Tripep initiates clinical development of ChronVac-C® for the treatment of chronic hepatitis C virus infection in collaboration with US company Inovio™

Tripep has today signed a product development agreement with the AMEX listed US company Inovio™ (AMEX:INO; www.inovio.com) regarding clinical development of Tripep's therapeutic vaccine ChronVac-C® for the treatment of chronic hepatitis C virus infection. Through this collaboration with Inovio™, Tripep will clinically evaluate genetic vaccination with ChronVac-C® (DNA plasmid) using the Medpulser™ apparatus, Inovio's patent protected in vivo-electroporation delivery device. The Medpulser™ apparatus has been approved for human investigational use and is believed to be a safe and effective way to enhance DNA vaccination and the use of this delivery device with ChronVac-C® promises to provide an effective treatment for chronic hepatitis C virus infection. The ChronVac-C® clinical development program was created following an initial discussion with the Swedish Medical Products Agency in Uppsala. A phase I clinical study of ChronVac-C® in humans (healthy volunteers) is planned to be performed at Karolinska University Hospital Huddinge with a start date estimated to late 2006. The production of the vaccine according to Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) has been completed and the pre-clinical studies required for testing of the vaccine in humans will start in the winter and will be completed during the summer of 2006. The aim of the phase I study is to evaluate the safety of the ChronVac-C® vaccine delivered by the Medpulser™ and to identify the optimal dose. In the industrialized world, it is estimated that a total of 15-20 millon people are chronically infected with hepatitis C virus. Chronic hepatitis C virus infection has been associated with an increased risk of developing liver fibrosis and liver cancer. The currently available therapy of choice is cumbersome, lengthy (six to twelve months), associated with several side effects, expensive (costs can be up to 25,000 USD per patient), and cures only 50 to 80 % of those with chronic infection, depending on the viral strain. "We are very enthusiastic over the collaboration with Tripep and we see a tremendous market potential for a therapeutic vaccine for the treatment of chronic hepatitis C virus infection" says Avatar Dhillon, CEO of Inovio™. "I am extremely satisfied that we now have a collaboration agreement in place for clinical development of ChronVac-C®, which was one of my goals when starting at Tripep. This shows that Tripep is no longer a one-product-company. We will now have two completely independent products in clinical development. This gives Tripep a tremendous strength and provides a further sign of approval for our in-house developed products. We envision that the combination of Tripep's ChronVac-C® vaccine and Inovio's Medpulser™ apparatus may become a completely new form of therapy for chronic carriers of hepatitis C virus, a group of patients I became well aquainted with during my years at Schering-Plough. Since the currently available therapy of choice is cumbersome, I envision that ChronVac-C® delivered by the Medpulser™ can be a first line therapy even if only modest treatment results are obtained, and furthermore ChronVac-C® does not compete with protease inhibitors developed by other companies. We could not have hoped for a better start of the new year” says, Jan Nilsson, CEO of Tripep. See Inovio's web page: www.inovio.com. For more information, please contact: Jan Nilsson, CEO, Tripep AB Tel: +46 8 449 84 80, mobile phone: +46 70 466 31 63 E-mail: jan.nilsson@tripep.se Anders Vahlne, Head of Research, Tripep AB Tel: +46 8 5858 1313, mobile phone: +46 709 28 05 28 E-mail: anders.vahlne@ki.se