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Research Triangle Park, North
Carolina and Leverkusen, Germany
June 19, 2001
Paradigm Genetics, Inc.
(Nasdaq: PDGM), a functional genomics company, and Bayer
AG (NYSE: BAYZ) today announced an extension and expansion
of their commercial partnership for herbicide discovery and
development. Per the agreement, the companies will collaborate
on herbicide discovery for an additional five years, with three
years of committed funding, plus a two-year option that would
extend the collaboration to October 2006.
Under the terms of the
contract, Paradigm will receive up to $30 million, including
milestone payments. Paradigm will also receive success fees for
all products that reach the market.
"This extension underscores the continued success of the
collaboration between our two companies and the impact that
functional genomics is having on product discovery," said
John A. Ryals, Ph.D., President and CEO of Paradigm Genetics.
"Bayer's decision to extend our collaboration beyond the
original scope is a strong endorsement of our high-throughput
technologies, and the value of our data and the assays that we
develop."
"Our decision to extend and expand our partnership with
Paradigm Genetics was based on the high level of success we have
had to date," said Dr. Detlef Wollweber, Head of Research
of the Crop Protection Business Group of Bayer. "Paradigm
continues to provide us with many validated herbicide targets,
high-throughput screening assays, and together we are building a
strong intellectual property position to secure the use of these
technologies in herbicide research. We believe that this type of
research will contribute to positioning Bayer into the top
league of herbicide suppliers."
Paradigm’s herbicide partnership with Bayer began in
October 1998 with the objective of discovering a portfolio of
novel herbicide products that will be developed and marketed by
Bayer. The term of the original agreement was three years with
an option to extend the relationship another two. Under that
agreement, Paradigm has received research and technical
milestone payments, and will receive product development
milestone payments and success fees on sales of any products
resulting from the partnership.
About Bayer
Bayer is a diversified, international chemicals and health
care group, offering a wide variety of products and services
from its health care, agriculture, polymers and chemicals
business segments. The company employs 120,000 employees
worldwide. For more information, visit www.bayer.com.
For more information on Bayer's crop protection strategy, visit www.news.bayer.com.
About Paradigm Genetics, Inc.
Paradigm Genetics is industrializing the process of gene
function discovery for four major sectors of the global economy:
human health, nutrition, crop production, and industrial
products. The company has designed the GeneFunction Factory™
– an integrated, rapid, industrial-scale laboratory through
which it discovers gene function. Paradigm and its strategic
partners intend to develop novel products using information
developed with the GeneFunction Factory™. Paradigm’s
GeneFunction Factory™ is based on a state of the art
phenomics platform integrated with metabolic profiling and gene
expression profiling technologies. The backbone of the GeneFunction
Factory™ is the company’s proprietary FunctionFinder™
bioinformatics system, used to collect, store, analyze, and
retrieve information. For more information visit www.paragen.com.
Company news release
N3593 |
