TORTOLA, British Virgin Islands--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Juvenescence Limited (“Juvenescence”) is pleased to announce the launch of a joint venture with Insilico Medicine, Inc. (“Insilico Medicine”), a Baltimore-based company using artificial intelligence (“AI”) principally focusing on ageing and age-related diseases. The new joint venture, Juvenescence AI Limited (“Juvenescence AI”), will focus on developing a pipeline of new compounds licensed from Insilico Medicine and on building AI-driven tools for clinical development. This partnership will produce commercially attractive drugs for Juvenescence AI while validating Insilico Medicine’s innovative AI approach for drug discovery. Juvenescence made an undisclosed investment into Insilico Medicine simultaneously with the creation of the joint venture.
“We are very pleased to partner with Alex Zhavoronkov and his team at Insilico Medicine. Artificial intelligence is set to increase efficiencies in many sectors, something sorely needed in drug development as evidenced by the prolonged decline in the sector’s productivity. Insilico Medicine’s approach has massive potential to reduce the cost associated with the discovery of new drugs,” said Juvenescence’s Chairman, Jim Mellon, adding, “We are excited by the potential for AI to streamline the longest and most costly portions of the drug development cycle: clinical trials. With Insilico Medicine’s help, we hope Juvenescence AI will both develop therapeutics that treat the diseases that plague all of us as we age and eventually treat the ageing process itself.”
The principals of Juvenescence, Jim Mellon, Dr. Greg Bailey and Dr. Declan Doogan, have extensive track records in drug development, company formation, and biotech investment. The Juvenescence executive and scientific team hopes to combine the classical drug development expertise earned through careers in the pharmaceutical industry and through their successful early investments in companies such as Medivation and Biohaven Pharmaceuticals (NYSE:BHVN), to bear on the new prospects presented by AI-assisted drug development. The team believes that advances in AI provide new avenues for clinical, regulatory and commercial success. Dr. Doogan, the former Senior VP of Clinical Development at Pfizer and current Chairman of Biohaven Pharmaceuticals (NYSE:BHVN), said:
“The application of AI techniques to drug discovery has enormous potential and could dramatically alter the way that we discover new drugs and define existing diseases. AI could decrease the cost and increase the speed with which we can bring new medicines to patients."
Juvenescence AI has agreed to license selected novel and repurposed compound families from Insilico Medicine on an ongoing basis, with the aim of developing therapies for both ageing itself and the diseases of ageing, such as diabetes, dementia, cancer, respiratory disease and cardiovascular disease, that increasingly burden our health systems as the world’s population continues to age.
“The team at Juvenescence AI has demonstrated extraordinary foresight in recognising that the anti-ageing sector is currently experiencing a period of rapid advance, with vast sums of capital set to flow into the sector in coming years. They have also recognised the potential of AI early and that it will play a key role in adding billions of healthy life years to the lives of people around the globe. We are eager to work with them to develop life-saving and life-extending drugs”, said Alex Zhavoronkov, PhD, Founder and CEO of Insilico Medicine, Inc. and Chief of Artificial Intelligence of Juvenescence AI.
About Juvenescence Limited
Juvenescence Limited is an investment company focussed on therapies to increase human longevity and complementary investments in related sectors. It was founded in 2017 by Jim Mellon, Greg Bailey,Declan Doogan, Anthony Chow, and Alexander Pickett. The Juvenescence team are highly experienced entrepreneurs and investors with a significant focus on the life science and commercial drug development sectors. Juvenescence creates new ventures and invests directly in both startup and established longevity related companies while offering strategic advice and operational support.
Juvenescence believes that advances in science have made real the possibility of slowing, halting or potentially reversing some elements of ageing. Juvenescence believes that the resulting increase in life expectancy will have profound implications on all sectors and in particular healthcare, education, insurance and leisure.
About Juvenescence AI Limited
Juvenescence AI Limited is a drug development and artificial intelligence company focussed on ageing and age-related diseases. Juvenescence AI combines advances in artificial intelligence with classical development expertise in order to prioritise and develop compounds from Insilico Medicine, Inc’s end-to-end automated drug discovery pipeline through to clinical proof of concept.
About Insilico Medicine, Inc.
Insilico Medicine, Inc. is an artificial intelligence company located at the Emerging Technology Centers at the Johns Hopkins University Eastern campus in Baltimore, with R&D resources in Belgium, Russia, and the UK sourced through hackathons and competitions. The company utilises advances in genomics, big data analysis, and deep learning for in silico drug discovery and drug repurposing for ageing and age-related diseases. The company is pursuing internal drug discovery programs in cancer, Parkinson's Disease, Alzheimer's Disease, ALS, diabetes, sarcopenia, and ageing. Through its Pharma.AI division, Insilico provides advanced machine learning services to biotechnology, pharmaceutical, and skin care companies, foundations and national governments globally. In 2017, NVIDIA selected Insilico Medicine as one of its Top 5 AI companies in its potential for social impact.
Brief company video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l62jlwgL3v8