Charlottesville, VA, June 23rd, 2009 -- Biovista Inc. today announced that BVA-601, its small-molecule drug targeting epilepsy, has shown positive results in the Κainic acid murine model of temporal lobe epilepsy. BVA-601, an existing drug that Biovista repositioned in epilepsy, exhibits both anti-epileptic and neuroprotective activity. In this pre-clinical trial, BVA-601 induced a statistically significant decrease of epileptic activity in rats pre-treated with Kainic acid.

“We are pleased with these initial results that confirm the predicted efficacy of BVA-601 and encourage us to further test and develop this compound in a disease area where there is a need for new, patient-friendly, therapies and patient-friendly drug delivery mechanisms” said Aris Persidis, Ph.D., President of Biovista. “This successful repositioning builds on our previously reported success with BVA-101 in multiple sclerosis, expanding our CNS portfolio. At the present time we are exploring all options available to us, including the further co-development with a pharmaceutical company and the licensing of the IP to a generics company,” added Dr. Persidis added.

For a non-confidential information pack on BVA-601 contact Biovista at info@biovista.com.

About Biovista’s BVA-601 trial in the kainic acid model of epilepsy

Epilepsy is a common chronic neurological disorder characterized by recurrent unprovoked seizures. These seizures may be transient signs and/or symptoms due to abnormal, excessive or synchronous neuronal activity in the brain. Epilepsy is one of the world's oldest recognized conditions, affecting around 50 million people worldwide. Fear, discrimination and social stigma have surrounded epilepsy for centuries. Some of the stigma continues today in many countries impacting the quality of life of people with the disorder.

In the animal proof of concept trial, BVA-601 was compared to diazepam, a potent anti-epileptic drug that is efficient in reducing epileptic activity but has troubling adverse events. BVA-601 induced a statistically significant reduction in the number of animals showing epileptic activity and delayed the onset of epileptic seizures.

About Biovista’s repositioning pipeline and technology platform

Biovista applies high-throughput efficiency discovery efforts to finding solutions for commercially relevant unmet medical needs.  Biovista’s proprietary repositioning technology allows the company’s experts it to perform mechanism-of-action based analyses and systematically assess clinical outcomes in any therapeutic area of interest, at relatively low cost and short time spans. The company is presently using this platform to develop its own pipeline of repositioned drugs in areas such as CNS, cardiovascular disease, oncology and autoimmune diseases.