Hamburg, Munich, Menlo Park (June 6, 2007) – Amgen (NASDAQ: AMGN) announced today that it has agreed to acquire Earlybird portfolio company Alantos Pharmaceuticals Holding Inc., a private company developing drugs for the treatment of diabetes and inflammatory diseases. Alantos´ lead drug candidate, ALS 2-0426, is a DPP-IV inhibitor in clinical development (Phase 2a) for the treatment of type II diabetes. Under terms of the agreement, Amgen will pay $300 million in cash to acquire Alantos.

In February 2003, Earlybird took the co-lead role in the Series C financing round. Matthias Jaffé, a Principal at Earlybird at the time of the investment, joined the company subsequently and was later promoted to CFO of Alantos. In 2005, after the headquarters have been re-located from Heidelberg (Germany) to Cambridge (USA), Earlybird also participated in the last financing round.

Rolf Mathies, a Managing Partner of Earlybird and Board Member at Alantos comments: “We are very satisfied with this significant and relatively early exit of a company that was started in Heidelberg and sold to a US buyer resulting in a nice investment multiple for Earlybird”. The sale of Alantos, a healthcare portfolio company of Earlybird III, follows the successful IPO of Wilex in November 2006 at the Prime Standard Segment of the Frankfurt Stock Exchange.

About Earlybird:
Earlybird is an international venture capital company with offices in Germany (Hamburg and Munich) and the USA (Menlo Park). The company was established in 1997 and currently manages a fund volume of around US$ 410 million (€ 300 million). Earlybird invests primarily in businesses which have their origins in Europe, in convergent multi-technology fields such as embedded software, communications technology components, Internet services, cleantech, medtech and other healthcare technologies. Its focus is on investment in the early stages of a company’s development. Earlybird identifies companies which are active in areas of technology where Europe plays a leading role and at the same time offers investors better initial valuations than in the U.S.

For further information please see www.amgen.com.

  www.amgen.com