CombinatoRx and Angiotech Sign Agreement to Apply CombinatoRx's Pipeline and Technology to the Field of Intervational Medicines

CombinatoRx to receive $42 million on closing: $27 Million Upfront plus $15 Million Equity Investment To Discover and Develop Drug-Device Combinations and Local Interventional Medicines

BOSTON, MA -- October 3, 2005 -- CombinatoRx, Incorporated and Angiotech Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ: ANPI, TSX: ANP) today announced a multi-year research and license agreement for the discovery, development, and potential commercialization by Angiotech of drug devices and interventional medicine products built from innovative drug combinations. The parties anticipate the collaboration will initially focus on vascular, orthopedic and general surgery indications.

The agreement unites CombinatoRx’s experience in the systematic discovery of potential combination drugs with Angiotech’s expertise in drug-device combinations and local interventional medicines. CombinatoRx has granted Angiotech an option to evaluate and exclusively license compounds selected by Angiotech from the CombinatoRx clinical and preclinical pipeline and proprietary Chalice™ database of drug combinations for development and potential commercialization in certain medical device and local interventional applications.

CombinatoRx has also agreed to deploy its proprietary combination high throughput screening technology in a joint multi-year research initiative to identify novel drug combinations for multiple areas of strategic importance to Angiotech. Intellectual property from this research project will be jointly owned, and exclusively cross licensed to CombinatoRx for systemic therapies and therapies outside the Angiotech field.

Under the terms of the agreement, Angiotech will make an upfront license execution payment of $27 million to CombinatoRx plus a $15 million equity investment in CombinatoRx. The initial consideration entitles Angiotech to license up to ten CombinatoRx compounds for the Angiotech field, and Angiotech may license up to five more compounds for an additional payment of $2 million per compound. CombinatoRx is eligible to receive development and regulatory milestone payments of up to $30 million for each product selected by Angiotech for development, in addition to royalties on cumulative commercial sales of such products.

About CombinatoRx

CombinatoRx, Incorporated is a biopharmaceutical company focused on developing new medicines built from synergistic combinations of approved drugs, designed to attack disease on multiple fronts. CombinatoRx applies its proprietary combination drug discovery technology to identify new combination product candidates in a number of disease areas, including immuno-inflammatory disease, oncology, metabolic disease, neurodegenerative disease, and infectious disease. By applying our proprietary screening technology, we have discovered and advanced into clinical trials a portfolio of seven product candidates targeting multiple diseases. For further information, please visit the CombinatoRx website at www.combinatorx.com.

About Angiotech

Vancouver, Canada-based Angiotech Pharmaceuticals, Inc. is a specialty pharmaceutical company focused on the combination of pharmaceutical compounds with medical devices and biomaterials to both create novel solutions for poorly addressed disease states and improve surgical outcomes. To find out more about Angiotech Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ: ANPI, TSX: ANP), please visit Angiotech’s website at www.angiotech.com.