Wednesday, August 10, 2011

Avila doubles space in move to Bedford

By Lori Valigra, Mass High Tech correspondent

Avila Therapeutics Inc., a clinical stage biotechnology company, said it has moved to a new facility in Bedford that more than doubles its space, in anticipation of growth as its product pipeline advances.

The new facility is 23,000 square feet. The company previously was located in Waltham, where it had outgrown its space and was using temporary auxiliary space, CEO Katrine Bosley said.

“The interest in our pipeline of covalent drugs has intensified remarkably, and we’ve recently expanded our team to advance our product candidates and to support our scientific collaborations,” Avila CEO Katrine Bosley said in announcing the new facility. The company’s head count has doubled to 50 over the past six months, partly in response to a collaboration with Sanofi. She would not specify how many workers are focused on the six oncology programs involved in that deal.

“There are two things driving our recent growth,” she said. “We expanded our research group to support the collaboration with Sanofi, and our lead program is continuing to advance.” She said the Bedford facility has the technical requirements and systems to accommodate the scientific equipment Avila has, so it is a great fit. The new facility is in a business park near several other biotechs, including Synta Pharmaceuticals Corp.

The company is developing targeted covalent drugs that treat cancer and autoimmune diseases through protein silencing. The lead candidate, AVL-292, which targets non hodgkin’s lymphoma and chronic lymphocytic leukemia, is in Phase 1 testing.

In late July, the company received its first U.S. patent. The company is developing its own therapeutic programs but also is leveraging its intellectual property through alliances with Sanofi, Clovis Oncology Inc. and the Novartis Option Fund.

The deal with Sanofi, announced in December, involves a $40 million upfront payment to Avila as part of a research collaboration aimed at developing cancer drugs that potentially could be worth a total of $800 million.

The agreement with Colorado biopharmaceutical company Clovis, announced last May, could net Avila up to $209 million and produce a lung cancer treatment.

Cushman & Wakefield represented Avila in leasing the new property, which is owned, managed and operated by Alexandria Real Estate Equities Inc.