PRESS RELEASE

Thursday, August 8, 2002

Company Press Release

SOURCE: BioMedicines, Inc.

BioMedicines Initiates World-Wide Phase 3 Breast Cancer Clinical Program

Emeryville, CA - August 8, 2002 - BioMedicines, Inc. today announced that it has enrolled the first patients in its phase 3 clinical trial of Atamestane. In this randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study, Atamestane will by administered as part of a two-drug combination hormonal therapy to treat women with metatstatic breast cancer. To date, BioMedicines has qualified clinical sites in the United States, Canada, Russia and the Ukraine.

"Our goal is to introduce a new standard of care for these patients" said Peter Langecker, M.D., Ph.D., Vice President of Clinical Affairs "This study is designed to demonstrate that our Atamestane combination therapy is superior to current hormonal monotherapy."

Atamestane is an experimental drug that inhibits the growth of estrogen-dependent breast tumors by blocking the enzyme responsible for estrogen synthesis. Atamestane will be used in conjunction with another drug that blocks the receptor for estrogen on tumor cells. "We call this Sequential Estrogen Blockade," said Dr. Langecker, "which we believe is much more likely to shut down estrogen-dependent tumor growth than can be achieved with any one drug."

Dr. Mark Moran, Chief Executive Officer, said, "We believe that BioMedicines has discovered why previous studies of hormonal combination therapy in this setting have been unsuccessful. This discovery is both the basis for our phase 3 study and new intellectual property filings."

BioMedicines, Inc., a privately held pharmaceutical company, has three products in clinical testing at phase 1b, 2, and 3 in the fields of cancer and infectious diseases. BioMedicines specializes in redirecting the development of drugs to new and more valuable indications. The company has current development and/or commercialization agreements with ALZA, Boehringer Ingelheim, Schering AG, and the G.D. Searle subsidiary of Pharmacia. BioMedicines is headquartered in Emeryville, California. More information about the company is available at www.biomedicinesinc.com.

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