Tularik Inc. announced that Sankyo Company, Ltd. has selected a target for further development under their collaboration focused on orphan G-protein coupled receptors (GPCRs).

Under the terms of the collaboration to jointly discover and develop human therapeutics that act on GPCRs, Sankyo will fund research and pre-clinical development activities relating to compounds with activity against the selected target for up to 4 years. The parties will share equally all clinical development costs and profits in the US and Europe. Tularik is entitled to milestone and royalty payments as compounds against this target progress through clinical trials to registration outside of the US and Europe. Other financial terms were not disclosed.

"Sankyo's selection of a target for further development provides Tularik with continuing revenue and expertise from a strong partner in the area of GPCRs," said Terry Rosen, PhD, Tularik's executive vice president, Operations. "We have enjoyed working with Sankyo and look forward to exciting results from this important collaboration."

Dr Norio Nakamura, PhD, senior executive officer and GM of the Research Institute of Sankyo, said, "We are very glad to have established a truly reliable working partnership with Tularik, in which we accumulated deep respect for Tularik's scientific capabilities. We look forward to the discovery of an innovative drug as the fruit of this collaboration."

G-protein coupled receptors (GPCRs) are proteins that traverse the cell membrane seven times (also referred to as heptahelical receptors). These proteins regulate diverse biological functions including sight, taste and smell. Furthermore, GPCRs are involved in the regulation of inflammation, blood pressure, reproduction, digestion and appetite. Approximately one third of the top 100 drugs currently on the market act on GPCRs, including Claritin, Cozaar and Singulair, which are the top three sellers targeting GPCRs.

Sankyo is one of Japan's largest pharmaceutical companies with annual worldwide sales of $5 billion and over 11,500 employees. Sankyo is working toward new discoveries especially in the field of cardiovascular, diabetes, obesity, bones and joints, immune system related disorders and allergies.

Tularik is engaged in the discovery and development of a broad range of novel and superior orally available medicines that act through the regulation of gene expression. Tularik's scientific platform is focused on three therapeutic areas: cancer, immunology and metabolic disease.