exclusive Agreement with Upstate
Galapagos NV have announced that its service division BioFocus has signed an exclusive marketing & sales agreement with Upstate, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Serologicals Corporation, for Galapagos’ adenovirus products worldwide, excluding Japan.
Under the terms of the agreement, Upstate will put its manufacturing, marketing, sales, customer support and technical assistance organization behind promotion of Galapagos’ adenovirus products. In return, Galapagos will receive double-digit royalties on net sales achieved by Upstate.
With this agreement, Upstate will be able to fill the demand for adenoviral reagents as research tools in drug discovery. Life science researchers at universities, biotechnology and pharmaceutical firms are continuously in search of the best tools for drug discovery research, and Galapagos’ proprietary adenovirus technology forms the basis of a product line with reagents to increase or decrease specific human proteins in human cellular assays.
This technology has proven to be the method of choice for target discovery by many pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies and has led to the identification of novel drug targets in many disease areas. Hallmarks of the adenovirus technology are the stability of the knock-in and knock-down protein levels, and the suitability for high-throughput assays using human primary cells.
These features should allow the adenovirus technology to compete effectively in the global market for siRNA reagents, projected by industry experts to grow to $ 270 million in 2008. Galapagos retains rights to continue servicing its existing customers for these products.
“Galapagos has been successful in marketing its adenoviral based products with pharma and biotech. Through the alliance with Upstate, a much larger customer base will be addressed, including the vast academic research market that is well served by Upstate’s marketing and sales organization,” said Onno van de Stolpe, Chief Executive Officer of Galapagos.
“We are confident that Upstate will exploit fully the unique selling points of our siRNA based adenoviral reagents and greatly increase its visibility and use by researchers worldwide.”
