VRP Verona Pharma Plc

 
TIDMVRP 
 
Verona Pharma plc 
 
                      ("Verona Pharma" or the "Company") 
 
             RPL554 Presentation at theAsthma and COPD Conference, 
                             London, 14 April2015 
 
London, UK, 14 April 2015 - Verona Pharma plc (AIM: VRP), the drug development 
company focused on first-in-class medicines to treat respiratory diseases, 
reports that the Company CEO, Dr Jan-Anders Karlsson, will be presenting at the 
11th Annual Asthma and COPD Conference, taking place at the Holiday Inn Regents 
Park, London at 13:30 today. 
 
The oral presentation will discuss "RPL554 as a novel treatment for severe 
COPD". COPD is one of the most common chronic diseases in the world, and the 
prevalence is increasing. In the UK, COPD is one of the most common causes of 
hospitalisation and more effective treatments are needed to reduce 
exacerbations of this disease. The presentation supports Verona Pharma's view 
that the emerging profile of RPL554 suggests that it could potentially become 
an important addition to available treatment options both as a monotherapy and, 
as a result of its unique mechanism of action, as a combination partner for 
existing drugs for COPD. Verona Pharma has demonstrated in previous clinical 
trials that RPL554 has the unique ability to combine potent bronchodilation 
with broad anti-inflammatory activity in a single molecule. The Company is 
initially developing RPL554 as a treatment for acute exacerbations in COPD, 
where they believe it has significant potential in a market for nebulised 
bronchodilator drugs currently worth $1 billion in the US alone.1 
 
                                     -Ends 
 
For further information please contact: 
 
Verona Pharma plc                              Tel: +44 (0) 20 3283 4200 
Jan-Anders Karlsson, Chief Executive Officer 
 
FTI Consulting                                 Tel: +44 (0)20 3727 1000 
Julia Phillips / Simon Conway 
 
Notes to Editors 
 
About the Asthma and COPD Conference 
 
Asthma and COPD together create an enormous public health burden and an urgent 
need for progress in disease understanding, therapy and care. The 11th Annual 
Asthma & COPD Conference provide the opportunity to share in the experiences of 
leading lights in the field who are addressing the challenges of solving the 
riddle of pathogenesis, biomarkers and endpoints, personalising therapies vs. 
the unmet need, tackling the causes and consequences of exacerbations, 
development of new animal models and better tools for disease diagnosis and 
monitoring. 
 
This conference will give delegates invaluable insights into the key thinking 
and advances in the respiratory drug market, focusing on the challenges and 
solutions to enhance patient outcomes, providing extensive knowledge from the 
key leading industry, academic and care providing experts. 
 
Further information on the conference can be accessed via the following 
weblink: http://www.smi-online.co.uk/pharmaceuticals/uk/conference/asthma-copd. 
 
About Verona Pharma plc 
 
Verona Pharma plc is a UK-based clinical stage biopharmaceutical company 
focused on the development of innovative prescription medicines to treat 
respiratory diseases with significant unmet medical needs, such as chronic 
obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), asthma and cystic fibrosis. 
 
Verona Pharma's lead drug, RPL554, is a first-in-class drug currently in Phase 
II trials as a nebulised treatment for acute exacerbations of COPD in the 
hospital setting. The drug is a dual phosphodiesterase (PDE) 3/4 inhibitor and 
therefore has both bronchodilator and anti-inflammatory effects, which are 
essential to the improvement of patients with COPD and asthma. 
 
Verona Pharma is also building a broader portfolio of RPL554-containing 
products to maximise its benefit to patients and its value. This includes the 
very significant markets for COPD and asthma maintenance therapy. The Company 
is also exploring the potential of the drug in different diseases, such as 
cystic fibrosis, where it is in pre-clinical testing and has recently received 
a Venture and Innovation Award from the Cystic Fibrosis Trust. 
 
About Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) 
 
Sixty-five million people worldwide suffer from moderate to severe COPD and the 
World Health Organisation (WHO) expects COPD to be the 3rd leading cause of 
death globally by 2020. It is the only major chronic disease with increasing 
mortality. Currently available drugs are aimed at long-term maintenance 
therapy, with the market dominated by large pharma. Despite the wide 
availability of these therapies, COPD patients suffer acute periods of 
worsening symptoms (exacerbations), which cause, in the US alone, some 1.5 
million A&E visits, 726,000 hospitalisations and 120,000 deaths per annum. 
 
Bronchodilating therapy is considered to be the standard of care, and agents 
can be administered via handheld devices such as metered dose inhaler (MDI), 
dry powder inhaler (DPI) and by nebulisers. The nebulised bronchodilator market 
was worth about $1 billion in 2014 in the US.1 RPL554 is being developed by 
Verona Pharma as an add-on therapy to the "Standard of Care" with the 
objectives of providing rapid and pronounced improvement in lung function, 
reduced symptoms and both shortened duration of hospital stays and reduced 
re-admission rates 30 days after discharge from hospital. Studies to date on 
RPL554 have demonstrated that it has a strongly differentiated 3-way mode of 
action, being: (1) bronchodilation (the relaxation of smooth muscle in the 
airway); (2) anti-inflammatory effects on cells and (3) ion channel activation 
in epithelial cells, with increased mucociliary clearance of the airway. 
 
References 
1 IMS Consulting Group market research 2014 
 
 
 
END 
 

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