Novartis will apply Unnatural Products (UNP)’s artificial intelligence (AI)-guided macrocyclic peptide platform to develop next-generation cardiovascular disease therapeutics, through a collaboration that could generate more than $1.8 billion for the Santa Cruz, CA-based biotech. UNP has signed a research collaboration and licensing agreement with Novartis launching the partnership, beginning with an undisclosed program. The collaboration is intended to enable access to previously undruggable targets by marrying UNP’s platform with the pharma giant’s global development and commercialization capabilities. UNP reasons that macrocyclic peptides offer an effective new class of therapeutics that combine the selectivity and potency of biologics with the flexibility and drug-like properties of small molecules. UNP says its platform is an integrated discovery engine that rapidly generates highly potent and selective oral and injectable macrocycles by joining AI-guided molecular design, “massively” parallel synthesis, and direct-to-biology screening. UNP’s process starts by screening candidate molecules against a protein target using technologies and established approaches for testing macrocyclics like phage display or messenger RNA (mRNA) display. The hits are then fed into the company’s computational drug platform, where they are modified and optimized. There is no black box algorithm in the process, Pye told GEN last July. “What the platform’s about is being able to take smart shots on goal” in order to “find a successful hypothesis to weave your way through that chemical landscape to a development candidate.” “Advances in macrocyclic chemistry are opening entirely new avenues in drug discovery, allowing us to engage targets at a dose and with a…
