Paris, France & Cambridge, US | April 26, 2018 | GLOBE NEWSWIRE—Independent international pharmaceutical company Servier and LabCentral, a well-known launchpad for innovative startups in the United States, have announced that Revitope, a startup specializing in biotechnology, has won the Golden Ticket awarded by Servier as part of its sponsorship of the prestigious American coworking facility. The prize is a year’s residency at LabCentral’s facilities for a Revitope scientist. Located in Cambridge, LabCentral is at the heart of scientific and technological innovation in the United States.

Servier has been a Gold sponsor of LabCentral for two years. Each year, it can award a Golden Ticket to a startup in the field of healthcare in order to provide support for a research project corresponding to the Group’s development strategy.

“Servier is happy to have given this award to Revitope whose innovative technology could enable the therapeutic antibodies developed by the Group to precisely target the cells to be treated in patients with cancer and inflammatory diseases”, said Olivier Nosjean, Scientific Director of the Center of Excellence Research and Biopharmacy. “In an open-innovation approach, Servier is committed to supporting promising startups in the field of healthcare, and particularly oncology, one of the company’s priority areas of research.”

The Golden Ticket award underwrites the cost of a lab bench for a Revitope scientist to reside in LabCentral’s open lab for one year. This includes access to all the latest research equipment, shared infrastructure, extensive programming and services offered by LabCentral. The start-up will also benefit from LabCentral’s corporate development support (co-working area, business coaching, investor relations).

“A core principle in every aspect of what we do at LabCentral — from the design of our facilities and speaker series to our sponsorship programs and networking events — is a deliberate attempt to encourage interaction and collaboration,” said LabCentral Cofounder and President Johannes Fruehauf, M.D., Ph.D. “The Golden Ticket program is a great example. It’s enormously gratifying to see our mission come to fruition, with Servier helping to support Revitope’s continued work at LabCentral.”

Revitope Oncology is developing prodrug platforms that have the potential to unleash potent immune responses that are focused entirely on the tumor. The company’s programmable antibody circuits are designed to focus immune activation to the cancer cell surface while expanding the antigenic targeting space on solid tumors to widen the therapeutic index in immune-oncology.

Revitope Chief Scientific Officer Werner Meier, commented, “We are very excited to have been selected by Servier as their Golden Ticket winner for 2017. It is particularly gratifying that an international pharma leader like Servier — laser-focused on bringing innovative therapies to patients across important therapeutic areas including cancer — is recognizing the potential of the Revitope prodrug platforms to widen the therapeutic index for T-cell redirection. The Servier Golden Ticket provides much-appreciated support that helps us to continue to be part of the LabCentral entrepreneur community — a terrific place for young, life sciences companies to grow.”

The cooperation agreement with LabCentral is part of Servier’s dynamic collaborative partnership strategy which aims to better respond to the challenges of therapeutic innovation by placing its research activities in the most dynamic research ecosystems where creativity, innovation and entrepreneurship are promoted and valued. This new agreement also confirms Servier’s commitment to developing its partnership strategy in the United States