Graffinity in research deal with Amgen

Germany's Graffinity Pharmaceuticals GmbH has entered into a research collaboration with US biotechnology major Amgen.

Under the terms of the agreement, Graffinity will receive technology access fees and success payments for the generation of novel small-molecule hits against a broad range of drug targets. Amgen will gain access to Graffinity's proprietary fragment-based drug discovery technology which uses chemical microarrays to screen for small-molecule fragments that bind to a variety of drug targets which play a key role in major human diseases. The identification of novel modes of action and chemistry is a major focus of the collaboration. Financial details of the transaction were not disclosed.

Mathias Woker, chief business officer of Graffinity, stated: "we are very pleased that Amgen has decided to partner with us. The novel chemistry that our technology can introduce into a medicinal chemistry program is one of the major reasons why fragments have become a new standard in drug discovery programs of large pharma and biotech companies. Graffinity offers one of the largest fragment libraries commercially available today with about 20,000 fragments and 90,000 lead-like structures."