Vicuron Pharmaceuticals Announces Data at ICAAC Supporting Next-Generation Lincosamide Program
2004年11月1日 - 4:00PM
PRニュース・ワイアー (英語)
Vicuron Pharmaceuticals Announces Data at ICAAC Supporting
Next-Generation Lincosamide Program Lead Product Candidate to Enter
Clinic in the First Half of Next Year KING OF PRUSSIA, Pa., Nov. 1
/PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Vicuron Pharmaceuticals Inc. (Nasdaq:
MICU; Nuovo Mercato) today announced that research generated from
its internal discovery program supports further development of
VIC-5555, its lead novel lincosamide. This next generation
clindamycin antibiotic, a part of an ongoing lincosamide program,
has demonstrated improved in vivo efficacy, potency and dosing. The
strong array of preclinical data was presented at the 44th Annual
Interscience Conference on Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy
(ICAAC) meeting in Washington, D.C. this past weekend. "Although
the data is early, we believe it shows the promise of the
lincosamide program to address anaerobic infections and again
demonstrate Vicuron's internal research engine's strength in
producing promising product candidates," Richard J. White, Ph.D.,
Chief Scientific Officer of Vicuron. "We expect to move the initial
product candidate from this program into the clinic in the first
half of next year. We feel that our approach to discovery will
continue to yield promising next-generation compounds for both
hospital-based and community-acquired infections." Highlights of
the oral presentation and nine poster presentations indicated that
the company's lead lincosamide product candidate, VIC-5555, has: -
good in vitro activity; and - excellent in vivo properties
including superior efficacy over clindamycin in experimental
Staphylococcus aureus, Steptoccus pneumoniae and Bacteroides
fragilis. About Lincosamide Program Vicuron is developing
next-generation lincosamides, a class of antibiotics which show
excellent anaerobe and Gram-positive activity. The current
lincosamide of choice is clindamycin which requires dosing two to
four times a day and shows poor activity against enterococci.
VIC-5555 is the lincosamide program's most advanced next-generation
clindamycin. It has potential for improved efficacy and potency
with an improved dosing regimen. This product candidate has
potential applications in primary hospital indications such as
intraabdominal and skin and soft tissue infections. About Vicuron
Vicuron Pharmaceuticals is a biopharmaceutical company focused on
discovering, developing, manufacturing and commercializing vital
medicine for seriously ill patients. In May 2004, Vicuron received
an approvable letter from the FDA for its lead product
anidulafungin for the treatment of esophageal candidiasis. The
company's other lead product, dalbavancin, a novel intravenous
antibiotic for the treatment of serious Gram-positive infections,
has completed Phase 3 clinical trials. The company's versatile
research engine integrates industry-leading expertise in functional
genomics, natural products discovery, mechanism-based drug design
and combinatorial and medicinal chemistry. These approaches are
yielding promising novel and next- generation compounds, many of
which are in the later stages of preclinical development. In
addition, the company has research and development collaborations
with leading pharmaceutical companies, such as Pfizer and Novartis.
Forward-Looking Statements This news release contains
forward-looking statements that predict or describe future events
or trends. The matters described in these forward- looking
statements are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties
and other unpredictable factors, many of which are beyond Vicuron's
control. Vicuron faces many risks that could cause its actual
performance to differ materially from the results predicted by its
forward-looking statements, including the possibilities that
clinical trials and the results thereof might be delayed, or
unsuccessful, that the timing of the filing of any new drug
application or any amendment to a new drug application might be
delayed, that clinical trials might indicate that a product
candidate is unsafe or ineffective, that the FDA might require
additional information to be submitted and additional actions to be
taken before it will make any decision, that any filed new drug
application may not be approved by the FDA, that ongoing
proprietary and collaborative research might not occur or yield
useful results, that the pipeline may not yield a new clinical
candidate or a commercial product, that a third party may not be
willing to license our product candidates on terms acceptable to us
or at all, that competitors might develop superior substitutes for
Vicuron's products or market these competitive products more
effectively, that a sales force may not be developed as
contemplated and that one or more of Vicuron's product candidates
may not be commercialized successfully. The reports that Vicuron
files with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission contain a
fuller description of these and many other risks to which Vicuron
is subject. Because of those risks, Vicuron's actual results,
performance or achievements may differ materially from the results,
performance or achievements contemplated by its forward- looking
statement. The information set forth in this news release
represents management's current expectations and intentions.
Vicuron assumes no responsibility to issue updates to the
forward-looking matters discussed in this news release. DATASOURCE:
Vicuron Pharmaceuticals Inc. CONTACT: Dov A. Goldstein, M.D. of
Vicuron Pharmaceuticals Inc., +1-610-205-2312, or ; or Hala Mirza
of WeissComm Partners, +1-212-204-2080, or , or Aline Schimmel of
Burns McClellan Inc., +1-212-213-0006, or , both for Vicuron
Pharmaceuticals Inc. Web site: http://www.vicuron.com/
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