Epigenomics' 1st-qtr income declines 74%

Epigenomics AG, a German firm developing diagnostics on the basis of DNA methylation, says that, for the first three months of 2006, revenue amounted to 470,000 euros ($605,541), a 74% decline on the same period in 2005. This decrease in revenue is attributed to the payment structure of the collaboration with Roche Diagnostics, which provided a significant R&D payment in the like, year-ago period.

However, the company believes that it remains on track to meet revenue guidance for the fiscal-year 2006 of 7.5-9.0 million euros. During the period R&D expenditure narrowed to 1.92 million euros from 2.10 million euros. General and administrative expenses stayed relatively constant at 1.02 million euros versus 990,000 million.

Epigenomics' key achievements in the first quarter included an extension of its R&D collaboration with Roche until September 2007, covering blood-based screening tests for colon, prostate and breast cancers. The firm also regained full rights to two tissue-based molecular pathology tests: one for prostate cancer classification and a second for breast cancer relapse prediction; and validated its PITX2 breast cancer marker in 400 anthracyline-treated patient samples.