Merrimack Pharmaceuticals acquires Hermes Biosciences
Merrimack Pharmaceuticals has acquired Hermes Biosciences, a private biotechnology company based in San Francisco, California. Hermes specialises in targeted drug delivery technologies using lipidic nano-carriers and antibodies as targeting agents. Merrimack, based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is focused on the discovery and development of novel treatments for cancer and autoimmune disease.
Merrimack Pharmaceuticals has acquired Hermes Biosciences, a private biotechnology company based in San Francisco, California. Hermes specialises in targeted drug delivery technologies using lipidic nano-carriers and antibodies as targeting agents. Merrimack, based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is focused on the discovery and development of novel treatments for cancer and autoimmune disease.
"The acquisition of Hermes is part of Merrimack's strategy to apply its systems biology approach to drug discovery and development to an expanding array of disease-fighting targets and technologies," said Robert Mulroy, President and CEO of Merrimack.
"We believe that coupling Merrimack's approach of identifying critical targets through systems analysis with our innovative drug delivery technologies creates great potential to generate novel therapies that can provide significant benefit to cancer patients," added John Park, ceo of Hermes.
Merrimack's proprietary Network Biology technology applies techniques from computational modelling, high throughput biology and engineering to understand cell system dynamics and develop therapeutics to address cell malfunctions in a disease state.
The first candidates to be developed out of this approach are MM-121, an ErbB3 antagonist, and MM-111, a bispecific antibody targeting ErbB2 and ErbB3. Both candidates are in Phase I development and are expected to enter Phase II in 2010.