21.03.2006 08:07 NicOx to receive up to 288 mln eur from Merck & co in hypertensive drugs deal PARIS (AFX) - French pharmeuticals developer NicOx SA (Nachrichten) said it will receive an upfront payment of 9.2 mln eur (11.2 mln usd) from Merck&Co Inc (Nachrichten/Aktienkurs) and is eligible for potential further milestone payments of 279 mln eur (340.2 mln usd) under a major new agreement to collaborate on the development of new antihypertensive drugs using NicOx' proprietary nitric oxide-donating technology.
The agreement follows completion of the companies' research collaboration, which has generated promising results, NicOx said.
The French company has the option to co-promote on a fee for detail basis products that result from the agreement to specialist physicians, such as cardiologists, in the US and certain major European countries.
In addition, Merck will pay NicOx industry standard royalties on the sales of all products resulting from the collaboration.
The agreement covers nitric oxide-donating derivatives of several major classes of antihypertensive agents for the treatment of high blood pressure, complications of hypertension, and other cardiovascular and related disorders, NicOx said.
Merck has the exclusive right to develop and commercialize antihypertensives that use NicOx' nitric oxide-donating technology for the treatment of systemic hypertension, it added.
NicOx will continue to be involved in the new research program, which will be focused on identifying lead candidates for development, while Merck will fund and manage all further pre-clinical and clinical development activities following selection of lead compounds.
'We are very pleased to be entering into this new collaboration with NicOx, which aims to address one of the world's leading health problems,' Anthony Ford-Hutchinson, Executive Vice President for Research Medicine at Merck Research Laboratories, said in a statement.
'We believe NicOx' innovative NO-donating technology has the potential to lead to the development of new and improved antihypertensive medicines,' Ford-Hutchinson said.
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