27 Nov 2018 07:00
C4X Discovery Holdings plc
("C4XD", "C4X Discovery" or the "Company")
LifeArc and C4X Discovery join forces to develop small molecule drug candidates active against a high value, novel oncology and inflammation target
27 November 2018 - C4X Discovery Holdings plc (AIM: C4XD), a pioneering drug discovery company, announces that it has entered into a discovery partnership with LifeArc®, one of the UK's leading medical research charities. C4XD and LifeArc will join forces to progress medicinal chemistry efforts on a novel, commercially attractive programme with applicability across oncology and inflammation indications. The undisclosed target originated from LifeArc's extensive partnerships in early-stage academic research.
The partnership will combine leading drug discovery expertise from both organisations, including application of C4XD's unique and proprietary ligand-focussed conformational analysis platform, Conformetrix, to LifeArc's extensive background and experience in the programme. The aim is to develop oral, potent and selective small molecule drug candidates against the undisclosed target suitable for pre-clinical out-licensing to a clinical development partner and, ultimately, to deliver a novel treatment in an area of high unmet clinical need.
This discovery partnership adds a high value programme to C4XD's portfolio. Furthermore, it demonstrates continued progress against its stated strategy of utilising its cutting-edge drug discovery engine, and establishing productive partnerships, to develop novel small molecules against targets with high partnering interest.
Terms of the agreement are undisclosed.
Dr Clive Dix, CEO of C4X Discovery, said: "LifeArc is a highly-respected medical charity with access to world-leading academic research for conditions where there is a clear need for new treatments coupled with deep experience in drug discovery. This partnership not only demonstrates the potential of our Conformetrix platform, it also highlights our strategic approach of accelerating towards a diversified portfolio of pre-clinical assets for out-licensing. We are delighted to be working with the LifeArc team and look forward to a successful outcome and continuing to build on our strategic relationship."
Dr Justin Bryans, LifeArc's Executive Director, Drug Discovery, added: "LifeArc is delighted to partner with C4XD. Our new partner's expertise in the rapid design and analysis of novel small molecule therapeutics complements LifeArc's drug discovery expertise. C4XD's focus on diseases with high unmet medical need is entirely in line with our objective of ensuring that innovative life sciences technologies progress along their development pathway towards the patients who so desperately need them."
This announcement contains inside information for the purposes of Article 7 of Regulatory (EU) No596/2014.
- Ends -
For further information, please contact:
C4X Discovery Holdings plc
Clive Dix, Chief Executive Officer +44 (0)7801 865 803
Panmure Gordon (UK) Limited (NOMAD and Broker)
Freddy Crossley, Emma Earl (Corporate Finance) +44 (0)20 7886 2500
James Stearns (Corporate Broking)
Consilium Strategic Communications
Mary-Jane Elliott, Chris Gardner, Matthew Neal +44 (0)203 709 5700
LifeArc
Glenn Mursell +44 (0) 207 391 2754
+44 (0) 7799 261 060
glenn.mursell@lifearc.org
About C4X Discovery
C4X Discovery aims to become the world's most productive drug discovery engine by exploiting cutting edge technologies to design and create best-in-class small-molecule candidates targeting a range of high value therapeutic areas. The company's goal is to drive returns through early-stage revenue-generating deals with the pharmaceutical industry.
C4X Discovery has a state-of-the-art suite of proprietary technologies across the drug discovery process. The company's innovative DNA-based target identification platform (Taxonomy3®) utilises human genetic datasets to identify novel patient-specific targets leading to greater discovery productivity and increased probability of clinical success. This is complemented by C4XD's novel drug design platform which comprises two innovative chemistry technologies, Conformetrix and Molplex, that combine 4D molecular shape analyses (based on experimental data) with best-in-class computational chemistry. This provides new and unprecedented insight into the behaviour of drug molecules, enabling the production of potent selective compounds faster and more cost effectively than the industry standard.
C4X Discovery is advancing its in-house pipeline that is primarily focused on the high value therapeutic areas of inflammation, neurodegeneration and cancer (including immuno-oncology) with a number of new drug candidates identified and further progress made towards the pre-clinical licensing discussions. In selecting new targets and executing new drug discovery programmes, C4X Discovery focuses on high-value disease areas that are the subject of significant licensing activity and will continue to also maximise value from opportunistic areas such as addiction and diabetes. The Company recently signed a licensing agreement with Indivior for a pre-clinical addiction programme worth up to $294m.
The Company was founded as a spin-out from the University of Manchester. It has a highly experienced management team and Board who have delivered significant value creation within the healthcare sector historically and have enabled C4XD to reach multiple value inflexion points since IPO. For additional information please go to: www.c4xdiscovery.com
About LifeArc
LifeArc is a medical research charity with over 25 years' experience in helping scientists and organisations turn their research into effective diagnostics and treatments. LifeArc collaborates with a wide range of life science charities and other partners. In addition to portfolio review, IP protection, technology transfer and licensing LifeArc also offers its partners expertise in; early stage research funding, diagnostics development, drug discovery, scientific scouting, campaigning, drug discovery pipeline, in vitro diagnostics and antibody engineering.