MorphoSys Signs Long-Term Alliance with Pfizer on Sloning Technology Platform

The agreement covers the installation, training and use of Sloning's technology platform Slonomics® for fabrication of highly-diverse gene and protein libraries at Pfizer's subsidiary Rinat Neuroscience Corp. in South San Francisco. The MorphoSys subsidiary will receive an upfront payment in 2010, and stands to receive annual license fees over the patent lifetime of the Slonomics technology platform. Further financial details of the agreement were not disclosed.

"This significant alliance around the Slonomics technology, only weeks after we closed the acquisition of Sloning, clearly illustrates the potential value of the platform," commented Dr. Simon Moroney, Chief Executive Officer of MorphoSys AG. "This alliance with Pfizer creates immediate value for our shareholders and is just the beginning of what we expect to be a considerable return-on-investment from the combined technology platforms of MorphoSys and Sloning in the years ahead."

"Rinat started using Sloning's services in 2009, and we were impressed by the diversity and quality of the libraries delivered," said Jaume Pons, PhD, Chief Scientific Officer at Pfizer's Rinat subsidiary. "We therefore decided to use this innovative technology platform further for our research and development activities."

Sloning's state-of-the-art Slonomics technology enables the precise construction of protein libraries comprising defined mixtures of amino acids at pre-determined positions with unprecedented speed. The technology provides a new and flexible approach to generating optimized proteins. MorphoSys acquired Sloning BioTechnology in October 2010.