HOMEGROWN drug developer S*Bio has just struck the biggest deal yet since the biomedical sciences push here kicked off in 2000.

It is the first biomed company to strike a licensing deal with a leading drug company.

Under the recently inked deal, S*Bio, which is Singapore's first research and development (R&D) biomed company, has received US$25 million from US-based Onyx Pharmaceuticals to develop two of S*Bio's potential drugs for a type of blood disorders.

If the drugs prove successful, Onyx can license them in North America and Europea, which can potentially add another US$525 million to S*Bio's coffers. On top of this, S*Bio can get royalties from sales of the drugs.

For S*Bio, this means ready cash and a validation that it has been doing good work, said the company's chief executive, Dr Jan-Anders Karlsson.

'This agreement also allows us to develop the drugs at our own pace until Onyx decides to license them. But even after that, we still have access to the markets other than the North American and European ones, which make up half the global markets,' said Dr Karlsson.

Chief executive of Bio*One Capital, Ms Chu Swee Yuek, said: 'This really puts S*Bio and Singapore on the map. So far, all the buzz in biotechnology has been in the US. But now, this is a validation of what Singapore can do.'

One of the drugs, called SB1518 for now, is currently being tested in humans in the US and Australia. It was designed to treat a group of blood disorders known as myeloproliferative disorders (MPD), where the body produces too many blood cells.

Another S*Bio's drug, called SB1578, has not yet reached a stage where it is ready for human testing.

Both these drugs work by targeting a specific mutation of a particular molecule in the body, known as JAK2.

JAK2 is found in all humans and is vital for normal cell function. But the mutation causes too many blood cells to be produced. Scientists are excited about this recently discovered mutation because it is also implicated in other diseases.

Said Professor Shazib Pervaiz from the National University of Singapore's Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine's physiology department: 'Stopping abnormal JAK2 activity in the cells is obviously an attractive and desirable therapeutic strategy. JAK2 inhibitors have so far shown tremendous promise in pre-clinical studies, and are currently being evaluated in the clinical settings.'