Selective Muscarinic Compounds Demonstrate Promising Preclinical Profile
SAN DIEGO, CA and COPENHAGEN, DENMARK, January 8, 2004 - ACADIA Pharmaceuticals
announced today that it has achieved a milestone in its collaboration agreement
with Allergan (NYSE: AGN) to discover, develop, and commercialize selective
muscarinic drugs for the treatment of glaucoma. The milestone was triggered
by Allergan's selection of a collaboration compound for further development
and commercialization.
"We are pleased to successfully achieve this phase of our collaboration
with ACADIA, which has generated an exciting new class of novel and selective
muscarinic compounds," said Lester J. Kaplan, Ph.D., Allergan's President,
Research and Development. "These drug candidates display a promising preclinical
profile and provide the potential for an important new breakthrough in glaucoma
therapy."
The collaborative glaucoma program emanates from ACADIA's discovery of chemical
leads that selectively target the muscarinic receptor responsible for the lowering
of intraocular pressure, while avoiding interaction with other targets believed
to cause side effects. Under the collaboration, ACADIA has combined its chemistry
capabilities and discovery expertise in the muscarinic area with Allergan's
disease models and eye care expertise to optimize these lead candidates. Allergan
is entitled to select up to two collaboration compounds and is responsible for
the development and commercialization of products resulting from the collaboration.
ACADIA received a milestone payment in connection with Allergan's selection
of a collaboration compound and will receive additional milestones as products
move through the development process. Allergan has worldwide rights to commercialize
products resulting from the collaboration for the treatment of ocular disease
and will pay ACADIA royalties on sales of products successfully developed and
commercialized. ACADIA retains the rights to its muscarinic compounds and related
assets for all other therapeutic areas.
"We are pleased with the exciting progress in our glaucoma collaboration,
which has benefited greatly from Allergan's extensive expertise and leadership
in the eye care field," said Uli Hacksell, Ph.D., ACADIA's Chief Executive
Officer. "We are very proud of the success of our first two discovery collaborations
with Allergan, which have led to exciting development programs in the therapeutic
areas of chronic pain and glaucoma. We look forward to the further advancement
of these drug candidates and to the discovery of additional innovative therapies
under our third collaboration with Allergan formed earlier this year."
ACADIA Pharmaceuticals is focused on the discovery and development of novel
small molecule drugs for the treatment of central nervous system and related
disorders. ACADIA has successfully applied its proprietary drug discovery platform
to generate a broad portfolio of drug candidates. ACADIA currently has five
programs in development directed at large unmet medical needs and major commercial
markets, including Parkinson's disease, schizophrenia, chronic pain, and glaucoma.
ACADIA's corporate headquarters and biological research facilities are located
in San Diego, California and its chemistry research facilities are located in
Copenhagen, Denmark.
Certain matters set forth in this press release are forward-looking statements
and are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to
differ materially. However, these forward-looking statements do not fall within
the meaning of the "safe harbor" provisions of the Private Securities
Litigation Reform Act of 1995 or Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933.
Contacts:
ACADIA Pharmaceuticals
Uli Hacksell, Ph.D., Chief Executive Officer
Thomas H. Aasen, Vice President and Chief Financial Officer
+1 858-558-2871