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Exscientia and Bristol Myers Squibb Enter Into a Multi-Target, AI-Driven Drug Discovery Partnership

Exscientia, Bristol Myers Squibb | May 20, 2021

Exscientia, an AI-driven pharma tech company in the clinical-stage announced today that it has signed a partnership agreement with Bristol-Myers Squibb Company. Exscientia's portfolio of shared assets will benefit from this extended partnership and will contribute to Bristol Myers Squibb's drug pipeline. The partnership will use artificial intelligence to speed up the development of small molecule therapeutic drug candidates in a variety of therapeutic fields, including oncology and immunology. The agreement is worth up to $1.2 billion including up to $50 million in upfront funding, and up to $125 million in near-to-mid-term future milestones, and other clinical, regulatory, and commercial payments. Exscientia will also receive tiered royalty based on the net sales of any marketed drug products as a result of the partnership.

This extended collaboration builds on Exscientia's existing partnership with Bristol Myers Squibb, which began in 2019 with Celgene before Bristol Myers Squibb purchased Celgene. Exscientia will be in charge of the AI design and experimental work needed to identify drug candidates for Bristol Myers Squibb as part of this partnership. Exscientia's AI-driven drug discovery platform will be used to create molecules and will deliver optimized compounds that meet complex design goals quickly and more efficiently than traditional drug discovery.

Exscientia's drug discovery platform has a proven track record and has been the one to advance AI-designed small molecule drug candidates into clinical studies. Exscientia has previously partnered with large pharmaceutical firms such as Bayer, Sanofi, and Dainippon Sumitomo, as well as several new biotech companies and the Gates Foundation, highlighting the company's reputation as the go-to partner for high-value AI-driven drug discovery. More than a dozen partnered or wholly-owned drugs are currently in development in the company. Exscientia recently raised $525 million in a Series D investment led by Softbank to expand its technology capability and proprietary drug pipeline.

About Exscientia
Exscientia's AI-driven, end-to-end drug discovery platform is designed to revolutionize the process of developing new drugs by creating therapeutics for areas of high unmet medical need that could benefit patients in much less time than industry standards. Exscientia is the first clinical-stage organization to bring AI-designed small molecules to the clinic, demonstrating AI's ability to transform the pharmaceutical industry.

At the molecular scale, drug design is precision engineering. Exscientia has built dedicated AI systems that effectively learn from a wide range of data and continuously re-apply enhanced information through design iterations to transform the industry. Candidate molecules satisfying complex therapeutic criteria are discovered with groundbreaking efficiency by Exscientia's AI systems, which learn faster and more efficiently than human-led efforts.

Spotlight

New Active Substances (NAS) LAUNCHED DURING 2018

Next up in the Annual Pharma R&D Review, the NAS supplement takes a look at the industry’s victories of 2018 – the drugs launched on to the market for the first time. New entities where the active ingredient had received no prior approval for human use are the focus of this roster of drugs which successfully crossed the finishing line, and lifted the trophy, to become part of pharma’s elite 2018 team.

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Spotlight

New Active Substances (NAS) LAUNCHED DURING 2018

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PHARMA TECH

Innovation Zed Announce 2022 Launch of InsulCheck DOSE Add-on Technology for Insulin Pens

Zed | November 15, 2021

Innovation Zed, developer of novel diabetes management technologies headquartered at NovaUCD, at University College Dublin, Ireland are delighted to announce today the arrival of the much anticipated InsulCheck DOSE technology that will be coming to market in 2022. "It is with great excitement that we announce the arrival of our InsulCheck DOSE by Innovation Zed. As the third generation product of the InsulCheck family, this technology has been a dream of our company from its very inception and this product is the culmination of over a decade of work to support multiple daily injection (MDI) pen users. We understood the difficult challenges presented by various injection pens and in particular the difficulties in working on a technology to reliably and accurately support low-cost disposable pens. This is the reason we at Innovation Zed took an incremental approach to developing the InsulCheck DOSE product.We have taken a unique approach in developing this technology by working closely with users, caregivers, software developers, medical device specialists and previous generations of InsulCheck products to design and develop a product that bolsters and supports the needs of all stakeholders.'' Dr Dean Minnock, CEO at Innovation Zed Innovation Zed has collaborated with SHL Medical in the development of InsulCheck DOSE. SHL Medical is a world-leading provider of drug delivery solutions and also offers design-to-build and contract manufacturing services for various medical products through its subsidiary, SHL Technologies. What is InsulCheck DOSE? InsulCheck DOSE is a single unit add-on device for pen injectors that automatically captures dose value dialled, injection event time stamp, temperature and mounting/unmounting events. Through Bluetooth® Low Energy (BLE) technology, InsulCheck DOSE transmits these data points to a paired companion software platform in real time for inclusion in diabetes management therapy. "InsulCheck DOSE technology supports MDI users by enhancing their traditional injection pen and transforming it into a smart pen that can optimise their treatment and reduce the stresses caused by MDI therapy. Through this technology we are enabling every MDI user to make their existing injection pen a smart pen without having to compromise or change from their existing HMO or health service provider" - said Dr Minnock. InsulCheck DOSE Features The technology utilises a multi-sensor approach to accurately detect and register the actual dosage dialled and provide an injection event time stamp to log the event. The incorporated temperature sensors constantly monitor the ambient temperature of the area surrounding the injection pen, providing safety notifications to the user if the surrounding temperature may affect the drug housed inside the pen. Using an OLED display, InsulCheck DOSE provides visual information and feedback to the user, helping improve best practice procedures. A rechargeable lithium battery powers the DOSE device and is capable of operating well over 1 week at a time between charges. As a BLE enabled product, all data captured by InsulCheck DOSE is transferred in real time to a paired mobile application. If the user does not wish or is unable to remain connected with a companion software platform, InsulCheck DOSE has built-in memory to store over 40 days' worth of injection history at a time. Through modification of the sleeve component and firmware refinement, InsulCheck DOSE can become applicable to all injection pens for various drug treatments. At launch, it will support a range of reusable and disposable injection pens on the insulin market from Novo Nordisk, Lilly and Sanofi. "Our ability to learn, adapt and improve our technology is one of the key aspects of InsulCheck DOSE and one that separates us greatly from our competitors. The future-proof design of InsulCheck DOSE means that it can be adapted to support the various pen mechanisms in use today, whilst maintaining accuracy and reliability for the patient. Among the numerous unique features of this product is the built in Firmware Over The Air (FOTA) capability which allows continuous optimisation of the device's firmware even when deployed in the field. That future-proofing allows InsulCheck DOSE to adapt to physical injection pen variations from the pen manufacturers and improve on device performance 'on the go' from real world user behaviours" - said Dr Minnock. Value Proposition The InsulCheck DOSE device helps patients, automatically track their daily injection and monitor treatment adherence. The intended use of InsulCheck DOSE is as a supporting component in a management ecosystem for therapy optimisation, remote monitoring and enhanced connected care. Dr Minnock explained, "InsulCheck DOSE is a disruptive technology that will revolutionise an entire market and change the lives of millions of MDI users worldwide. Innovation Zed have entered into discussions with market leaders in the diabetes management sector with the intention of finding a strategic global partner in taking this InsulCheck DOSE technology to the market. InsulCheck DOSE is an attractive offering to any organisation working in this space as it can significantly enhance their existing offering to become more competitive and command new growth and additional market share." Conclusion InsulCheck DOSE enters production at the end of Q2 2022 and will be available as an FDA registered and CE marked product. Manufacturing of InsulCheck DOSE will be handled by Innovation Zed's existing manufacturing partner SHL Technologies, a subsidiary of SHL Medical. If you wish to understand InsulCheck DOSE or any of our technology offerings in greater detail, please feel free to visit our website or reach out to us directly.