Roche and Entelos Announce Collaboration in Metabolic Disease Research

Roche and Entelos, Inc. (LSE: ENTL) today announced a two-year collaboration in metabolic disease research. Under the terms of the agreement, Roche will provide R&D funding and milestone payments, and Entelos will conduct biosimulation research using its Metabolism PhysioLab® platform, which utilizes a 'virtual patient' approach to predict the effects of a drug on metabolic pathways and/or biomarkers. This approach will be useful to Roche in analyzing existing preclinical and clinical data in order to optimize future clinical trials. Financial terms were not disclosed.

"With the increase of diabetes and obesity on a global scale, Roche is dedicated to developing new therapies to treat chronic metabolic disorders," said Jacques Mizrahi, global head of metabolic and vascular diseases at Roche. "As part of this commitment, we believe Entelos' biosimulation capabilities and disease knowledge will complement Roche's expertise in metabolic diseases and provide us with cutting edge technology that will enhance our drug discovery programs."

"Entelos is extremely pleased to be expanding our collaboration with Roche, a world leader in the adoption and deployment of systems biology solutions," stated James Karis, president and CEO of Entelos. "With our capability to create virtual patients and simulate human biology, we believe that Entelos brings a deeper understanding of human biology to the R&D process."

The Entelos technology will be applied across several research programs and is expected to contribute information along the discovery and development path: from compound optimization through to clinical trial design.

About Entelos' Metabolism PhysioLab platform

The Metabolism PhysioLab platform is a large-scale mathematical model of human physiology that supports research in the areas of obesity and type 2 diabetes. The platform includes the physiology and pathophysiology of metabolic disease, as well as the underlying cellular mechanisms. Processes that the model can simulate include the digestion, absorption, storage, mobilization, and oxidation of carbohydrate, fat, and protein, as well as the hormonal regulation of these processes. In vivo responses to typical tests (e.g., glucose-insulin clamps, glucose tolerance tests, and mixed meal ingestion) are also included, as are physical activity and available therapies. Due to the heterogeneity of these diseases, over 150 virtual patients have been created that span the disease spectrum, from lean, insulin-resistant to severely obese, severely diabetic subtypes. The platform is capable of simulating human in vivo plasma levels for more than 20 metabolites and hormones.

Entelos has also worked with Roche Diagnostics in type 2 diabetes, and together the companies received the 2004 Bio-IT Best Practices award in recognition of their innovative use of life science and information technologies to accelerate the drug discovery and development process.

About Roche

Hoffmann-La Roche Inc. (Roche), based in Nutley, N.J., is the U.S. pharmaceuticals headquarters of the Roche Group, one of the world's leading research-oriented healthcare groups with core businesses in pharmaceuticals and diagnostics. For more than 100 years, the Roche Group has been committed to developing innovative products and services that address prevention, diagnosis and treatment of diseases, thus enhancing people's health and quality of life. An employer of choice, in 2005, Roche was named one of Fortune magazine's Best Companies to Work For in America, one of the Top 20 Employers (Science magazine), ranked as the No. 3 Best Company to Work For in NJ (NJ Biz magazine), the No. 1 Company to Sell For (Selling Power), and one of AARP's Top Companies for Older Workers. For additional information about the U.S. pharmaceuticals business, visit our websites: http://www.rocheusa.com or www.roche.us.

About Entelos

Entelos, Inc. (www.entelos.com) is a US-based life sciences company that applies engineering principles and mathematical modeling approaches to simulate human biology. The company helps its pharmaceutical and biotechnology customers increase the efficiency of the drug discovery, development, and commercialization process by accurately predicting human response to therapeutic intervention. Entelos' teams of life scientists and engineers use its proprietary computer platforms, called PhysioLab systems, to create "virtual patients" and apply them to test research theories, translate preclinical data into meaningful human results, and optimize clinical trial designs in diseases such as asthma, obesity, type I and type II diabetes, and rheumatoid arthritis. In addition to co-development and internal research programs, Entelos partners with pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies worldwide.

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