Iproteos, one of the five spin-offs launched by IRB Barcelona, a BIST centre, focuses on the development of third-generation drugs for diseases such as schizophrenia, epilepsy, and atherosclerosis. Its proprietary technology allows faster research processes to identify new drugs and produce novel molecules. The new company Accure Therapeutics is taking over Iproteos with an initial €7.6 M investment, which will allow for the development of its product portfolio.
Iproteos, a spin-off from the Institute for Research in Biomedicine (IRB Barcelona), a centre of the Barcelona Institute of Science and Technology, and the University of Barcelona (UB) has become part of Accure Therapeutics, a new clinical research company devoted to diseases associated with the central nervous system (CNS).
For its launch, Accure Therapeutics has completed an investment round worth €7.6 M, which will allow it to develop its portfolio of products and to take over Iproteos and Bionure – companies specialised in neuroprotective drugs and with central offices at the Barcelona Science Park. The investment round has been headed by Alta Life Sciences and supported by the Centre for the Development of Industrial Technology (CDTI).
With the takeover of the two Catalan biotech companies, Accure Therapeutics is advancing in its goal of developing treatments for CNS diseases, the leading cause of disability and one of the major causes of death worldwide. In fact, Iproteos’ products are a key and differential factor in the Accure pipeline, since they will provide the company with a portfolio of advanced-stage products that are close to clinical trials for the treatment of CNS diseases.
Iproteos currently has several projects underway for the treatment of CNS diseases, including schizophrenia and Parkinson’s disease, epilepsy, and atherosclerosis. Founded in 2011, Iproteos came about from research by Teresa Tarragó, Associate Researcher at IRB Barcelona, and Ernest Giralt, Head of the Peptide and Protein Lab at the same centre and Emeritus Professor of the University of Barcelona.
By becoming part of Accure Therapeutics, Iproteos will be able to accelerate its projects and access networks of international investors and pharmaceutical companies more quickly, to which it could license out the products in the future. Iproteos’ Director Teresa Tarragó, says, “Forming part of a new company like Accure Therapeutics, with a team of outstanding senior scientists with experience in the pharmaceutical sector and with strong investors such as Alta Life Sciences and CDTI, is a fantastic opportunity for the projects initially conceived and developed by Iproteos to reach patients quickly”.
In 2016, Iproteos closed a first financing round of €2.7 M to complete the pre-clinical stage of its compound for the treatment of Cognitive Deficit Associated with mental illnesses such as schizophrenia (CIAS). The Iproteos cognitive enhancer is a state-of-the-art drug prepared using proprietary IPROTech technology, a cutting-edge platform that combines computer and biotechnology tools developed by the biotech research team for the design innovative therapeutic molecules, called peptidomimetics. Based on highly advanced computational chemistry tools specifically designed to generate and model novel molecules, this technology makes it possible to greatly accelerate the research processes for obtaining new drugs.
More information can be found on the IRB Barcelona website.