Veraxa Biotech and Indivumed have announced an agreement to jointly discover modulatory and functional antibodies against several targets for colorectal cancer. The targets have been identified by Indivumed’s discovery solution platform nRavel, while antibody development and commercialisation will be performed by Indivumed’s subsidiary, Ix Therapeutics.
Veraxa uses microfluidic technology for the screening of antibodies with modulatory function on complex signal proteins like GPCRs or ion channels. Its screening platform reportedly allows for the testing of millions of natural IgGs from humans and mice for therapeutic effects, rather than just for binding. The company also offers customised screening services for users worldwide. Besides contract projects, it’s also establishing a proprietary pipeline of therapeutic antibody candidates for joint development with pharma partners.
Indivumed has set up a multi-omics database with medical experience, bioinformatics expertise, and AI-integrated analytics for medical diagnostics and predictive therapeutic use. Recently, the company launched the AI-based platform nRavel, which, together with the company’s IndivuType multi-omics database, is hoped to derive more precise insights and predictors for pathologies and diseases with unmet medical needs.
“The high quality of data and the artificial intelligence tools that Indivumed utilizes means that we can be more confident in the validity of the targets,” said Dr Christoph Antz, CEO of Veraxa. “With our technology, we can move rapidly into the development of functional antibodies that have the potential to serve as new therapeutics.”
“Having thousands of patient cases complete with comprehensive multi-omics and clinical data coupled with the advanced AI capabilities of nRavel gives us the ability to derive novel insights in just a short period of time,” said Prof Hartmut Juhl, founder and CEO of Indivumed. “As we continue to uncover additional targets, having a partner like Veraxa who can develop functional antibodies in an accelerated manner is critical to our ability to discover new possibilities for cancer treatment in the shortest-possible time and fight this disease.”
