Pharmaceutical development company Protina and Samsung Bioepis are collaborating to develop antibody drugs using artificial intelligence (AI).

Protina announced on the 5th that it has been selected as the final research and development institution for the national project 'Development and Demonstration of Antibody Biopharmaceuticals Using AI Models,' organized by the Ministry of Health and Welfare. Protina will lead this project, with Samsung Bioepis and the research team of Professor Baek Min-kyung from the Department of Biological Sciences at Seoul National University, an expert in the field of antibody design AI, participating as joint research and development institutions. This consortium plans to develop 10 AI-designed antibody drug candidates within 27 months by the end of 2027. Among these, three candidates are expected to reach the preclinical stage, and one candidate is expected to complete the application for a Phase 1 clinical trial (IND).

Traditional antibody drug development requires an enormous cost of up to KRW 3 trillion and a long period, with a particularly low success rate in the early development stages. Although AI technology has been recently introduced, the design success rate remains below 1%, and there are limitations in reducing the development period. The consortium aims to overcome these limitations and transform the paradigm of antibody drug development.

It is expected that rapid development will be possible through the antibody design AI (AbGPT-3D) jointly developed by Protina and Seoul National University, supported by Protina's proprietary ultra-fast mass antibody improvement and performance measurement platform (SPID).

Samsung Bioepis will be responsible for completing the process of turning the antibody candidates discovered by the consortium into biopharmaceuticals that can undergo actual clinical trials. Samsung Bioepis will lead the clinical trials and commercialization of the successfully developed antibody candidates, while Protina will receive milestone payments and royalties accordingly.

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