Grünenthal and Amura Therapeutics LTD sign Agreement for Research Collaboration in Pain and Inflammation

Aachen, Germany (ots) - The Grünenthal Group and Amura
Therapeutics LTD (Cambridge, UK) announced today that they have
entered into a Collaboration Agreement. The focus of this
collaboration is the development of protease inhibitors which play a
key role in pain and inflammation, key focus areas in Grünenthal?s
research-focused Strategic Business Unit Grünenthal Innovation.

Under the terms of the agreement Grünenthal and Amura will combine
their respective expertise to collaborate on the development of
cathepsin inhibitors to treat pain and inflammation. Starting from
advanced lead compounds generated from Amura, Grünenthal will add its
key expertise to the continued development of these small molecule
drugs and assume responsibility for further research and development.

Grünenthal takes exclusive rights for worldwide clinical
development, manufacturing and commercialisation of potential new
pharmaceutical products arising from the collaboration. Grünenthal
has made an undisclosed upfront payment, will make further milestone
payments and is funding the costs under the running agreement.

"We are excited about this collaboration with Amura Therapeutics
LTD. Our expertise, strength and innovative power in developing
therapies for patients suffering from pain and inflammatory diseases
hopefully will help these patients in the future as these are still
areas of unmet medical need", said Dr. Klaus-Dieter Langner,
Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer of Grünenthal
Innovation.

Commenting on the announcement, Dr David Brown, Chairman of Amura,
said "we are delighted to have entered into this exciting
collaboration with Grünenthal, a global leader in developing
treatments for pain. This Agreement provides confirmation of the
scientific and commercial validity of Amura's novel AMcore(TM)
platform and we look forward to a fruitful partnership with
Grünenthal and developing new medicines in an area of unmet medical
need."

About Grünenthal Innovation

To account for the importance of proprietary research for
Grünenthal and ensure the necessary focus, the Strategic Business
Unit Grünenthal Innovation has been created. It encompasses the value
generation from drug discovery to Proof-of-Concept in humans as well
as the development of new drug-delivery technologies. This business
model builds on true partnership, especially in co-development and
co-commercialization, in order to bring real medical innovation to
the market as fast as possible for the benefit of patients.

With regard to NCEs, the focus lies on selected therapeutic areas.
The later stage pipeline continues to build on the company's
leadership in developing new pain therapeutics, while in parallel a
second pillar has been built: inflammation. This approach utilizes
the highly interesting overlap and synergies between pain and
inflammation, while at the same time establishes a unique position
within the broad variety of inflammatory diseases.

About Grünenthal

The Grünenthal Group is an independent, family-owned,
international research-based pharmaceutical company headquartered in
Aachen, Germany. Building on its unique position in pain, its
objective is to become the most patient-centric company and thus to
be a leader in therapy innovation.

Grünenthal is one of the last five research-oriented
pharmaceutical corporations with headquarters in Germany which
sustainably invests in research and development. These investments
amounted to about 25 percent of revenues in 2011. Grünenthal's
research and development strategy concentrates on select fields of
therapy and state-of-the-art technologies. We focus on the intensive
search for new ways to treat pain better, more effectively and with
fewer side-effects than before.

Altogether, the Grünenthal Group has affiliates in 26 countries
worldwide. Grünenthal products are sold in more than 155 countries
and today approx. 4,200 employees are working for the Grünenthal
Group worldwide. In 2011, Grünenthal achieved revenues of EUR 947 mn.

About Amura

Amura has a number of advanced pre-clinical candidates, which
target distinct enzymes. These enzymes are implicated in a wide a
range of commercially attractive therapeutic indications such as
neuropathic pain, arthritis, osteoporosis, auto-immune conditions and
metastatic bone disease. Lead molecules and first rate back-up
molecules are now available for partnering. Amura is a venture
capital backed company is majority owned by Avlar Bioventures Ltd.,
Madingley, Cambs.

Contact:
Frank Schönrock, Vice President Corporate Communications
Tel.: +49 241 569-1568, Fax: +49 241 569-3539,
frank.schoenrock@grunenthal.com

Grünenthal GmbH, 52099 Aachen, Germany, www.grunenthal.com