Sanofi signs agreement with US University

French drug major Sanofi-Aventis has signed a three-year agreement with the Division of Allergy and Clinical Immunology of the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, USA.

Under the terms of this agreement, the partners will jointly work to discover and develop new ways of treating respiratory diseases, in particular severe asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, as well as immuno-allergic diseases. For each research theme, the University and Sanofi will work on new target identification, assay development and compound screening. The two research organizations will also collaborate on the design of potential clinical studies and the selection of biomarkers.

"This collaboration will allow Sanofi-Aventis and Johns Hopkins ACI to join their efforts to identify new therapeutic approaches, in particular in severe asthma and COPD," said Marc Cluzel, senior vice president of R&D at Sanofi.