For its biggest antibody deal to date, Pfizer choose Medarex, which insists on non-exclusive agreements, leaving the biotech free to work with other partners on any given target. In doing so, Pfizer reckoned that the potential for competition with respect to a particular target was outweighed by the greater access to targets which Medarex's deal model provides.

A preview of the emerging health care companies profiled in the current issue of Start-Up. This month's profile group, Protein Manufacturing Start-Ups, features profiles of Chesapeake PERL Inc., Chlorogen Inc., ProteomTech Inc. and Psyche Pharmaceuticals Inc. Plus these Start-Ups Across Health Care: ArgoLink Inc., Confirma Inc., FivePrime Therapeutics Inc. and QuantomiX Ltd.

Should a disruptive protein production technology emerge, the current interest in developing large-molecule therapeutics assures there would be many takers.

Inserting foreign genes into chloroplasts--the compartments within plant cells where photosynthesis occurs--may have significant advantages over other transgenics technologies for producing therapeutic proteins. Chlorogen Inc. believes its proprietary chloroplast transformation technology will make the St. Louis start-up a player in the protein production arena.