Singapore: Taiwan's PharmaEngine has collaborated and signed research agreement with China's Guangzhou BeBetter Medicine Technology. The two companies will collaborate to design, synthesize and develop new chemical entities against predefined targets in oncology. This collaboration opens a new chapter for partnership between Taiwan and China in searching for novel anti-cancer drugs.

Under the terms of the agreement, PharmaEngine will hold the exclusive worldwide rights of manufacturing, development and commercialization of new drug candidates with the exception of China, while BeBetter will keep the respective rights in China (including Hong Kong and Macau).

BeBetter is responsible for discovering optimized compounds for IND-enabling studies. PharmaEngine will be responsible for development and commercialization.

"Dr Changgeng Qian (founder of BeBetter) and I were colleagues in several biopharmaceutical companies in the US, including Millennium Pharmaceuticals. We have established mutual respect and trust throughout many years," said Dr C Grace Yeh, president and CEO, PharmaEngine.

"I am very pleased to have the opportunity to collaborate with Dr Qian again. I believe that our collaboration can create a win-win combination of BeBetter's drug discovery know-how and PharmaEngine's drug development expertise."