Micromet grants SCA licences to Abbot, Alligator, Haptogen

Micromet AG, a spin-off from the Institute for Immunology at Munich University, said it has agreed to grant four licences of its single chain antibody technology to Abbott Laboratories, Alligator Bioscience AB, Haptogen Ltd. and an unnamed biopharmaceutical company, for the development of cancer treatments.

While Abbott, Alligator - a spin out from the department of Immunotechnology at Lund University, and Haptogen - a British drug discovery company,  have taken research licenses, the unnamed partner has been granted a product license for the development and commercialisation of Micromet’s SCA technology, said Evelyn Wolf, head of corporate communications at Micromet, in an interview. She declined to disclose further details.

“SCA is the binding fragment of an antibody, but much smaller and it’s extremely versatile for engineering,” said Wold. “It has a very broad application. It can be used for diagnostics, research tools and therapeutics.”

Micromet said earlier this month it plans to gain a stock listing by merging with CancerVax Corp., a Nasdaq-listed US cancer vaccine company, in an all-share deal.

Munich-based Micromet is offering CancerVax shareholders 32.5 per cent of the combined group, with the rest owned by Micromet’s shareholders.

Micromet is developing human antibodies to fight cancer and has linked with Swiss biotech Serono SA to develop and market a treatment for breast and prostate cancer. The drug, in clinical trials, is called MT201. The company was a spin-off from the Institute for Immunology, Munich University in 1993. Its partners include MedImmune, Enzon, Boehringer Ingelheim and it has 85 employees.

www.micromet.de