BioFocus announced that it has achieved success in its oncology target discovery collaboration with Ortho Biotech Oncology Research & Development, a division of Janssen Pharmaceutica N.V. (Janssen).  The success of the program has resulted in €1.6 million in target acceptance payments.

In the two-year target discovery collaboration initiated in January 2008, BioFocus performed assay development using cancer cells, target discovery with the SilenceSelect® adenoviral collection as well as target validation.  Today’s success involved BioFocus developing advanced cellular assays using high-content imaging, and identifying and validating novel drug targets for cancer areas with unmet medical need.  The collaboration has been extended into 2010, to enable BioFocus to further develop complex screening assays for additional targets.  BioFocus may receive success-based payments of up to an additional €4.5 million should certain downstream criteria be reached by Janssen.

“This latest success in discovering new cancer drug targets using advanced cellular assays illustrates the versatility of our target discovery platform,” said Onno van de Stolpe, Chief Executive Officer of Galapagos.