JW JoongWai Embarks on Organoid-Based New Drug Development

Joint Research Agreement with Organoid Science
New Technology for Stem Cell Culture and Recombination with Organ-Like Structures

Park Chan-hee, CTO of JW Pharmaceutical, and Yoo Jong-man, CEO of Organoid Science (from left in the photo), are posing for a commemorative photo at the signing ceremony for the "Establishment of an Organoid-Based New Drug Development Platform and Joint Research" agreement.

[Asia Economy Reporter Chunhee Lee] JW Pharmaceutical announced on the 18th that it has signed a contract with the bio-venture company Organoid Science to strengthen preclinical translational research through the “Establishment of an Organoid-Based New Drug Development Platform and Joint Research.”

Organoids, also called organ mimetics, are a compound word of ‘organ’ and ‘oid,’ meaning ‘similar to an organ’ in the human body. It refers to culturing or recombining stem cells into structures similar to organs. This next-generation drug development technology not only reproduces the structural and functional specificities of patients’ organ tissues but also can replace animal testing and predict results without direct clinical trials.

Through this contract, both companies plan to jointly build a research and development (R&D) platform that databases the genomic information of organoids. Organoid Science will develop organoid models using patient tissue samples, while JW Pharmaceutical will decode the genes of the organoid models and build a platform that accumulates this information. Based on continuous cooperation, both companies plan to actively utilize the organoid R&D platform for new drug development.

In addition, JW Pharmaceutical’s New Drug Research Center, the research corporation C&C New Drug Research Institute, and JW CreaGen, the research corporation of JW New Drug, plan to promote joint research with Organoid Science to strengthen their respective new drug pipelines. They will analyze drug efficacy evaluation and mechanisms of action using organoid models targeted by each new drug candidate to increase the success rate of future clinical trials and utilize them for expanding indications and exploring new substances. The joint research among JW Group companies aims to start in the first half of this year.

Yoo Jong-man, CEO of Organoid Science, said, “We expect that the innovative technology of the organoid-based platform accumulated by Organoid Science will create synergy through joint research with JW Group, which has rich experience and organizational strength in various new drug development fields,” adding, “We will strengthen cooperation so that the competitiveness of both companies can lead to groundbreaking results in customized innovative drug development.”

Park Chan-hee, Chief Technology Officer (CTO) of JW Pharmaceutical, said, “Through the organoid platform, we will further expand JW’s R&D direction of patient-customized innovative drug pipelines in the three major fields of oncology, immunology, and regeneration.”