AstraZeneca taps Korean firm for antibiotics
pharmafile | January 15, 2010 | News story | Research and Development | Asia, AstraZeneca, CrystalGenomics, Korea, anti-infectives
AstraZeneca has signed another licensing deal to bolster its anti-infectives business, this time signing a deal with Korean company CrystalGenomics to develop drug candidates against an unnamed bacterial target.
It is the first time the drug giant has forged an R&D pact with a Korean company and provides further evidence of the emergence of Asia as a pharmaceutical R&D hub.
Commenting on the deal, AstraZeneca’s vice president of infection discovery Les Hughes said the new deal was part of an ongoing effort at the company to build “a leading franchise” in the treatment of infectious diseases.
Financial details of the CrystalGenomics have not been disclosed, but in a statement AstraZeneca said it would provide research funding to the Korean firm for two years.
CrystalGenomics specialises in structural chemoproteomics, which scrutinises the three-dimensional structural mechanisms behind the binding of target proteins and chemicals. Its technology platform is designed to make it easier to convert genomic and proteomic discoveries into drug candidates.
The company has already developed a pipeline of preclinical anti-infectives, including novel antibiotics for methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA).
CrystalGenomics will use its drug discovery platform to “optimise selected novel scaffolds from AstraZeneca’s proprietary compound library against an antibacterial target”.
The Korean firm will carry out early-stage work, including assays, medicinal chemistry, toxicology and pharmacokinetic studies, with AstraZeneca handling preclinical and clinical development of promising candidates.
Towards the end of last year, AstraZeneca bought anti-infectives specialist Novexel of France for $350 million and announced collaboration with Forest Laboratories for the co-development of two late-stage antibiotics which use Novexel’s investigational beta-lactamase inhibitor NXL-104.
At the time, the company said that anti-infectives had emerged as a “strategic priority” for the company. In the last few years, emerging bacterial resistance has prompted a resurgence of interest by the pharmaceutical sector in researching antibiotics, after years of neglect.
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