Aventis Pharma (now Sanofi-Aventis) and Millennium formed an alliance in June 2000 focused on identifying drug targets and developing new therapies for inflammatory diseases. Several hundred scientists have been collaborating on the discovery and development of small molecule drug candidates for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis, asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. Our mutual goal is to develop novel treatments for these key diseases. Several targets implicated in inflammatory disease pathways have been identified and medicinal chemistry related to small molecules has been established. The companies have been sharing discovery-stage assets in their inflammation pipelines, and sharing costs equally. The collaboration has resulted in advancing a CCR1 inhibitor into clinical trials. Candidate compounds under the collaboration will be jointly developed and marketed by Millennium and Sanofi-Aventis in North America and by Sanofi-Aventis in the rest of the world.

In addition to alliances with industrial and academic partners, Millennium actively supports the mission of the Federation of Clinical Immunology Societies (FOCIS), and to this end has created a new program to provide training support to postdoctoral fellows in the area of clinical immunology.  These fellowships will be awarded to postdoctoral fellows in clinical immunology working under the direction of a mentor who is affiliated with FOCIS through membership in one of the societies comprising the Federation.

For more information about the Federation and the fellowship program, please refer to their website at http://www.focisnet.org/.