Wednesday, August 6, 2008

Alnylam lands $7.5M to keep developing Ebola drug

By Mass High Tech Staff

Cambridge-based RNAi therapeutics company Alnylam Pharmaceuticals Inc. says it has won $7.5 million in continued funding from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) to develop an RNA interference-based therapeutic against viruses like Ebola.

Alnylam (Nasdaq: ALNY) was awarded the contract in 2006 by NIAID, a unit of the National Institutes of Health. The contract could result in up to $23 million in funding over a four-year period, and calls for Alnylam to develop small interfering RNAs as anti-viral drugs to fight hemorrhagic fever viruses like Ebola, which can cause a severe, often fatal infection.

So far, the government has committed up to $14.2 million for the first two years of the contract to Alnylam.

According to Barry Greene, president and COO of Alnylam, the company has landed more than $63 million in federal contracts to date for the unit Alnylam Biodefense. The government considers hemorrhagic fever viruses not only a public safety risk but a potential bioterrorism threat.

Alnylam is working with the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases in developing the therapeutics. Alnylam produces drug candidates which are then sent to USAMRIID for in vitro and in vivo testing against Ebola virus.

Earlier this week, Alnylam reported it had widened its RNA therapeutics program by obtaining the intellectual property (IP) rights for a new type of technology called RNA activation, or RNAa, from labs across the country.

Alnylam has 129 employees and reported a 2007 net loss of $85.5 million on revenue of $50.9 million.