Merrion Pharmaceuticals Plc, a publicly listed product development company, announced the commencement of an oral drug delivery feasibility and option agreement with Rebel Pharmaceuticals, LLC, on two undisclosed compounds. The agreement will evaluate the ability of Merrion's patented Gipet technology to enhance the compounds clinical profile and provide a substantially improved product.

On successful completion of the feasibility agreement, Merrion and Rebel Pharmaceuticals will enter into license agreements, the financial terms, including milestones and royalties have already been agreed. Rebel Pharmaceuticals is a speciality pharmaceuticals company focused on enhancing approved drugs using proven and patented drug delivery technologies.

Commenting on the announcement, John Lynch, CEO, Merrion Pharmaceuticals said “we are very pleased to be entering into this agreement with Rebel Pharmaceuticals and building a relationship with them. We believe there can be substantial patient benefits from improved oral formulations of these compounds using our unique Gipet technology”.

David Blume, CEO, Rebel Pharmaceuticals, commented, “we are excited to partner with Merrion Pharmaceuticals to use their Gipet technology to achieve our goals for these development programs of enhancing existing drugs to benefit patients”.

Merrion's patented drug delivery technology, Gipet, is supported by a large database reflecting 10 years research and development by drug delivery experts and 21 clinical studies conducted on a broad range of drug types. In a database comprising more than 40 compounds which have poor permeability, Gipet has shown the ability to improve absorption by as much as 200 times, achieving excellent inter-subject reproducibility and with a positive safety database.

This database covers a wide range of compounds with varying physiochemical properties and molecular weights. This includes traditional small molecules as well as biopharmaceutical peptides and proteins, making Gipet a platform technology with broad applicability. Merrion's technology is endorsed through collaborations with pharmaceutical companies such as Novo Nordisk (oral insulin, oral GLP-1), Ferring Pharmaceuticals and others.

Merrion Pharmaceuticals is a publicly listed product development company focused on delivering innovation to the market by: designing our own patented products and partnering with other pharmaceutical companies to develop patented products. Established in 2003, Merrion are engaged in the development of oral forms (tablets/capsules) of drugs that have poor absorption and are generally given by injection.

Merrion Pharmaceutical's patented drug delivery technologies (Gipet) hugely increase bioavailability, by improving absorption in the gastrointestinal tract, of drugs that are otherwise poorly absorbed. As well as increasing absorption, Merrion's technologies also increase the consistency of absorption.

These new products can provide substantial benefits in enhanced drug efficacy, improved safety, toxicity and side effect profile, health economics, patient experience and quality of life.

Merrion has agreements with several pharmaceutical companies. The company has two license agreements with Novo Nordisk A/S to develop and commercialise oral Insulin and oral GLP-1 using Merrion's GIPET technology and it also has an oral drug delivery research collaborative program with Ferring Pharmaceuticals, a Swiss based international pharmaceutical company.

Merrion Pharmaceuticals is based in Dublin, in a state of the art purpose built cGMP facility which allows rapid development and reduced risk in taking product ideas from conception to final product formulation. Merrion also has operations in Wilmington, North Carolina.

Rebel Pharmaceuticals is a speciality pharmaceuticals company that employs novel drug delivery technologies to enhance approved compounds in order to improve substantially their clinical benefit.