Italfarmaco S.p.A. and VeriSIM Life have entered into a strategic collaboration to discover and develop novel histone deacetylase (HDAC)-targeted therapies for neuromuscular, fibrotic and rare diseases.

The partnership combines Italfarmaco’s expertise in HDAC biology, medicinal chemistry, translational science and clinical development with VeriSIM Life’s artificial intelligence-enabled drug discovery platforms, BIOiSIM and AtlasGEN.

Under the collaboration, the companies will discover, design, synthesise and optimise novel small molecules against a selected HDAC target. AI-based predictive technologies will be used to assess and prioritise compounds with the potential to progress successfully into clinical development.

VeriSIM Life will be eligible for technology service fees, development, regulatory and commercial milestone payments, as well as royalties on future commercial products. The agreement has a potential total value of more than US$100 million and is intended to generate new therapeutic assets and associated intellectual property.

VeriSIM Life’s BIOiSIM platform evaluates potential drug candidates across areas including pharmacology, exposure, safety, biomarkers and patient variability. Its AtlasGEN platform is used to design novel chemical compounds that can be synthesised.

By combining the two platforms, the companies aim to prioritise compounds based not only on their activity against the selected HDAC target but also on their pharmacological and translational properties. This approach is intended to support better candidate selection during early-stage drug discovery.

The collaboration expands Italfarmaco’s HDAC discovery pipeline into disease areas with significant unmet medical needs, including neuromuscular, fibrotic and rare diseases. It also allows the company to apply computational and generative technologies to identify potential next-generation HDAC-targeted medicines.

For VeriSIM Life, the partnership supports its strategy of developing proprietary therapeutic assets with pharmaceutical companies while participating in their potential long-term commercial value.

Overall, the collaboration aims to combine established HDAC expertise with AI-enabled drug discovery to identify differentiated therapeutic candidates with the potential to advance towards clinical development and future patient use.

 

Source: businesswire.com

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