Two Firms Team Up Against Viral Infectious Diseases

Evotec and Haplogen signed a collaboration agreement to discover and develop small molecules against viral infectious diseases.

Evotec and Haplogen signed a collaboration agreement to discover and develop small molecules against viral infectious diseases. The two companies will co-develop drugs against a human protein that is essential for pathogenic viruses to infect their host cell.

This protein was discovered by Haplogen’s target discovery technology to identify host factors for infectious human pathogens. Haplogen's technology platform is designed to discover host factors against which new chemical or biological entities can be developed, which could help in finding new drug targets. Evotec will further develop Haplogen’s lead compounds and apply its drug discovery platform to find additional small molecule inhibitors.

"This partnership will ensure that our therapeutic program advances with increasing pace to discover molecules for clinical testing in those patients that are at high risk of virus infections," says Georg Casari, CEO of Haplogen. "We are excited that Evotec shares our vision and has joined forces on this first-in-class drug target."

Haplogen is a privately held biotechnology company based on a genetics technology platform and focused on combatting infectious diseases. Evotec is a drug discovery alliance and development partnership company that currently has long-term alliances with Boehringer Ingelheim, CHDI, Genentech, Medimmune/AstraZeneca, Novartis, and Ono Pharmaceutical. In September, Evotec signed a 10-year contract with NIH to operate the latter’s Small Molecule Repository.