Under the agreement, DAC will access compound intellectual property that Evotec has generated on this disease target through its internal R&D activities. The aim of the collaboration will be to take compounds identified by Evotec as being active against the target and further optimize them to the point of clinical development.
In the collaboration, which may run for an initial period of over two years, Evotec will use its medicinal chemistry, profiling and ADMET (Absorption, Distribution, Metabolism, Excretion and Toxicity) expertise to generate lead molecules for further progression into clinical trials.
For its contributions to the discovery project Evotec will potentially receive single digit millions R&D service revenues and will also be eligible for additional preclinical and clinical milestone payments.
“We are delighted that DAC and Genextra, one of the most innovative and active biopharmaceutical companies in Italy, appreciated the value of the HSP90 inhibitors that we had identified using our novel approach to fragment screening and have selected us for this project,” said Dr Mark Ashton, executive vice president Business Development Services at Evotec.