King’s spin-out seals $232M deal for Parkinson’s drug

Collaboration deal

Proximagen Neuroscience plc has agreed a $232 million worldwide licensing deal with Upsher-Smith Laboratories Inc. for the development and commercialisation of PRX1, a preclinical stage product for the symptomatic treatment of Parkinson’s disease. As part of the deal Upsher-Smith will make a $6 million equity investment in Proximagen, giving it 7.1 per cent holding.

Proximagen was spun out from King’s College London, United Kingdom, in 2003. It floated on AIM in 2005, raising £14.5 million and bringing a £1 million windfall for the university. Upsher-Smith is privately held company based in Minneapolis, Minnesota, which focuses on developing branded and generic products in the therapeutic areas of women’s health, dermatology, cardiology and neurology.

PRX1 is designed to improve on L-DOPA, the current gold-standard treatment for Parkinson’s disease. The compound has shown significantly increased biological half-life in pre-clinical studies compared with L-DOPA and Proximagen says this could represent a significant advancement in the current treatment, reducing the peaks and troughs in blood levels that are associated with dyskinesia, the involuntary movements suffered by Parkinson’s disease patients. 

In animal models, the administration of PRX1 at doses equivalent to L-DOPA produced maximal reversal of motor disability with virtually no dyskinesia side effects. 

Kenneth Mulvany, CEO of Proximagen, said, “We are delighted to have partnered our PRX1 programme. This deal demonstrates Proximagen’s ability to leverage our expertise in Parkinson’s disease to discover first class drug candidates, as well as our ability to commercialise early stage products.”

Proximagen was spun out of the Neurodegenerative Diseases Research Group at King's College London in November 2003 and joined the Alternative Investment Market in London in 2005.