Sanofi Pasteur is purchasing Orlando, FL-based VaxDesign for $55 million up front and an additional $5 million in milestones. The company develops, manufactures and markets in vitro models of the human immune system. Sanofi says that VaxDesign's Modular IMmune In-vitro Construct technology will help it better filter preclinical stage candidates to pick the best compounds for Phase I human clinical trials. Better selection at an early stage can help avoid large (and costly) late-stage failures.
"MIMIC is the most-advanced platform in the field," said Michel DeWilde, Sanofi Pasteur's Senior Vice President of R&D. "With this novel model for understanding mechanisms of action, the probability of clinical success increases and the time to market should decrease. MIMIC(R) successfully reproduced our own clinical data and is adaptable for the evaluation of multiple diseases and corresponding patient populations. This platform will provide a significant competitive advantage in the development of vaccines."
- take a look at the VaxDesign release