Millennium and Aventis extend alliance

Millennium Pharmaceuticals and Aventis have expanded theirdrug-development collaboration to include 11 discovery projects that were previously being pursued outside the joint venture. The new drug discovery assets include chemokine receptors, kinases and integrins, which the companies note are major targets in inflammatory disease research.

The additional drug discovery projects have been added to the collaboration by both companies as they pursue the joint development and commercialization of small-molecule drugs for the treatment of inflammatory diseases in five major areas: asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, rheumatoid arthritis, inflammatory bowel disease and multiple sclerosis.

Last year, Aventis entered into one of the largest-ever biotechnology deals when it paid Millennium $450 million in return for a stake in the firm and rights to certain drug discovery technologies (Marketletter August 7, 2000). The addition of the new projects takes the number of jointly-funded discovery projects in the Aventis-Millennium alliance to around 50.