Bayer, OncoMed Enter Clinical Mfg Pact

OncoMed Pharmaceuticals and Bayer HealthCare have expanded their collaboration under which Bayer will manufacture clinical supplies of a second Wnt inhibitor. Bayer will manufacture the bulk drug substance at its Berkeley, CA clinical manufacturing center to support Phase I testing, which expected to begin in 2012.

“We are pleased to announce this expansion of our partnership with Bayer,” said Paul Hastings, president and chief executive officer of OncoMed Pharmaceuticals. “We continue to make significant progress in our Wnt pathway programs, and this manufacturing agreement underscores the commitment of both parties to collaboratively advance breakthrough anticancer stem cell programs into development.”

“At Bayer we have extensive experience in process development and manufacturing a wide variety of proteins, including complex glycoproteins,” said Harald Dinter, vice president of Global Biologics Development for Bayer HealthCare. “This extension of our partnership with OncoMed to include clinical manufacturing of this additional product candidate is characteristic of our approach to working side-by-side in collaborations to advance novel therapeutic candidates to patient care.”