BioCentury
ARTICLE | Strategy

Lexicon finds chemistry with Coelacanth

June 18, 2001 7:00 AM UTC

As a functional genomics company, Lexicon Genetics Inc. has busied itself churning out validated targets using its knockout mouse technology. But without additional components of a drug discovery engine, LEXG was faced with the choice of either out-licensing its targets or warehousing them. With last week's proposed $32 million stock acquisition of Coelacanth Corp., LEXG gains chemistry technologies for NCE identification, and expects that it now will be able to play both sides of the drug discovery game, picking and choosing targets for internal development while farming out others.

Upon closing of the acquisition, expected in July, LEXG will establish a Lexicon Pharmaceuticals division for small molecule drug discovery, with Coelacanth at its core. "Lexicon Pharma will go from human gene to lead compound," said LEXG President and CEO Arthur Sands. "We'll always have a surplus of in vivo validated targets - some, therefore, will be partnered at the lead stage."...