MorphoSys Nominates First Pre-Development Program in Antibody Collaboration

MorphoSys AG (FSE: MOR; Prime Standard Segment, TecDAX) announced today that it has exercised its first option to participate in the development of a therapeutic antibody program within its collaboration with Novartis. In a first, pre-development step, Novartis will fund the companies’ joint efforts until the program reaches formal pre-clinical development. MorphoSys will recognize its share of the funding as additional revenues.

In December 2007, MorphoSys and Novartis forged one of the most comprehensive strategic alliances in the discovery and development of biopharmaceuticals. Financial terms include committed payments in excess of US$600 million over the 10-year lifetime of the agreement. Under the co-development options, MorphoSys may elect to participate in a selection of projects through cost and profit sharing with financial participation reflecting its level of investment in the respective programs. The pre-development agreement provides MorphoSys with the option to enter a formal co-development for the respective program with Novartis. Certain early stage costs in these programs are being funded by Novartis.

“Today’s news marks another significant step in our plans to expand our proprietary drug development activities. This is a great opportunity for MorphoSys to become involved in developing an antibody against a very promising target together with Novartis,” commented Dr. Simon Moroney, Chief Executive Officer of MorphoSys. “We see these pre-development options as an extremely valuable component of our deal with Novartis as they give us the opportunity to build our drug development capability in conjunction with one of the strongest and most experienced companies in the pharmaceutical industry.”

About MorphoSys:
MorphoSys is a publicly traded biotechnology company focused on the generation of fully human antibodies as a means to discover and develop innovative antibody-based drugs against life-threatening diseases. MorphoSys’s goal is to establish HuCAL as the technology of choice for antibody generation in research, diagnostics and therapeutic applications. The Company currently has therapeutic and research alliances with the majority of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies including Boehringer Ingelheim, Centocor/Johnson & Johnson, Novartis, Pfizer and Roche. Within these partnerships, more than 50 therapeutic antibody programs are ongoing in which MorphoSys participates through exclusive license and milestones payments as well as royalties on any end products. Additionally, MorphoSys is active in the antibody research market through its AbD Serotec business unit. The business unit has operations in Germany (Munich), the U.S. (Raleigh, NC) and U.K. (Oxford). For further information please visit http://www.morphosys.com/

HuCAL®, HuCAL GOLD® and RapMAT® are registered trademarks of MorphoSys AG

This communication contains certain forward-looking statements concerning the MorphoSys group of companies. The forward-looking statements contained herein represent the judgment of MorphoSys as of the date of this release and involve risks and uncertainties. Should actual conditions differ from the Company’s assumptions, actual results and actions may differ from those anticipated. MorphoSys does not intend to update any of these forward-looking statements as far as the wording of the relevant press release is concerned.