CJ Bioscience Acquires New Drug Candidate from UK 4D Pharma

Platform Technology Acquisition Agreement
"Accelerating Microbiome New Drug Development"

CJ Bioscience is accelerating the development of microbiome-based new drugs by securing a new pipeline.

On the 27th, CJ Bioscience announced that it has signed a contract to acquire promising new drug candidates and platform technologies owned by 4D Pharma, a microbiome company based in the UK and Ireland.

The newly introduced drug candidates total nine and target solid tumors, gastrointestinal diseases, brain disorders, and immune diseases. In addition, CJ Bioscience plans to acquire all related intellectual property rights, including two of 4D Pharma's diagnostic and new drug candidate discovery technology platforms. The contract amount will not be disclosed according to mutual agreement between the two companies.

CJ Bioscience explained that greater synergy is expected when the newly secured drug candidates from this contract are combined with the company's bioinformatics-based 'EasyGM platform.' The EasyGM platform is CJ Bioscience's proprietary platform that discovers drug candidates and biomarkers related to diseases based on microbiome databases and clinical data, increasing the likelihood of clinical development success.

CJ Bioscience plans to reflect the detailed data analysis of each pipeline into its research and development (R&D) strategy. It intends to prioritize clinical trials focusing on candidates with high success potential, including the immune-oncology drug 'CJRB-101,' which received clinical approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in January.

A CJ Bioscience official stated, "With the introduction of the new pipeline, we have secured world-class competitiveness in microbiome-based new drug development. In addition to the FDA clinical trials of existing pipelines scheduled for this year, we will continue to discover new drug candidates through follow-up research."

CJ Bioscience officially launched in January last year by integrating the microbiome specialist company 'ChunLab,' acquired in October 2021, with the RedBio resources it already possessed. The company has announced goals of securing 10 pipelines and achieving two technology exports by 2025.