A piece of news
Catalan biotech firm Thrombotargets and the University Institute of Science and Technology (IUCT) have reached an agreement to carry out research over 2 years (can be prolonged) to develop new anticoagulant drugs to treat cardiovascular diseases. In this time, they aim to carry out the pre-clinical phase of development and later license the more effective compounds in order to obtain the necessary financial resources to begin patient trials.
Thrombotargets has developed a molecule-scanning platform that reduces research time from 5 to 3 years. The IUCT will contribute their experience in combinatorial chemistry. Both companies will invest 2 million euros in this new line of products.
The global anticoagulant market moved 6,500 million dollars in 2008. "With the proliferation of obesity and cardiovascular problems, all laboratories are trying to find new drugs with lower risks," explained Ignasi Miquel, head of alliances and product development at Thrombotargets, in the newspaper Expansión (2/2/2009). According to this executive, the problem with current anticoagulants is that they require repeated medical visits because if the dose is too low, they are ineffective and if it is too high, they can cause hemorrhaging.
Thrombotargets has their headquarters in the Mediterranean Technology Park, in Castelldefels (Baix Llobregat). It is controlled by the Biotech Angels investment group and has similar alliances in USA, Russia and the Netherlands.
IUCT has offices in Mollet del Vallès and the Tres Cantos Science Park (Madrid). In April, they reached an agreement with SC Consulting to market their products in Japan.
