Millennium and Bayer industrialize drug discovery through research alliance

More than 70 disease-relevant validated drug targets moving into or beyond screening in first two years of collaboration

Barely two years into their drug discovery partnership, Millennium Pharmaceuticals Inc. (Cambridge, MA) and Bayer AG (Leverkusen, German) are moving more than 70 disease-relevant validated drug targets into high-throughput screening or lead identification. Each company has focused on its own strengths: Millennium on rapid identification, characterization and validation of target proteins, and Bayer on large-scale high-throughput screening.

With Bayer's high-throughput robotic screening technology, selected targets are incorporated into test systems to search for compounds that show promise for further development. Bayer's equipment is capable of screening more than 200,000 compounds per day.

"The progress of the Millennium and Bayer alliance in its first two years has been extraordinary, particularly given the usual three-year timeframe for the processing of targets, chemistry and pharmacology necessary to yield a developmental drug candidate," said Wolfgang Hartwig, executive vice president of pharmaceuticals research at Bayer. "As we celebrate our second anniversary with Millennium, we anticipate that in addition to our screening pipeline of more than 70 targets, we will have several preclinical compounds and potentially one chemical compound nearing IND status by year-end."

In May 2000, based on their early success, Millennium and Bayer expanded the initial objectives of the alliance. The two companies collectively accelerated their second year goal of identifying new validated drug targets from 50 to 100 by the end of 2000. "Bayer and Millennium have created the world's leading platform for biologically annotating targets and moving them into drug discovery," said Mark Levin, CEO of Millennium. "Our joint efforts exemplify the power of Millennium's genomics-based approach to drug discovery and development, Bayer's cutting-edge screening and chemistry capabilities and expertise, and the extraordinary success which can be created through 'over-the-top' alliances."

Goals
The primary goal of the alliance is for Millennium to supply 225 important new drug targets identified as relevant for cardiovascular disease, cancer, pain, hematology and viral infections. From those identified by the alliance, Bayer will select drug targets for its exclusive use and the remainder will be available to Millennium to use in its proprietary drug development efforts.

In return for a total investment of up to $465 million, including an equity investment in Millennium over a five-year period, Bayer receives access to key technologies in modern genome research and a flow of new genomics-based targets for drug development.

For more information, contact Maureen Suda of Millennium Pharmaceuticals Inc. at 617-551-2959.

Edited by Angelo DePalma
Managing Editor, Drug Discovery Online and Pharmaceutical Online
Email: adepalma@vertical.net