About ERIX
EiRx Therapeutics is a specialist provider of pre-clinical therapeutics to the pharmaceutical industry. Our unique scientific expertise and knowledge in the field of Apoptosis provide a sound base to discover and develop new medicines that will safely and selectively repair this natural process in disease. The potential benefits from these new medicines are enormous, since as many as 70% of all human disease have some defect in the control of Apoptosis.
Apoptosis - the biological process that determines whether cells in our bodies live or die...
http://www.eirx.com/index.html

Purchased some of these on the strength of the PROGRESS UPDATE looks promising.
http://moneyam.uk-wire.com/cgi-bin/articles/200603200701130254A.html

ERX interview with John Pool
http://www.wallstreetreporter.com/interview.php?id=18589&player=real
Latest News
CANCER COLLABORATION WITH BIOMERIEUX SA
http://moneyam.uk-wire.com/cgi-bin/articles/200607120700230534G.html
Biomerieux Web Site
http://www.biomerieux.com/servlet/srt/bio/portail/home
ABOUT ERX Focus Of The Month
http://www.billamag.net/focus-document-text.asp?FocusTextID=1
ERX pdf filehttp://www.eirx.com/eirx_heading_images/Yokohama2005.pdf
19/09/2006 A 50% reduction in breast tumour volume size seen with Eirx lead molecule in animal studies
http://moneyam.uk-wire.com/cgi-bin/articles/200609190700171175J.html

Past and present collaborative partners include:

* bioMieux SA
* Almac Diagnostics Ltd
* Merck & Co, Ltd
* Biofocus plc
* MGI Pharmaceuticals, Inc
* OSI Pharmaceuticals, Inc
* Sareum plc
* Regen Therapeutics plc
* SR Pharma plc

Bobby

pot head must be yoda !!

smiler did you get the email on the takeover

pot head No !

October 31, 5:19 AM ET
Merck to Buy Biotech Firm for $1.1B

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - Pharmaceutical company Merck & Co. said Monday it agreed to pay an eye-popping $1.1 billion to buy Sirna Therapeutics Inc., a tiny biotechnology firm developing drugs based on new technology at the heart of last month's Nobel Prize for medicine award.

Merck's $13-per-share offer for the San Francisco-based company is almost a 102 percent premium over Sirna's closing Nasdaq Stock Market price of $6.45, which fell 5 cents before the bid was made public after the stock markets closed. Sirna's stock surged 98 percent to $12.74 in after-hours trading. The stock's high for the past year is $8.52, set in April.

Merck's stock fell 45 cents to $45.64 at the close of trading on the New York Stock Exchange and remained unchanged in after-hours trading.

Sirna is developing drugs using so-called RNA interference technology. There are at least a half-dozen biotechnology companies developing drugs that silence genes by interfering with the messenger-carrying RNA, a technique discovered by this year's Nobel winners, Andrew Fire of Stanford University and Craig Mello at the University of Massachusetts. There are eight U.S and European patents specifically related to the technology.

Analysts said the deal could spur other similar acquisitions of some of Sirna's handful of competitors who are racing to commercialize a discovery made only eight years ago - a short time in the scientific world.

Normally skittish venture capitalists already have invested hundreds of millions in the nascent technology and now Merck has made its second, most substantive bet on RNA interference. The Whitehouse Station, N.J.-based company previously had invested in Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, a Sirna competitor.

The closest drug Sirna has near market is for the treatment of the eye disorder, macular degeneration, a leading cause of blindness in the elderly. However, that drug is still at least two years from regulatory approval and probably further out because its experimental treatment will require the successful completion of at least two costly, time-consuming and large-scale human trials testing for safety and effectiveness.

"It's kind of surprising and I don't think anyone saw it coming," said Leerink Swann analyst William Tanner. "Big pharmaceutical companies tend to buy biotechnology companies with nearer term prospects."

But Tanner and other analysts said Sirna's technology is promising, as evidenced by the Nobel award this year.

"We believe that RNAi could significantly change the way in which we go about discovering and developing drugs, and could become a new way to treat patients with unmet medical needs," said Merck president Peter S. Kim.

Drug makers and researchers have long sought to create drugs that target bad cells while leaving healthy ones alone, hoping to rely less on dangerous, blunt treatments such as chemotherapy. Many are betting RNA interference will be a powerful tool in customizing drugs.

The idea, essentially, is to mug the messenger RNA before it can deliver its genetic information and thereby "silencing" genes.

But Nobel winner Fire recently said there are several significant scientific hurdles to overcome before the technology can be turned into drugs, including figuring out how to ensure the drug reaches its intended target while leaving healthy cells unharmed.

For Sirna, Merck's bid vindicates the dramatic overhaul company officials took in 2003, when the struggling company was named Ribozyme Pharmaceuticals Inc. and was based in Boulder, Colo.

In April 2003, stockholders approved of a reverse stock split and a renaming of the company to Sirna to reflect its new embrace of RNA interference. The company changed most of its board of directors to appoint members from the stable of venture capital firms that invested a combined $48 million that April.

"The company made a really good call early on to focus on therapeutics and that focus has really paid off," said Jim Niedel, a venture capitalist who made half the $48 million investment on behalf of The Sprout Group. That investment made Sprout the company's largest shareholder and is worth a little less than $250 million based on Merck's bid, said Niedel, who served as the company chairman until earlier this year.

Merck said stockholders holding 36 percent of Sirna's outstanding shares already have committed to support the deal, which still needs antitrust clearance to close. The two companies hope to complete the deal in the first quarter of 2007.

EiRx Therapeutic in deal with Merck for its delivery technology

LONDON (AFX) - EiRx Therapeutics PLC said it signed an agreement with Merck
& Co Inc to demonstrate its sirRNA delivery technology, which is used for
validation of novel drug targets.
EiRx, which specialises in the control of programmed life and death of cells
(apoptosis), will carry out research using its established cancer cell assays to
demonstrate the effectiveness of its technology to Merck.
newsdesk@afxnews.com

October 31, 5:19 AM ET
Merck to Buy Biotech Firm for $1.1B

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - Pharmaceutical company Merck & Co. said Monday it agreed to pay an eye-popping $1.1 billion to buy Sirna Therapeutics Inc., a tiny biotechnology firm developing drugs based on new technology at the heart of last month's Nobel Prize for medicine award.

Merck's $13-per-share offer for the San Francisco-based company is almost a 102 percent premium over Sirna's closing Nasdaq Stock Market price of $6.45, which fell 5 cents before the bid was made public after the stock markets closed. Sirna's stock surged 98 percent to $12.74 in after-hours trading. The stock's high for the past year is $8.52, set in April.

Merck's stock fell 45 cents to $45.64 at the close of trading on the New York Stock Exchange and remained unchanged in after-hours trading.

Sirna is developing drugs using so-called RNA interference technology. There are at least a half-dozen biotechnology companies developing drugs that silence genes by interfering with the messenger-carrying RNA, a technique discovered by this year's Nobel winners, Andrew Fire of Stanford University and Craig Mello at the University of Massachusetts. There are eight U.S and European patents specifically related to the technology.

Analysts said the deal could spur other similar acquisitions of some of Sirna's handful of competitors who are racing to commercialize a discovery made only eight years ago - a short time in the scientific world.

Normally skittish venture capitalists already have invested hundreds of millions in the nascent technology and now Merck has made its second, most substantive bet on RNA interference. The Whitehouse Station, N.J.-based company previously had invested in Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, a Sirna competitor.

The closest drug Sirna has near market is for the treatment of the eye disorder, macular degeneration, a leading cause of blindness in the elderly. However, that drug is still at least two years from regulatory approval and probably further out because its experimental treatment will require the successful completion of at least two costly, time-consuming and large-scale human trials testing for safety and effectiveness.

"It's kind of surprising and I don't think anyone saw it coming," said Leerink Swann analyst William Tanner. "Big pharmaceutical companies tend to buy biotechnology companies with nearer term prospects."

But Tanner and other analysts said Sirna's technology is promising, as evidenced by the Nobel award this year.

"We believe that RNAi could significantly change the way in which we go about discovering and developing drugs, and could become a new way to treat patients with unmet medical needs," said Merck president Peter S. Kim.

Drug makers and researchers have long sought to create drugs that target bad cells while leaving healthy ones alone, hoping to rely less on dangerous, blunt treatments such as chemotherapy. Many are betting RNA interference will be a powerful tool in customizing drugs.

The idea, essentially, is to mug the messenger RNA before it can deliver its genetic information and thereby "silencing" genes.

But Nobel winner Fire recently said there are several significant scientific hurdles to overcome before the technology can be turned into drugs, including figuring out how to ensure the drug reaches its intended target while leaving healthy cells unharmed.

For Sirna, Merck's bid vindicates the dramatic overhaul company officials took in 2003, when the struggling company was named Ribozyme Pharmaceuticals Inc. and was based in Boulder, Colo.

In April 2003, stockholders approved of a reverse stock split and a renaming of the company to Sirna to reflect its new embrace of RNA interference. The company changed most of its board of directors to appoint members from the stable of venture capital firms that invested a combined $48 million that April.

"The company made a really good call early on to focus on therapeutics and that focus has really paid off," said Jim Niedel, a venture capitalist who made half the $48 million investment on behalf of The Sprout Group. That investment made Sprout the company's largest shareholder and is worth a little less than $250 million based on Merck's bid, said Niedel, who served as the company chairman until earlier this year.

Merck said stockholders holding 36 percent of Sirna's outstanding shares already have committed to support the deal, which still needs antitrust clearance to close. The two companies hope to complete the deal in the first quarter of 2007.

take note of the takeover here... there is more to this

MM at it again.

Looks that way laurie !! 34,mil trades and back where we started :(

Merk and co are our major shareholder... hint hint if ya didnt know

Pot head, thanks for the post's but caution I think ! erx has not come fwd with an RNS, and why has the sp not moved ? SO UNTILL news i would rather not speculate ! but remain hopefull : )

our father ou art in heaven!!!!

After several e. mails a reponse : -
Thank you for contacting me.



We do not normally comment on rumours but can assure you that our company is aware of its reporting requirements and that information which is required to be disclosed has been and/or will be disclosed via RNS when appropriate. We are reviewing our website but as we cannot incorporate any price sensitive information until it has been released via RNS, we suggest that you look there for important news in the first instance.

LAURIE, THANKS our guess was right then ! post 406 ! :)

driver you should have mail by tomorrow sent it to day ref erix it was sent to me by colin telfer : )

laurie
So this is the most talked about email on the whole of the net it seems to me its a general answer thats given out to any question that you ask of ERX but read into it what you will. IMO I wouldnt want a take over, what would it be 100% premium on the close I thought we was looking for a lot more than that.

smiler
Email received cheers.

No way to only 100%, if only half the current rumours are true management would tell them to go away.
Based on the purchase yesterday from PH ERX holds more patents and is in control of a major niche area.
I don't think management would sell for less than 5p and if milestones are all in pipeline maybe pushing 10p as they know they are sitting on a good product IMO.

It would solve Glaxo or similar current pipeline problems though so an offer would not be a surprise to me.

JohnDavison - 31 Oct'06 - 21:13 - 8413 of 8443

Evening All

As promised I have had time to go through my e-mails despite interruptions from the family and clients.

I asked JP about OSI, I asked if the targets were set at the end of each cycle and in what form are the payments due, ie. consult fees for the first stage..etc... or would you normally get more than 1 of these at each stage from these sorts of contracts. - The response back was that normally there is a specific payment at the end of each defined process unless there is a JV or consultancy agreement in parallel in which case they would be separate.

So to take it further I wanted to know if such a payment process and parallel consult agreement is in place for OSI and, importantly, do we know if any of those targets have been met? Well a resounding Yes and Eirx are chasing.


As for the talk about takeover, I , currently, tend to disagree with Cannon...sorry mate !

JP has already said they have enough cash to last a year so why consider being taken over? Also when JP mention the M&A he was referring to the piece in the reports and accounts, he confirmed that to me. Just in case anyone didn't see it, it said

M & A activity:
A key aspect of the Company's longer term strategy is the building of an
integrated pharmaceutical company through the addition of skills such as
medicinal and synthetic chemistry. With our small-molecule lead programmes
underway and rapidly progressing towards the clinic, the need for these skills
is clear. Such skills may be acquired through M&A transactions, collaborations
(see above), or organic growth. The Board strongly feels that M&A activity
offers the most opportune route in the current climate and to this end is
actively exploring a number of such opportunities that offer access to key
complementary assets of other companies.

So I think it seems that both MGI and OSI owe us money and are being chased, I think the takeover rumour was just that...a rumour, and other news is due.

If any questions please let me know...I'll try and answer them...

Oh 1 other thing..any chance we can use this BB for info rather than jamming it up with crap..just a thought ? LOL

JD

fantastic article in the metro on cancer, using mice, appararently they are immune to cancer, they are called super mice.. sounded very much like ERX, it was front page news