Adimab announces initiation of research collaboration with Novartis

Adimab, Inc., a leader in the discovery of fully human antibodies, today announced the initiation of a research collaboration with Novartis (Basel, Switzerland). This agreement represents the fifth major partnership Adimab has announced since launching its platform at BIO 2009 in Atlanta, just one year ago. In addition, Adimab today announced the receipt of a second milestone payment from its ongoing collaboration with Merck and Co.

“Based on our early success, we believe that Adimab's technology will continue to be in high demand and we are in active discussions with several partners regarding broader unencumbered access and technology transfer.”

"Adimab's ability to generate high quality therapeutic leads in less than three months reduces much of the uncertainty of preclinical development and translates into a fundamental competitive advantage for our collaborators," comments Tillman Gerngross, PhD, co-founder and CEO of Adimab.

In the first year after the launch of its antibody discovery platform, Adimab has entered into discovery partnerships with some of the world's premier pharmaceutical companies including Merck, Roche, Pfizer and Novartis. Further, Adimab has received numerous payments related to the successful achievement of key technical milestones in these programs. "With current announced and unannounced contracts, continued revenue from milestone payments and broad interest around Adimab's platform, we expect 2010 to be our first profitable year," notes Errik Anderson, COO of Adimab.