GenPath Pharmaceuticals Raises $42.7 Million In Series B Funding

Cambridge, Mass. - October 1, 2003 - GenPath Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a drug discovery and development company focused on the treatment of cancer and other diseases, announced today that it has raised $42.7 million in a Series B financing.

The round was led by Flagship Ventures, and joined by Highland Capital Partners and Oxford Biosciences as well as private investors from Europe. Series A investors in the company also participated in the round, including MPM Capital, Venrock Associates, Prospect Venture Partners, Greylock, and private investors Kenneth E. Weg, former Vice Chairman of Bristol-Myers Squibb, and A. Grant Heidrich, III. As part of this financing round, Muzammil Mansuri, Ph.D. of Flagship Ventures and Robert Higgins of Highland Capital Partners have joined the GenPath board.

"We are very gratified that the enormous progress that the company has made since our labs opened 15 months ago is fully recognized in this Series B financing. The size of this round will allow the company to move to our next phase of aggressively converting our discovery technologies into clinical candidates. Beyond the amount, we are very proud in extending our high quality investors group to include Flagship, Highland and Oxford Biosciences," said Tuan Ha-Ngoc, President and CEO of GenPath.

"GenPath represents the combination of accomplished leadership, scientific excellence and commercial potential that is found only in the most successful Biotech companies," commented Muz Mansuri of Flagship Ventures who led the Series B financing round. "We look forward to building on this foundation and realizing GenPath's transformative potential."

"We are excited about the progress GenPath has made to date in discovering and developing innovative cancer therapeutics," said Robert Higgins, managing general partner with Highland. "We look forward to being part of a team of accomplished managers, scientists, and investors centered on building the leading developer of cancer treatment products."

GenPath is focused on the discovery and development of drugs that target gene products critical for the maintenance and recurrence of established cancers. The company utilizes a novel approach by applying recent breakthroughs from leading cancer research centers. Central to this approach is the use of inducible, spontaneous cancer models that more faithfully reproduce the human disease and make it possible to discover genes involved in tumor maintenance and recurrence for the first time.

About GenPath

GenPath employs powerful, proprietary genetic model systems to discover and develop drugs against essential targets critical to the origin, maintenance, and spread of malignant tumors. This novel, high-throughput in-vivo pathway technology platform enables the rapid functional prioritization of only the most relevant drug targets, thus dramatically improving the efficiency of drug discovery. In addition, when coupled with high-throughput genomics and bioinformatics, this platform is designed to enhance drug development through the identification of novel biomarkers for both exposure and efficacy endpoints to guide clinical development. Beyond oncology, GenPath's technologies are broadly applicable to other disease states, including cardiovascular, metabolic and neurodegenerative disorders.

GenPath is a privately held company located in Cambridge, Mass. For more information, please visit the company's website at (www.genpathpharma.com).

About Flagship Ventures

Founded in 1999, Flagship Ventures is an early-stage venture capital firm focused on creating, financing, and building companies in the life science, information technology and communications sectors. With a team of 21 professionals, Flagship currently invests from $400 million in funds raised in 2000.

About Highland Capital Partners

Highland Capital Partners is an early-stage venture firm focused on building companies in the communications, information technology and healthcare markets. Founded in 1988, Highland has invested in and worked to create such firms as Altiga Networks, Ask Jeeves, Aspect Medical Systems, Avid Technology, CheckFree, EXACT Sciences, GenVec, HighGround Systems, Lycos, MapQuest, Ocular Networks, Odyssey Healthcare, PRAECIS PHARMACEUTICALS, Sybase and WebLine Communications. For more information, visit Highland's web site at (www.hcp.com).

About Oxford Biosciences

Oxford Bioscience Partners (OBP) is a life science venture capital firm that provides equity financing and management assistance to start-up and early-stage companies in the bioscience and healthcare industries. The General Partners of OBP currently manage venture funds with combined committed capital of more than $800 million.