Drug delivery specialist SkykePharma has licensed the European marketing rights of its cancer drug to Dublin-based pharmaceuticals group Elan.
Under the agreement the British company received a $10 million signing fee and will receive milestone payments of up to $13 million for the rights to Depocyte.
SkyePharma will also manufacture and supply the injectable product to Elan and receive a supply price equal to a fixed percentage of net sales.
SkyePharma has already licensed the sustained-release drug for lymphomatous meningitis - a potentially fatal complication of certain cancers - to Chiron Corp in the US, Paladin Labs Inc in Canada and Nippon Shinyaku in Japan.
Yesterday Elan reported a 59 per cent rise in after-tax profits in the second quarter of 2001 to $163.7 million (€187.30 million) from $102.9 million.
Earnings per share rose by 45 per cent to 45 cents in the second quarter. Revenues increased by 25 per cent to $461.2 million from $368.8 million in that period driven by a 48 per cent rise in product revenues to $356.3 million.
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