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Baltimore, MD | Thursday, March 24, 2011

Champions Announces Technology Collaboration Utilizing Champions’ Tumorgraft™ Technology Platform for Oncology Drug Development

Oct 20 2011 10:00 AM

Champions Biotechnology, Inc. (OTC: CSBR) (“Champions”) announced today the signing of a technology collaboration agreement with Cephalon, Inc. in which Champions will conduct low passage Tumorgraft™ studies on two proprietary chemical compounds, CEP-32496, an inhibitor of mutant B-Raf, and CEP-37440, a selective dual ALK-FAK inhibitor, provided by Cephalon to determine the activity or response in potential clinical indications. The results of these studies will be used to inform the future clinical development path of these compounds.

Cephalon will pay Champions an initiation fee of $1,390,000 by April 15, 2011, and will, under certain conditions, also pay Champions various amounts upon achieving certain milestones. Potential milestone payments under the Agreement total $27 million. In addition, under certain conditions, Cephalon will pay Champions royalties on any commercialized products developed under the Agreement.

Guy Malchi, Champion’s head of corporate development commented, “This is our largest Translational Oncology Services contract to date and provides us with a great foundation for strong revenue growth for our next fiscal year. We are very excited to be partnering with an innovative company like Cephalon that can utilize our technology to improve the process of oncology drug development. The potential for future milestone and royalty payments in these contracts will allow us to capture a portion of the financial upside our technology generates for our customers. We hope this is just the beginning of a productive and long term partnership between our companies.”

Jeffry Vaught, Cephalon’s Executive Vice President for R&D said, “Our collaboration with Champions Biotechnology significantly compliments our oncology discovery capabilities by providing wider access to more clinically relevant and predictive pre-clinical oncology models. In addition, Champions’ technology platform will enable us to more effectively select the subsets of specific human cancers most likely to respond to our novel targeted therapeutic agents and identify the underlying cancer genotypes associated with drug sensitivity and resistance to chemotherapeutics.”

About Champions Oncology, Inc.

Champions Oncology, Inc. (formerly Champions Biotechnology, Inc) is engaged in the development of advanced technology solutions and services to personalize the development and use of oncology drugs. The Company’s Tumorgraft™ Technology Platform is a novel approach to personalizing cancer care based upon the implantation of primary human tumors in immune deficient mice followed by propagation of the resulting engraftments, or Tumorgrafts™, in a manner that preserves the biological characteristics of the original human tumor. The Company uses this technology in conjunction with related services to offer solutions for two customer groups: Personalized Oncology Solutions (“POS”) in which physicians and patients looking for information help guide the development of personalized treatment plans, and Translational Oncology Solutions (“TOS”) in which pharmaceutical and biotech companies seeking personalized approaches to drug development can lower the cost and increase the speed of developing new drugs and increasing the adoption of existing drugs. The Company’s Tumorgraft™ Technology Platform consists of processes, physical tumors and information that we use to personalize the development and use of oncology drugs. The Company is building its Tumorgraft™ Technology Platform through the procurement, development and characterization of numerous Tumorgrafts™ within each of several cancer types. Tumorgrafts™ are procured through agreements with a number of institutions in the U.S. and overseas as well as through its POS business. The Tumorgrafts™ are developed and tested through agreement with a United States-based preclinical facility.

The Company provides POS to oncologists by establishing and administering expert tumor panels for their patients to analyze medical records and test results, to assist in understanding conventional and experimental options and to identify and arrange for testing, analysis and study of the patients’ cancer tissues, as appropriate. Additionally, the Company offers Personalized Tumorgraft™ development, drug studies and genome sequencing as part of its POS whereby physicians can evaluate the effects of cancer drugs on their patients’ tumorgrafts and understand the genetic make-up of their patient’s tumor enabling them to better select treatment regimens that may be efficacious to the patient

This press release may contain “forward-looking statements” (within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Act of 1995) that inherently involve risk and uncertainties. Champions Oncology generally uses words such as “believe,” “may,” “could,” “will,” “intend,” “expect,” “anticipate,” “plan,” and similar expressions to identify forward-looking statements. One should not place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements. The Company’s actual results could differ materially from those anticipated in the forward-looking statements for many unforeseen factors. See Champions Oncology’s Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended April 30, 2011 for a discussion of such risks, uncertainties and other factors. Although the Company believes the expectations reflected in the forward-looking statements are reasonable, they relate only to events as of the date on which the statements are made, and Champions Oncology’s future results, levels of activity, performance or achievements may not meet these expectations. The Company does not intend to update any of the forward-looking statements after the date of this press release to conform these statements to actual results or to changes in Champions Oncology’s expectations, except as required by law.

References:

  1. Hidalgo M et al. Activity of gemcitabine in direct patient derived xenografts predicts clinical outcome: validation of an in vivo model for drug development. J Clin Oncol 27:15s, 2009 (suppl; abstr 4528)
  2. Hidalgo M et al. A Pilot Study of Treatment Guided by Personalized Tumorgrafts in Patients with Advanced Cancer. Mol Cancer Ther August 2011 10:1311-1316
  3. Rubio-Viqueira B, Jimeno A, Cusatis G, et al. An in vivo platform for translational drug development in pancreatic cancer. Clin Cancer Res. 2006;12:4652-4661.
  4. Champions data on file.