Background

Morvus Technology Ltd is a pharmaceutical company formed in April 2004 to exploit its founders’ proven expertise in the areas of drug and target-discovery and the commercialisation of novel technology.  Its primary focus is oncology.

Morvus was established by an experienced management team who were previously the founders and senior executives of Enact Pharma Plc, which was acquired in June 2003 by Protherics Plc. In April 2004 the team negotiated a management buy-out from Protherics acquiring some niche early-stage programmes and technology and an asset-base of equipment.  Since then Morvus has substantially increased the value of the business via the creation of a product-rich portfolio derived out of a suite of programmes outside the original buy-out.

In October 2007 Morvus completed the acquisition of two specialist oncology companies, Cardiff Protides Limited and Cardiff Biologicals Limited, which were formed to exploit the innovative research of Professors Chris McGuigan and Wen Jiang at Cardiff University.  The former company added medicinal chemistry resource and the technology to produce improved versions of known nucleoside-based anti-cancer drugs and the latter drug development expertise and access to a bio-informatics database.  Most importantly the companies each added a potential “blockbuster” oncology drug candidate to the Company’s product pipeline which allows Morvus to achieve critical mass in its pre-clinical product portfolio.

The Company’s business strategy is to out-license its intellectual property and/or know-how to the pharmaceutical/biotech industry and generate revenue from signature fees, milestone payments and royalties.  The Company is technology-rich and has the capability to out-license a combination of pre-clinical and post-clinical programmes.