Medicago Inc., a biotechnology company focused on developing highly effective and competitive vaccines based on proprietary manufacturing technologies and Virus-Like Particles (VLPs), announced the successful completion of the first stage of its research collaboration, announced initially on April 6, 2011, with a top 10 global pharmaceutical company for the development of a non-influenza VLP vaccine candidate. Medicago's collaboration partner has indicated its intent to proceed to the second stage of the agreement.

"The recent decision by our partner to proceed to the next stage is very encouraging and validates the importance and potential of our rapid, efficacious and cost-effective VLP vaccine technology," said Louis Vezina, chief scientific officer of Medicago. "In addition, successfully completing the first stage of this agreement demonstrates the potential of our VLP vaccine technology platform outside of influenza. As we move forward, we believe that the advantages of our technology will become increasingly evident, with the potential of attracting further partnerships."

Under the terms of the research collaboration, Medicago is applying its transient expression system to develop a vaccine candidate for a non-disclosed target. Medicago is eligible to receive payments from its partner on achievement of specified milestones stipulated in the contract.

Medicago is committed to provide highly effective and competitive vaccines based on proprietary Virus-Like Particle (VLP) and manufacturing technologies. Medicago is developing VLP vaccines to protect against pandemic and seasonal influenza, using a transient expression system which produces recombinant vaccine antigens in the cells of non-transgenic plants.