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Biotech company Galapagos has bought the rights to sell the GLPG0634 arthritis molecule drug from pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline.
The oral medication, developed in collaboration with GSK, is said to have shown good activity in biochemical studies and in vivo models of rheumatoid arthritis. GLPG0634 has also just passed its pre-clinical development stage.
Trials of the drug are scheduled to begin next week. It has already been cleared by regulatory and ethics committees for phase one clinical tests.
The rights to GLPG0634, once part of Galapagos’s “arthritis alliance” with GSK, were re-acquired for an unknown sum of cash and any future activity with the medication will not involve the drugs giant.
Galapagos is looking into the safety and pharmacological profile of the molecule drug, and said it wants raise the value of GLPG0634 to its highest possible level before a development partner is found.
The firm’s chief executive, Onno van de Stolpe, said: “JAK inhibitors have shown great efficacy in rheumatoid arthritis trials recently. GLPG0634 has a competitive therapeutic profile and we believe that this is an attractive compound to take into development.”
Copyright © Press Association 2010
