Columbia deal

COB paid $2 million to a group of French investors for the right to license a multibranched peptide that is designed to prevent HIV from entering healthy cells. The peptide was developed at the University of Marseille, which will use the money to run Phase II/III dose ranging trials in France and the U.K. in late-stage AIDS patients. The endpoint of the study, slated to begin in the first quarter of 1994, will be decreased viral load. ...