CAMBRIDGE, U.K., March 30, 2004 (PRIMEZONE) -- Cytomyx Holdings plc (LSE:CYX), the leading provider of drug discovery products and services, today announces that Clinomics Biosciences Inc, its recently acquired US subsidiary, has licensed its Oncology Cell Signalling Database to AstraZeneca, marking an important milestone for the Company.
Clinomics' Oncology Cell Signalling Database is based on a unique set of more than 30,000 human oncology samples, representing virtually all forms of cancer. The database was created from Clinomics' broad collection of more than 200,000 highly characterised human samples, which form the basis for new genomic tools to assist the pharmaceutical industry in the discovery of new drugs.
Mike Kerins, Cytomyx' chief executive, said: "We are delighted that AstraZeneca has chosen our Oncology Cell Signalling Database to assist in its cancer drug discovery and the agreement marks a highly significant step following the Clinomics acquisition.
"Clinomics' technology enables us to offer critical new tools to pharmaceutical companies to allow the biological characterisation of gene and protein targets across many disease areas."
Under the terms of the AstraZeneca purchase agreement, AstraZeneca has received multiple user licences to the Oncology Cell Signalling Database along with rights to database upgrades. Financial details of the agreement, which isnon-exclusive, are not being disclosed.
Patrick Muraca PhD, Clinomics Biosciences' Chief Scientific Officer, said: "We have analysed the protein expression patterns of 100 cell signalling proteins across all of the 30,000 oncology samples and integrated this information into a new searchable database. Researchers are able to interrogate a wide range of data fields within the database including patient demographics, medical history, pathology and treatment outcomes to identify factors important in disease progression."
Clinomics was acquired by Cytomyx in December last year.
Notes to editors
About Cytomyx Holdings plc
Cytomyx Holdings plc (www.cytomyx-holdings.com) is a rapidly growing life science company based in Cambridge, UK. Its four operating subsidiaries -- Cytomyx Ltd, Clinomics Biosciences Inc, Cambridge Bioscience Ltd and Cytocell Technologies Ltd -- develop and market a wide range of products and services to the pharmaceutical, diagnostics and academic research markets. Cytomyx is listed on the London Stock Exchange's Alternative Investment Market in 2001.
About Clinomics Biosciences Inc
Clinomic Biosciences Inc (www.clinomicsbio.com),a wholly owned subsidiary of Cytomyx, offers database products for the biological characterisation of gene and protein targets for use in drug discovery research. The company has a collection of more than 200,000 highly characterised human and biology samples and its proprietary Tissue MicroArray technology allows hundreds of individual tissue samples to be arrayed on microscope slides for use in gene and protein characterisation studies.
About AstraZeneca
AstraZeneca is a major international healthcare business engaged in the research, development, manufacture and marketing of prescription pharmaceuticals and the supply of healthcare services. It is one of the top five pharmaceutical companies in the world with healthcare sales of over $18.8 billion and leading positions in sales of gastrointestinal, oncology, cardiovascular, neuroscience and respiratory products. AstraZeneca is listed in the Dow Jones Sustainability Index (Global and European) as well as the FTSE4Good Index.
This information is provided by RNS
The company news service from the London Stock Exchange