I: News on TechBio Innovation
I: News on TechBio Innovation
Revolutionizing Drug Development
“There are so many cells in your body that your entire collection of DNA would be about twice the diameter of the solar system.”
“We share about 96 percent of our genes with chimpanzees and as much as 60 percent with bananas.”
By Clegg Brian, Ten Patterns That Explain the Universe
News
⛹️ New AI drug discovery powerhouse Xaira rises with $1B in funding
🏄 How AI is Shaping Drug Discovery at AION Labs
🏂 Pfizer collab with Austrian research institute leads to new AI models for drug discovery
🚴 The Future Unfolds at AI Expo: Witness groundbreaking innovations shaping global technology leadership. May 7-8, 2024 | Washington, D.C.
🤼 Every Cure and BioPhy Partner to Repurpose Existing Drugs Faster with AI
🤽 Valence Labs uses OCI to help build largest GNN in drug discovery
🤾 Pioneering AI for Drug Discovery: A Leap Forward at Arabian Gulf University
TechBio Mergers and Acquisitions (2024-2022)
👛 On February 28, 2024, Ginkgo Bioworks acquired Reverie's platform.
The transaction included Reverie's AI infrastructure and software, as well as team. Four key team members from Reverie will join Ginkgo to assist the integration of Reverie's technology into Ginkgo's AI/ML infrastructure.
At Reverie Labs—a virtual company that started in a New York City apartment with a few laptops and no lab of its own building state-of-the-art ML models—
they enumerate and screen millions of compounds in their virtual libraries for hit identification,
they employ simulation techniques to understand the energetics of bound ligands to their protein targets and to design superior kinase inhibitors (pipeline),
they predict important molecular properties, including on-target binding, toxicity and ADMET, and many more.
Ginkgo’s (NYSE: DNA) existing AI/ML-driven efforts include Owl, which integrates a full range of computational tools. Ginkgo also announced a strategic partnership with Google Cloud to build a generative AI platform for engineering biology and for biosecurity. Additionally, Ginkgo has partnered with Merck (NYSE: MRK) to improve its biologic manufacturing, with Pfizer to advance the discovery and development of novel RNA molecules across priority research areas, and with Boehringer Ingelheim to accelerate discovery and development of novel therapeutic molecules to address hard-to-treat diseases.
👛 Apart the AI-driven drug discovery company Reverie Labs, Ginkgo Bioworks announced the same week that it has also acquired the gene-editing diagnostics developer Proof Diagnostics and the AI-designed DNA sequence for gene therapy Patch Biosciences (Ginkgo Bioworks announced the acquisition of Patch Biosciences).
Ginkgo will incorporate Patch’s ML models and downstream assays into its existing platform, making new capabilities in synthetic promoter and untranslated region (UTR) engineering available to partners. Additionally, Patch’s validated muscle promoters and robust RNA UTRs complement Ginkgo’s circular RNA and promoter screening platform technology, which is already accelerating customer program progress.
Financial terms of the acquisitions have not been disclosed.
👛 On January 9, 2024, SandboxAQ Acquired Good Chemistry to Accelerate AI Simulation Platform for Drug Discovery and Material Science.
SandboxAQ is an enterprise SaaS company that leverages AI and Quantum technologies (AQ) including crypto-agile security, quantum sensing and quantum simulation and optimization offering solutions for Cybersecurity, Quantum Sensing and AI simulation.
Good Chemistry (which spun out of 1Qbit in 2021) is a leading computational chemistry company that leverages AI, quantum and other advanced technologies to accelerate drug discovery and materials design. As part of the acquisition, SandboxAQ will integrate Good Chemistry’s software, QEMIST Cloud and Tangelo, into its growing enterprise software portfolio.
QEMIST Cloud is a robust, SaaS-based computational chemistry platform designed to run high-accuracy, high-throughput quantum simulations on both classical and quantum computing hardware.
Tangelo is an open-source, quantum computing SDK (Software Development Kit) that supports end-to-end chemistry workflows and enables rapid experimentation (process molecular data, decompose complex chemistry problems) across all major quantum cloud providers and quantum hardware devices.
The terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.
👛 On October 25, 2023, AxoSim has acquired the microBrain drug discovery technology platform from StemoniX, a subsidiary of Vyant Bio, to develop drugs for neurological disorders.
StemoniX’s (a Vyant Bio subsidiary) microBrain utilizes human induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) to develop organoids of human brain and nerve structures. microBrain’s technology is a highly scalable iPSC-derived high-throughput neural screening platform coupled with advanced bioanalytical software for phenotypic drug discovery.
In 2014, AxoSim spun out of Tulane University with a license to proprietary technology with the potential to solve the challenge of modeling human results in vitro, that led to the development of NerveSim® and BrainSim® (a 3D in vitro peripheral nervous system model and a biomimetic 3D environment, featuring a unique combination of neurons, astrocytes and oligodendrocytes) that can predict clinical performance in the lab. After their latest acquisition, the three available platforms, NerveSim®, BrainSim® and microBrain™, make AxoSim the leader in preclinical neuro drug discovery.
The acquisition (worth $2.25M) also included a research, development and manufacturing facility in the US, nine patents for the technology and the associated intellectual property.
On February 28, 2024, AxoSim Appointed Two Biotech Industry Veterans as Co-Chairs of Its Board of Directors.
👛 On October 17, 2023, Thermo Fisher Scientific (NYSE: TMO) Acquired Olink, a Leader in Next-Generation Proteomics.
Olink Proteomics AB offers an unmatched high-multiplex technique to identify actionable biomarkers, with a strong focus on the human plasma proteome. Using minimal sample volume they provide quantifiable results with high-throughput, exceptional sensitivity and specificity (using ML for feature selection and prediction/classification), with coverage across a broad dynamic range. Olink is well-established in Europe (HQ Uppsala, Sweden) and the USA (HQ Boston, MA), with a rapidly developing presence across Asia. Olink’s products and services include:
Olink® Flex, that enables you to select and combine targets for up to 21 human proteins in one biomarker panel,
Olink® Explore, that rapidly measures 3072 assays covering all major biological pathways using less than a 6 μL sample. Readout via NGS, enabling up to 1.3 million protein measurements per week per NGS instrument,
Targeted protein biomarker studies with disease- or biology-focused 96-plex or 48-plex panels with qPCR readout, and
Olink Signature, an affordable, user-focused instrument for the readout of all Olink 96/48-plex and custom panels.
The transaction values Olink at approximately $3.1 billion which includes net cash of approximately $143M.
👛 On October 10, 2023, Certara Acquired Formedix LLC to Increase Data Standardization Across Clinical Trials for Faster Study Setup, Time to Analysis and Submissions (for an undisclosed amount).
Certara (NASDAQ: CERT) is a global leader in biosimulation and software solutions helping the entire drug development lifecycle and Formedix is a provider of clinical metadata repository and clinical trial automation software.
With the Formedix acquisition, the Certara offering for data standards, data management and clinical and statistical programming now includes:
ryze clinical data management and SDTM automation suite for faster study builds and data mapping,
Pinnacle Data Exchange for external data management of providers, formats and specifications and
Pinnacle data validation suite used by clinical and statistical programmers from more than 185 life sciences organizations globally including 24 of the top 25 biopharmaceutical companies along with FDA and Japan’s PMDA.
👛 On February 7. 2023, OKRA.ai joined forces with Envision Pharma Group.
OKRA.ai was founded in 2015 by Dr. Loubna Bouarfa a Dutch, Moroccan data scientist, assisting the healthcare industry towards data-driven decision-making by explainable AI. OKRA.ai’s AI platform curates and enhances a valuable data lake for insights generation and leverages advanced feature extraction algorithms to understand the characteristics that are critical for value creation. Since 2015, OKRA.ai has supported the commercialisation of 92 molecules, 67 indications and 13 pharmaceutical brands.
Founded in 2001, the Envision Pharma Group is a leading global technology-enabled strategic solutions partner for the life sciences industry, working with over 200 pharma and biotech companies, including 20 of the top 20 pharmaceutical companies. Is considered a best-in-class partner for medical affairs teams, with expertise in leading medical strategy, medical communications, publication planning & delivery, patient engagement, and more.
👛 On January 10, 2023, BioNTech Acquired InstaDeep to Strengthen Pioneering Position in the Field of AI-powered Drug Discovery, Design and Development.
InstaDeep leveraging its expertise in GPU-accelerated computing, DL and reinforcement learning, has built AI systems to tackle the most complex challenges across a range of industries and sectors. The acquisition (a total upfront consideration of approximately £362M in cash and up to £562M in future milestone payments) follows a multiyear partnership set up by BioNTech (BNTX) and InstaDeep in 2020.
On April 30, 2024, InstaDeep presented “ChatNT: The first multimodal conversational agent for DNA, RNA and protein tasks”.
👛 On January 4, 2023, Biognosys and Bruker Formed a Partnership for Advanced Proteomics CRO Services for Global Biopharma and Biomarker Customers (CHF 75M).
Biognosys—founded in 2008 as a spin-off from the lab of proteomics pioneer Ruedi Aebersold at ETH Zurich—offers a diverse range of proteomics solutions that can help you address key research objectives for biomarker discovery and drug development. It’s TrueDiscovery platform utilizes Hyper Reaction Monitoring/HRM™ that enables specific and unbiased biomarker discovery through the quantification of complete proteomes and phospho-proteomes. Further, the platform leverages their flagship software, Spectronaut, for AI/ML enhanced proteomics data analysis for the identification of differentially regulated proteins in a hypothesis-free manner. They also provide highly multiplexed targeted proteomics with absolute quantification for customized panels of proteins.
Bruker Corporation (BRKR)—an American manufacturer of scientific instruments for molecular and materials research, as well as for industrial and applied analysis—has also acquired Berkeley Lights now part of Bruker Cellular Analysis that provides AI solutions for antibody discovery, cell line development, cell therapy development and synthetic biology for life science research.
In March 2023, Berkeley Lights and IsoPlexis merged and PhenomeX was formed, and as a result The Beacon Optofluidic System (for moving cells without physical contact) by Berkeley Lights and The Protein Barcoding Suite (for evaluating the functional phenotypes of individual cells) by IsoPlexis were brought together. Then on August 17, 2023, Bruker entered into a merger agreement with PhenomeX, to acquire functional cell biology company PhenomeX for a total equity value of $108M, that will serve as Bruker’s entry point into single-cell research and boost its spatial biology programs (by also acquiring Canopy Bioscience and investing in Acuity Spatial Genomics).
Bruker (founded on September 7, 1960, in Karlsruhe, Germany) is advancing life sciences with Green-Tech and AI.
👛 On May 8, 2023, Recursion Entered into Agreements to Acquire Cyclica and Valence to Bolster Chemistry and Generative AI Capabilities.
Recursion Pharma (RXRX) a leading clinical stage TechBio company (fuelled by petabytes of data and one of the world’s most powerful supercomputers) has signed two agreements to acquire two companies in the AI drug discovery space—Cyclica ($40M) and Valence Labs ($47.5M)—to bolster digital chemistry and generative AI capabilities in order to further create new chemical composition of matter for novel biological targets.
Cyclica has built an industry-leading digital chemistry software suite which enables mechanism of action deconvolution, generative chemistry and molecular optimisation tools.
Valence Labs is a ML/AI digital chemistry company which has pioneered the development of novel hybrid graph neural networks and transformers for state-of-the-art chemical property prediction.
These two strategic acquisitions will add industry-leading capabilities in digital chemistry, as well as ML and AI, which combined with Recursion’s large-scale automated wet-laboratories and supercomputing capabilities, will enable them to deploy the most complete, technology-enabled drug discovery solution in the biopharma industry.
👛 On August 31, 2023, Optibrium acquired BioPharmics LLC, expanding its 3D drug design and visualisation offering.
BioPharmics LLC was founded in 1998 to develop algorithms and software for computational drug design. They have leading solutions in the areas of 2D to 3D ligand conversion and conformer generation (FGen3D and ForceGen), molecular docking (Surflex-Dock), molecular similarity (eSim), binding affinity prediction (QuanSA), and real-space modeling of ligand ensembles in X-ray density maps. All methods within the Surflex platform couple physical realism in modeling protein-ligand interactions with algorithms for rapid optimization of conformation and alignment of small molecules.
Optibrium, a leading developer of software and AI solutions for drug discovery in the UK, has StarDrop™ that guides you through multi-parameter optimization challenges to target compounds with the best chance of success, saving you time and resources by enabling you to synthesize and test fewer compounds. StarDrop's core features can be extended with a comprehensive range of optional plug-in modules; predictive models for ADME properties, Phase I and II metabolic routes and toxicity; automatic QSAR model building; 3D SAR analysis; and de novo design to stimulate the search for new optimization strategies.
👛 On October 11, 2023, Cosmos Health Acquired Cloudscreen, a Cutting-Edge AI-Powered Drug Repurposing Platform (the total investment is expected to exceed $5M through 2029.).
Cloudscreen® is a multimodal platform for drug repositioning and repurposing. It integrates both 1D and 3D data types into its AI algorithm, analyzing the druggable proteome and variome, offering accurate predictions for repurposing of existing drugs toward new indications. The platform is accompanied by in vitro validation for both toxicity and effectiveness.
Cloudscreen has been developed by Cloudpharm that is one of the 5 Greek startups entering the final phase of the Start4Health Challenge by the Pfizer Digital Innovation Centre in Thessaloniki, Greece.
👛 On April 5, 2022, Valo Health announced the acquisition of TARA Biosystems, Inc.
Tara Biosystems is a New York City-based cardiovascular disease biotechnology company, creating the first of its kind vertically integrated cardiovascular drug discovery and development platform. The combination of TARA’s proprietary human three-dimensional tissue engineering and cardiac disease modeling capabilities with Valo’s Opal Computational Platform, positions Valo to transform cardiovascular disease drug discovery and development. Valo founded by David Berry in early 2019 is also applying AI to human data, reducing the cost and time of drug development while increasing confidence the medicines will work.
On March 4, 2024, Valo announced full enrollment in the company’s Phase 2 Spectra clinical trial to evaluate the potential benefit of oral OPL-0401 in patients with moderately severe or severe non-proliferative diabetic retinopathy (NPDR) or mild proliferative diabetic retinopathy (PDR).
👛 On September 27, 2022, iBio Acquired RubrYc Therapeutics’ AI Drug Discovery Platform and Pipeline (an upfront payment of $1M in iBio’s common stock to RubrYc investors. Eligibility for RubrYc’s investors to receive up to $5M in development milestones over the next five years).
The acquired assets of RubrYc Therapeutics, Inc by iBio, Inc (NYSEA:IBIO) (a developer of next-generation biopharmaceuticals and pioneer of the sustainable FastPharming Manufacturing System) include:
A patented system that uses AI to design 3D models of epitopes to facilitate the creation of better antibody drug candidates. The RubrYc Discovery Engine uses predictive algorithms to identify and model subdominant and conformational epitopes, enabling the discovery of new antibody treatments for hard-to-target cancers and other diseases.
Previously Licensed Candidates: IBIO-101 (an IL-2 sparing anti-CD25 antibody for depletion of regulatory T cells) and “Target 6”. And
New Therapeutic Candidates: three promising immuno-oncology candidates, plus a partnership-ready PD-1 agonist for serious autoimmune diseases, such as systemic lupus erythematosus and multiple sclerosis.
👛 In 2022, Sanofi (SNY) acquired the AI-enabled company Amunix Pharmaceuticals (for an upfront payment of approximately $1 billion and up to $225 million upon achievement of certain future development milestones).
Amunix Pharmaceuticals, Inc, is an immuno-oncology company leveraging its proprietary, clinically validated XTEN and innovative universal protease-releasable masking technology platform, Pro-XTEN, to discover and develop transformative T-cell engagers (TCE) and cytokine therapies for patients with cancer. Amunix’s pipeline, which includes the lead candidate AMX-818 (a masked HER2-directed TCE) offers a strong strategic fit with Sanofi’s focus on developing potentially transformative cancer therapies in immuno-oncology.
For more about Sanofi: