Genesis Research and Development Corporation (NZX/ASX:GEN) advises that it has implemented a programme of cost reductions, predominantly in its wholly owned plant biotech subsidiary, AgriGenesis BioSciences Limited.

At this stage AgriGenesis’ capital raising programme has not resulted in any new investment and, as a result of feedback received from potential investors, AgriGenesis will now focus on a limited number of projects, scaling back investment in a number of its research programmes.

A total of 29 positions have been made redundant and staff have been advised of their termination.

“We are maintaining core AgriGenesis research programmes with 25 staff,” said AgriGenesis CEO, Dr Peter Lee. “We’re tightening our focus of spend based on feedback from potential partners. The restructuring means that investment will be suspended on a number of AgriGenesis R&D projects. The intellectual property will remain protected within AgriGenesis and the company will continue to seek partnering opportunities for its research and development programmes.”

Dr Jim Watson, Chief Executive of Genesis, said, “ Following a review of opportunities to bring in new investors by selling down part of our interest in AgriGenesis, we have determined that several early stage plant science projects should be terminated. It is sad to see good staff being released but this reduction in resources is necessary in order to focus our resources on the highest priority projects. The AVAC Clinical Trial for paediatric eczema is now fully enrolled, and the Zyrogen and RNAi pre-clinical projects are also making good progress. "

Genesis expects that the cash balance at 31 December 2004 will be sufficient to fund ongoing operations for several years, at least.

 Founded in 1994, Genesis is a New Zealand-based biotechnology company with 81 staff in the group. It has built a broad genomic platform and an RNAi programme with and multiple product candidates in development, targeting immune disorders and cancer. These are backed by an extensive patent portfolio.

Collaborations are maintained with Amgen Inc. (Nasdaq:AMGN), Corixa Corporation (Nasdaq:CRXA), SR Pharma plc (LSE:SPA), Jurox Pty Ltd, EvoGenix Pty Ltd, CSL Australia and AgResearch.

AgriGenesis Biosciences Ltd is a wholly owned subsidiary of Genesis that is focused on using key plant cell signalling genes – novel hormones and transcription factors – that control such commercial traits as growth rates, wood fibre quality, biomass development and flowering control. It has developed comprehensive plant EST databases including the world’s largest EST database for commercial forestry species and has commercial collaborations with ArborGen LLC, Wrightson (NZX: WRI) and HortResearch.