HYBRIGENICS : launches a new service to screen interactions between small molecules and protein targets

Press Release

Paris, 24 January 2013 - Hybrigenics (ALHYG), a bio-pharmaceutical company listed on Alternext (NYSE-Euronext) in Paris today announces that Hybrigenics Services, its subsidiary specialized in protein interactions, has launched a new service to identify interactions between small molecules and protein targets.
Using a chemical linkage adaptation of its optimized "yeast two-hybrid" technology, renamed "yeast chemical-hybrid" (YChemH), Hybrigenics Services is now able to screen a small molecule as a "bait" against its cDNA or genomic libraries expressing millions of "prey" protein fragments to identify target proteins with which this tested molecule interacts.
These exhaustive screens can be of interest from both safety and efficacy perspectives. This technology may uncover a full range of related targets accounting for the whole spectrum of therapeutic activities of a drug (so-called "on-targets") and/or explain unexpected side effects exerted through unsuspected targets (so-called "off-targets"). Some drugs are active in whole cellular or animal models, but their mechanism of action remains unknown: the YChemH technology may find a relevant target for these "orphan" drugs, in a process called "drug de- orphanisation". Finally, it may be relevant for widely used chemicals in every day products to ascertain that they do not interact with any protein.
This new technology has been developed in collaboration with Charnwood Molecular, an English medicinal chemistry firm, for the linkage of the small molecule to the rest of the yeast molecular biology machinery mastered by Hybrigenics Services. It is the outcome of a joint development project amounting to a total investment of close to one million euro over two years which has been supported up to 40% of the costs by a European Union subsidy under the Eurostars® programme.
"This new service offering covers a whole new area of protein interaction screening: with small molecules. It has been conceived and developed to strategically answer recurrent unmet needs of the pharmaceutical industry and to generate awareness of the chemical industry. We warmly thank Charnwood Molecular for their up-lifting collaborative spirit and their outstanding chemical contribution, first to the project and now, to the launch of this new YChemH service" said Remi Delansorne, Hybrigenics Services' President.

Hybrigenics (www.hybrigenics.com) is a bio-pharmaceutical company listed (ALHYG) on Alternext (NYSE- Euronext) in Paris, focusing its internal R&D programs on innovative targets and therapies for the treatment of proliferative cancerous or non-cancerous diseases.

Hybrigenics' current development program is based on inecalcitol, a vitamin D receptor agonist active by oral administration. Oral inecalcitol has shown excellent tolerance and strong presumption of efficacy for the first-line treatment of metastastic castrate-resistant prostate cancer in combination with Taxotere®,

which is the current gold-standard chemotherapeutic treatment for this indication. Oral inecalcitol has recently been studied in a clinical trial for the treatment of moderate-to-severe psoriasis, and is currently being tested in chronic lymphocytic leukemia patients.

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Press Release

Hybrigenics has a research collaboration with Servier on deubiquitinating enzymes and their inhibitors in oncology, neurology, psychiatry, rheumatology, ophthalmology, diabetes and cardiovascular diseases. Hybrigenics continues to build on its pioneer research position in the field of ubiquitin-specific proteases by exploring their role in other areas of particular relevance, such as inflammation and virology.

Hybrigenics Services (www.hybrigenics-services.com), a fully-owned subsidiary, is the market leader in Yeast Two-Hybrid (Y2H) and related services to identify, validate and inhibit protein interactions for researchers in all areas of life sciences, using its ISO 9001-certified high-throughput Y2H screening platform, its sophisticated bioinformatics tools and extensive database, along with its chemical library and chemical screening platform.

Tel.: +33 (0)1 58 10 38 00 investors@hybrigenics.com

Financial communication

Axelle Vuillermet / Pierre Laurent Tel.: +33 (0)1 44 71 94 94 hybrigenics@newcap.fr

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