PharmCADD, a Korean Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Physics-based drug discovery company announced that it has finished USD 16 million series B funding on March 31, 2021.
This funding round was led by Strategic Investors: Huons, Samyang Holdings and SD BIOSENSOR; and Financial Investors: KTB Network, Daily Partners, DSC Investment, KDB Capital, Maple Investment and KB Securities. As a result, PharmCADD has secured total of USD 22 million in funding since its establishment.
PharmCADD plans to use the funding not only to launch the U.S. and India-based branches but also to advance its AI & Physics-based drug discovery platform technology, Pharmulator™, and to expand R&D manpower. The funding will be used for the preclinical study of internal pipelines as well.
“We will continue to optimize Pharmulator™ that can generate novel drugs and overcome conventional drug discovery limitations. The collaborations with several partner companies and institutes will help us to validate our technology. We are preparing to take due diligence for IPO and planning to list on Korean stock market within 2022,” said Mr. Taehyung Kwon, CEO.
Pharmulator™ is an integration of five (5) core modules: (1) Protein 3D Structure Prediction (2) Molecular Dynamics Simulation (3) Quantum Calculation (4) Toxicity Prediction and (5) AI Drug Generation. Pharmulator™ can generate potent but less toxic novel synthetic small molecules. By employing this platform technology, PharmCADD is also actively expanding collaboration in the field of PROTAC (PROteolysis TArgeting Chimera), mRNA vaccine and DDS (Drug Delivery System).
Recently, the mRNA COVID-19 vaccine that PharmCADD and Eyegene are codeveloping demonstrated similar neutral antibody titer to Moderna vaccine.
“PharmCADD can predict unidentifiably minute physical and chemical interactions between the target protein and a small molecule with the aid of quantum calculation. We have a massive amount of in-house quantum-calculated data and the constructed AI-based quantum calculation module by training them. The technology is highly competitive and inimitable,” said Dr. Sangwook Wu, CTO.
PharmCADD currently employs 50 people (34 R&D members and 17 Ph.Ds among them). The R&D scientists are AI, Molecular Dynamics Simulation, Quantum Calculation and Biochemistry experts from multiple nations.
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