November 3, 2003

News Release: Transgene Signs Pre-Clinical AIDS Vaccine Manufacturing Agreement With ANRS and INSERM

Transgene (Nasdaq: TRGNY; Nouveau Marche: FR0005175080) announced today that it has entered into an agreement with the French AIDS Research Agency (Agence Nationale de Recherches sur le SIDA /ANRS) and the French Institute for Health and Medical Research (Institut National de la Sante et de la Recherche Medicale / INSERM) to construct and manufacture pre-clinical lots of a novel AIDS vaccine. Transgene will make the constructs consisting of Modified Vaccinia Ankara (MVA) vectors carrying AIDS virus epitopes from Gag, Nef and Pol genes and will manufacture the pre-clinical lots. INSERM, which owns the intellectual property of the Nef protein fragments, will conduct the immunological pre- clinical testing of the vaccine constructs together with ANRS. Under the terms of this short-term service agreement, Transgene will receive payment from ANRS.

'We are pleased to collaborate with the ANRS and INSERM on this serious worldwide public health problem. We believe that this agreement is further evidence of the broad capability of Transgene's technology both in the construction and the manufacturing of recombinant vaccines and vectors,'said Jean-Francois Carmier, Chief Executive Officer of Transgene.

About Transgene:

Transgene, based in Strasbourg, France, is a biopharmaceutical company dedicated to the discovery and development of therapeutic vaccines, immunotherapy products, and delivery technologies for the treatment of diseases for which there is no cure or adequate treatment at present, with a focus on the treatment of cancer. Transgene has five products in clinical development, two of which are in Phase II clinical trials and three of which have completed Phase I clinical trials. Transgene's proprietary vector technology platform consists of adenovirus, poxvirus and non-viral vectors.

This press release contains forward-looking statements. Statements that are not historical facts are based on Transgene's current expectations, beliefs, estimates, forecasts and assumptions. Those statements are not guarantees of future performance and involve certain risks, uncertainties and assumptions which are difficult to predict. Accordingly, actual outcomes and results may differ materially from what is expressed in those forward-looking statements. Important factors that may affect Transgene's future operating results include the following: Transgene's collaboration agreement with ANRS and INSERM may not provide Transgene with the anticipated benefits when expected, if at all; Transgene's product candidates may not demonstrate therapeutic efficacy; Transgene may be unable to obtain regulatory approval for its product candidates; Transgene's patent rights may not provide it with any benefit and the patents of others may prevent it from commercializing its products; Transgene may be unable to conduct its clinical trials as quickly as it has predicted; Transgene may not have sufficient resources to complete the research and commercialization of any of its product candidates; competitors may develop technologies or products superior to Transgene's technologies or products; and other important factors described in Transgene's Annual Report on Form 20-F for the year ended December 31, 2002 filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, including those factors described in the section entitled 'Risk Factors.'

SOURCE Transgene

Michel Hubert, V.P., Business Development, Transgene,+33-3-88-27-91-12; Julie Huang, +1-212-798-9814, or Julio Cantre,+1-212-798-9779, both of Cohn &Wolfe for Transgene; Marie-Carole de Groc,+33-1-58-47-95-07, or Odile Rebattet, +33-1-58-47-95-06, both of Euro RSCGC&O(TRGNY)


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