Eurand to collaborate with universities to develop new class of pain relief compounds

By E. Janene Geiss

Philadelphia, Jan. 24 - Eurand announced Tuesday that it has signed research agreements with the University of Milan and the University of Sassari to evaluate a new class of analgesic compounds.

This new class of compounds is expected to be comparable to opioids in terms of efficacy but not to possess the major drawbacks of tolerance and dependence that limit the use of opioids, the gold standard in pain relief, according to a company news release.

Under terms of the agreement, Eurand and the universities will collaborate to develop and evaluate the efficacy of five novel compounds for the treatment of moderate to severe pain.

The universities, which discovered the compounds, will be responsible for their synthesis, while Eurand will be responsible for the preclinical evaluation and development of the products and will use its proprietary drug delivery technologies to optimize the release profiles of the drugs, officials said.

Eurand said it has an option for exclusive worldwide development and commercialization rights.

"Eurand is excited about this research project and is looking forward to working with the Universities of Milan and Sassari for the development of this new class of compounds. In-licensing of select molecules forms a core element of our internal product development strategy and this is the third such agreement signed by Eurand since we commenced this program," Gearoid Faherty, chief executive officer of Eurand, said in the release.

"We are in active discussions with a number of academic research organizations to establish research and development collaborations such as the one with these leading European institutions."

Eurand is a Milan, Italy-based, privately held specialty pharmaceutical company that develops enhanced pharmaceutical and biopharmaceutical products based on its proprietary drug delivery technologies with a focus on bioavailability enhancement of poorly soluble drugs, customized release, taste masking/fast-dissolving formulations and drug targeting.

© 2015 Prospect News.
All content on this website is protected by copyright law in the U.S. and elsewhere. For the use of the person downloading only.
Redistribution and copying are prohibited by law without written permission in advance from Prospect News.
Redistribution or copying includes e-mailing, printing multiple copies or any other form of reproduction.