Lilly To Acquire Hypnion

Eli Lilly and Co. has signed a definitive merger agreement to acquire Hypnion, Inc., a neuroscience drug discovery company focused on sleep disorders. The transaction is expected to close by the end of the first quarter of 2007, contingent upon customary closing conditions. Financial terms of the agreement were not disclosed.

“The acquisition of Hypnion provides Lilly with a broader and more substantive presence in the area of sleep disorder research,” said Steven M. Paul, M.D., executive vice president, science and technology for Lilly. “Hypnion has leveraged its expertise in this area to develop both innovative technologies and molecules, including the promising insomnia compound HY10275. We are excited to bring this expertise to Lilly and continue the efforts to discover better treatments for patients struggling with insomnia and other sleep disorders.”

Nick Galakatos, Ph.D., chairman of Hypnion, commented, “Having demonstrated the promise of our pipeline of sleep medicines in the clinic and our enabling SCORE technology, we recognized that a partnership with a leading pharmaceutical company was our best strategy for moving forward quickly. Given Lilly’s long record of achievement in neuroscience, we are confident that together we can produce safer and more efficacious sleep medications.”

Hypnion’s compound, HY10275, recently met the primary and secondary endpoints in an initial Phase II trial at doses of 1 mg and 3 mg in adults with transient insomnia. HY10275 is a proprietary compound discovered and developed by Hypnion as a dual-acting H1/5HT2a compound using the SCORE-2004 technology.