arGEN-X receives two preclinical milestone payments under collaboration with Shire

• Enters into pilot research agreement with Boehringer Ingelheim

Breda, the Netherlands / Ghent, Belgium– arGEN-X, a clinical stage human therapeutic antibody company, announces the attainment of two important success milestones in its SIMPLE Antibody™ research and product development collaboration with Shire. The milestones, which trigger undisclosed payments from Shire, relate to demonstration of in vivo proof of concept for one of the ongoing antibody discovery programs.

Initiated in February 2012, the collaboration is focused on creating human therapeutic antibodies against complex targets implicated in severe, rare genetic diseases. Shire has an option to license the most promising antibody leads for further development and commercialization worldwide, in return for fee, milestone and royalty payments.

Yet again the functional diversity of SIMPLE Antibodies™ has enabled our scientists to set a precedent in validating highly complex targets both in vitro and in vivo and identifying antibody leads with exciting therapeutic potential, said Hans de Haard, PhD, Chief Scientific Officer of arGEN-X. We value our collaboration with Shire very highly and continue to make excellent progress through the outstanding joint efforts of our teams.

We are very impressed by the productivity and consistent success of our therapeutic antibody collaboration with arGEN-X,said Albert Seymour, Head of Discovery Biology and Translational Research at Shire.

arGEN-X today also announced the initiation of a new pilot research agreement with Boehringer Ingelheim. No further details are being disclosed at this stage.