Opko Health Inc. announced an expansion of the previously announced exclusive licensing deal with Arctic Partners Ab Oy (Turku, Finland) for two biomarkers in the kallikrein family which used together with prostate specific antigen (PSA)can reduce the need for prostate biopsies by over 50%. Opko exercised a right of first refusal to secure additional proprietary information, patents, know-how, property and technology associated with time-resolved fluorescence detection technology, which is directly applicable to the novel prostate cancer biomarkers. Opko will pursue commercialization of the assay panel on platforms for use in a laboratory setting as well as the point-of-care.

“Kallikrein markers can be assessed on a variety of detection platforms, and the additional technology gained by executing this secondary agreement with Arctic will accelerate our path to market,” said Phillip Frost, M.D., Chairman and CEO of Opko Health.

Opko Health recently announced the acquisition of an exclusive license from Arctic Partners for the two biomarkers in the kallikrein family. These novel biomarkers were developed by investigators at the University of Malmo, Sweden, University of Turku, Finland, and Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, New York. The research results indicate that these markers can predict initial biopsy results in men suspected of having prostate cancer; they have been tested in over 8,000 men and were independently validated in the European Randomized Study of Prostate Cancer Screening (Rotterdam).

-Richard Park