Drug discovery system developer Compugen Ltd. (Nasdaq: CGEN; TASE: CGEN) has named its chairman, Martin Gerstel, as its new CEO. The appointment is effective as of January 2009.
Speaking at the 10th annual Rodman & Renshaw Healthcare Conference in New York, Gerstel said that in 2009, Compugen will look to cut costs, with measures including laying off employees. The firm will also focus on activities it can pursue in collaboration with other companies, saying it intends to explore various types of broader strategic industry relationships.
Gerstel said, “Compugen intends to focus its internal R&D activities primarily on therapeutic peptides and monoclonal antibody drug targets. In its biomarker and other programs, particularly in view of the current financial situation, the company intends to give priority to those activities pursued in collaboration with other companies. The net impact of these and related decisions will be a staff reduction and an approximate 30 percent reduction in expenditures. For calendar year 2009, Compugen is anticipating a net cash usage of approximately $8 million.”
Compugen hopes to continue with its existing discovery platforms. Gerstel said, "Currently with products in the peptide therapeutics field achieving revenues of more than $30 billion, the field is of significant interest to the biopharmaceutical industry and has been a focus of Compugen’s efforts for the past few years. In addition to the GPCR peptide ligand platform, the company has disclosed the development and validation of its Viral Peptides and DAC Peptide Blockers discovery platforms.
“Since each of these three peptide therapeutics discovery platforms relies on a fundamentally different methodology, together they provide the company with an exceptional discovery capability in this important and rapidly growing field."
In September, Compugen reported that its DAC blockers discovery platform found a new peptide which may increase the effect of widely-used cancer drug Taxol.
Mr. Gerstel further explained that during 2009 Compugen intends to focus a larger percentage of its discovery efforts on its ten existing discovery platforms, and plans to reduce the number of new discovery platforms in development, but maintaining in development at least one new platform in the peptide therapeutics field.
Shares in Tel Aviv-based Compugen closed at $0.80 on Nasdaq yesterday, giving it a market cap of $22.72 million. Its shares have traded between $0.50 and $2.80 in the past 52 weeks.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on November 12, 2008
© Copyright of Globes Publisher Itonut (1983) Ltd. 2008