This ones a heck of a specualive investment but it seems that the institutions are willing to stomp up the cash to back it in the long term.

Heres the latest news from Killik stocbrokers on the company..........

MEDICAL MARKETING Joint Venture

We recently highlighted Medical Marketing (MMG) as worthy of attention. The company, in which I have a personal share holding, has this morning announced the formation of a joint venture, Genvax, to develop a novel DNA vaccine platform technology.

Human trials have been underway since 2001 in areas such as Lymphoma and Myeloma but the technology has broad applications in cancer, viral and bacterial infections (hence the term platform). The technology works on boosting the immune system by teaching it to identify hard to recognise cancer proteins as foreign and destroy them. Early results from the 25 patient trial in lymphoma are encouraging and evaluation of the result is expected by March 2005. Successful results should mean big pharmaceutical groups will start to take financial and commercial interests around that time.

This looks to be the first of a series of announcements due from Medical Marketing as it has a range of predominantly cancer trials moving into the clinical stage. (news flow could push the price higher)

The stock has made good progress in recent sessions up to the mid-80p level where the company is valued at just under 40 million. ENDS.

Please DYOR

cheers GF.

Yes good luck to all of us !
Nice to see a buy of 100,000 shares at 1.60 go through this afternoon.
DB66

Its fighting hard to keep hold of recent gains and some pretty decent size buys starting to come in today.

Do you know what i`m bloody sure i`m the only one really left in here !
A buy has just gone through at 1.67 so its still moving on up.

Your not you know DB. Its going very well. I darent say much on this thread in case I put the dampner on it. SCHHH.

cheers GF.

Fair enough GF,maybe i`m getting a bit carried away with the recent gains but you have to go back to September to see the SP at this sort of level.
I will keep quiet now as i`ve noticed they have put a large sell through! B******s

I have a target of 2 before I take my profit. I am looking for guidance here, is this realistic? or should I be brave and hold on for more? Does anyone have a realistic long term view? Lot's of questions I know but if someone has some anwers I would appreciate them.

Hi guy's
was into mmg heavily for some years but sold last October. Have just bought back in (thursday). I think it could be poised for another run up and i'm looking for 2.50.
cheers Rob

Its got some momentum going now. If Evil drops out his followers will and will push the price up.

cheers GF.

What makes you think he's still short?

The web site he posts his diaryies on says so.

MS

the reason I sold last year was because of 'alleged' shorting campaigns (succesfull) by certain 'followed' investors. I had held this share since its days on ofex as Bioscience Innovation and was very dissapointed by last years farce. I am back in now and hopefully the share can run its true valued course and the tosspots will leave it alone.

Rob

If this goes up on no news I think it will retract and the shorters will jump all over it again. But if we get news then the shorts will get a real stuffing.

MS

Thanks MS.
I'm not a subscriber.

I think this will reach 400p in no time

Not without substantial news it won't.

MS

Dont be so down Mickey, but your caution is well recieved.

cheers GF.

Not sure if this oine as been posted before.............

One Deal Away
9/1/2006 (119264)

One Deal Away


Just one commercial agreement with a major pharmaceutical company for one of Medical Marketing Internationals (MMG) products could transform the business and its value.

That is a direct quotation from the pre-Christmas interim statement by David Best, chairman of MMI. It had little impact, perhaps because Best has made similar statements before. It is possible that MMI will not land such an agreement, of course. Nothing in the highly technical pharmaceutical industry is certain. But the chances are looking good, and at 142p to 149p, the shares continue to look a good gamble with a market capitalisation of about 70m.

Such a conclusion is nothing new here, however. MMI has long been a favourite at higher and lower prices. The interim statement merely emphasised the opportunity.

With the benefit of a 10m fund-raising at 135p at the end of September, MMI has a solid balance sheet which removes any opportunity for a bigger business to force negotiations through. MMI has strength to survive happily for at least a couple of years while there is further progress on what appear to be two potentially block-buster cancer treatments, with others in the background.

One way or another, the company is talking to the majority of the worlds top ten pharmaceutical giants. This is not speculation. It is fact, confirmed by the company. Some of these discussions have been in progress for quite some time. It would be unwise to attempt to predict when one would produce a public announcement, but 2006 should be the year when MMI starts to deliver deals which justify the belief of insiders that it is worth very much more than the current share rating.

Anyone in any doubt ought to go to the companys website at www.mmigroup.co.uk, or check my archives for the November 3 report on the presentation at the annual meeting (The MMI Meeting).

The Genvax (effectively 58% owned) subsidiary has a global first in DNA vaccines, achieving a strong targeted immune response against cancer. The wholly owned Oncosense subsidiary features a family of ruthenium compounds which look as if they could become established as a superior alternative to the massively important platinum-based drugs in the fight against cancer. There is other potentially exciting progress, but Genvax and ruthenium lead the way.

The interim report shows that all is coming along nicely. Genvax has four different cancer vaccines in the clinic. The lymphoma study has been done. The key results have been published, but the full study is not yet complete, and will take a while longer. There is no adverse reason for this, and it is unlikely that the final odds and ends will do other than echo the results already known.

This is confirmed by news that the other Genvax trials have permission to push ahead. The prostate cancer trial should finish at the end of February, with more patients recruited and higher doses being administered. Though it is fairly easy to measure the results, it will probably take several months before they are released.

Permission has been granted for a colon cancer trial. That is a longer term project, and could take a couple of years. A further trial using healthy bone marrow donors is in the clinic.

Though the main research thrust has been towards treating cancer, the Genvax vaccines are also significant because they demonstrate that the company has
a working DNA vaccine which might help provide a rapid solution to the possible bird flu pandemic.

Dr Freda Stevenson and her colleagues at the University of Southampton have created a platform technology with many possible applications. After years of neglect, the vaccine market is hot again as governments pump money into initiatives which can boost production. DNA vaccines can be made in a matter of weeks, and hopefully can be formulated rapidly to respond to the changing shape of the avian flu virus.

The company is talking to relevant authorities. This suggests that not only are major pharmaceutical companies involved, but Government scientists are also taking an interest. All such matters are governed by tight confidentiality clauses, so shareholders will have to watch and wait.

The latest unsettling news from Turkey supports the fear that a pandemic is still likely, though transmission from human to human has not yet happened.

All in all, it appears that Genvax is probably the most likely to be the first MMI project to attract a major announcement, though this is by no means certain. Because it deals with an area of science which has frustrated others for decades, potential partners have more questions to resolve ahead of any deal.

The chemistry of ruthenium is not that dissimilar from platinum, where there is a vast bank of knowledge and understanding, making it potentially more predictable.

MMI has received the first two of three ruthenium compounds manufactured to commercial standards by Sigma-Aldrich. Tests will start very soon, and it could take a couple of months to establish that these compounds reproduce the original results. There will also be work to establish the maximum tolerated dose, and to ensure that the compound remains stable in a variety of conditions. All being well, this will be the prelude to a move into clinical trials later this year.

Ruthenium has attracted more interest than might have been expected at this stage, and there is work to develop a second generation of compounds and to guard patents.

Supported by the possibility that the Viratis programme developing ribozymes to treat viral diseases could also become a platform technology, the MMI portfolio is developing in highly promising fashion.

Talks with potential partners continue against a background of a steady flow of industry deals between big pharma and small research-based companies.

These can attract packages worth hundreds of millions of dollars, and in some cases open the way to billions of dollars. It is always important to emphasise that until a deal is done, there is no guarantee that any of the MMI technology could attract any such deal. But the breakthrough at Genvax, and the progress on ruthenium suggest MMI has a real chance.

AstraZeneca is in the process of buying a private British company called KuDos for $210m. KuDos has one cancer product in phase I trials, and on the face of it looks less much less broadly based than MMI.

Just before Christmas, US company Atherogenics announced that AstraZeneca was to licence a product which is in phase III for atherosclerosis, a disease which leads to heart attacks and strokes. AstraZeneca will pay $50m upfront, with $300m on development milestones and $650m in other fees and milestone payments. There will also be royalties on sales. Predicted turnover is $2bn.

A different area to MMI? Sure. But cancer therapy is a massive market, and the two most successful platinum-based drugs had peak sales of $5bn before generics came in.
The MMI projects are well behind the Atherogenics product in terms of clinical trials. It is important to realise that they could fall at any hurdle.

As MMI continues to move along the path towards and through clinical trials, however, the notional value increases. A deal with big pharma in the months ahead ought to raise the perceived value of the company significantly.

In the meantime, there could be more news on patents, and perhaps some reports from brokers who have been following the company.

MMI shares remain a high-risk, high-return play. Last year, we saw big pharma businesses being forced to withdraw big-selling drugs from the market as the problems with the science emerged. No investment in this sector can be regarded as absolutely safe and predictable.

Look, though, at the repeated statements from the company. Several times, Best has mentioned talks with big pharma and pointed to the potential for transforming value.

The shares tend to move quite sharply on low volume, and have been subject to cynical attacks from shorters in the past. They remain vulnerable until Best can announce a deal, so holding MMI is not without risk. But the odds look good.

I hold shares in MMI.

Ends

cheers GF.

A good post the details of which most of us long term holders will know about.
It is good to have it posted on the board if only to remind some people what they seem to have forgotten the last few months.
This as stated in the above post is high risk but one i`m willing to take.

Me too DB66. The risk it there, but I think the potential outweighs any risk. I'm in and staying in.

LOL

MS

Looking at the effect on SP of the Atherogenics AZN deal announcement, the SP increased 25% from 16$ to 21$.
The SP 2 months later is back down to 16$ (in a bull market!, lesson to be learnt?).
This was for a phase III drug not one about to start phase IIb.
My point is that I think the comment "one deal away" is misleading. The drugs are no more likely to be successful with big pharma on board.

I see drug results being the key driver here and not deals (although it will help).

Having said that Atherogenics is valued at 600M$ and increased 150M$ on the announcement. They have a poor pipeline with only 1 other product in phase 1 but do have 200M$ cash.
Shame MMG are not listed on NASDAQ.