SK Biopharmaceuticals Co. announced Sunday that it signed a licensing deal with a Chinese pharmaceuticals maker on a potential treatment for depression and bipolar disorder.

Established in April, SK Biopharmaceuticals is a subsidiary of the SK Group’s holdings company SK Corp.

Under the contract, SK Biopharmaceuticals will work with Shanghai Medicilon to complete preclinical trials on a bipolar disorder treatment in China within the next two years, and obtain license to conduct clinical trials in China and the U.S. SK Biopharmaceuticals said that it will continue to work with the Chinese company after the clinical trials either by collaborating in developing treatments, or by selling related technologies to multinational drug makers.

Shanghai Medicilon is a research and development organization that specializes in providing services for developing new medicines.

The candidate material, developed independently by SK Biopharmaceuticals, was shown to be effective against both depression and manic disorder in animal tests, the company said.

According to the company, existing treatments for bipolar disorder are not effective for both depression and manic disorder, and require more than two weeks for the effects to show.

As such, the company is hoping that the candidate material will allow it to tap into the global market for depression and other mental disorders. According to the company, the value of the global market for pharmaceuticals for depression and other such conditions came in at $39 billion last year.

By Choi He-suk  (cheesuk@heraldcorp.com)