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- Samsung Life Science Fund invests in Generate:Biomedicines, a Flagship Pioneering company leading in AI-enabled protein therapeutics discovery and development - Investment highlights Samsung's dedication to advancing innovation and creating a robust ecosystem for AI-enabled therapeutic development INCHEON, South Korea, Dec. 18, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Samsung announced today it has invested in Generate: Biomedicines ("Generate") as part of its efforts to drive growth and innovation in the biopharmaceutical sector. The investment was made via the Samsung Life Science Fund, which was created jointly between Samsung Biologics, Samsung C&T, and Samsung Bioepis, and managed by Samsung Venture Investment Corporation. Established in 2021 and worth KRW 240 billion, the fund has invested in biotech companies with promising technologies. Generate, founded by Flagship Pioneering, is a US-based clinical stage company leading in generative biology. The company applies AI-based optimization and de novo generation to discover and design novel protein therapeutics, and has a robust pipeline of approximately 20 programs from preclinical to clinical development across oncology, immunology, and infectious diseases. "We see great potential in Generate to develop first- and best-in-class therapeutics," said John Rim, President and CEO of Samsung Biologics. "Leveraging Generate's strengths in AI and machine learning, we look forward to creating an ecosystem for development, manufacturing, and R&D collaboration to advance next-generation medicines in areas with unmet needs." "Funding from leading partners like Samsung enables us to continue advancing our platform, generating high-quality data, and empowering our exceptional team to tackle some of the toughest challenges in human health," said Mike Nally, CEO of Generate:Biomedicines. "With clinical programs already in progress and plans to add three to six more within the next 18 months, we are turning technological promise into tangible outcomes." About Samsung Biologics Co., Ltd. Samsung Biologics (KRX: 207940.KS) is a fully integrated, end-to-end CDMO service provider, offering seamless development and manufacturing solutions from cell line development to final aseptic fill/finish as well as laboratory testing support for the biopharmaceutical products we manufacture. Our state-of-the-art facilities are CGMP compliant with bioreactors ranging from small to large scales to serve varying client needs. Maximizing operational efficiency and expanding our capabilities in response to growing biomanufacturing demand, Samsung Biologics offers a combined 604 kL total capacity at Bio Campus I. The company launched Bio Campus II with the construction of Plant 5, which will be operational in April 2025, adding 180 kL biomanufacturing capacity. Additionally, Samsung Biologics America enables the company to work in closer proximity to clients based in the U.S. and Europe. We continue to upgrade our capabilities to accommodate our clients by investing in a dedicated ADC facility, mRNA technologies, and additional aseptic filling capacity. As a sustainable CDMO partner of choice, we are committed to on-time, in-full delivery of the products we manufacture with our flexible manufacturing solutions, operational excellence, and proven expertise. About Generate:Biomedicines Generate:Biomedicines is a technology company founded at the intersection of machine learning, biological engineering, and medicine that is advancing a new era of programmable biology to engineer better medicines for patients, faster. The Generate Platform's infusion of technology into biology allows us to address historically undruggable and hard-to-drug targets as well as known targets in new and more effective ways. Our platform has enabled the generation of a broad pipeline of therapies across multiple therapeutic areas and protein-based modalities, addressing health challenges out of reach of traditional approaches. Founded by Flagship Pioneering in 2018, Generate is a clinical-stage company leading a fundamental shift from drug discovery to drug generation. Learn more at or follow us on X, LinkedIn and YouTube. Samsung Biologics Media Contact Claire Kim [email protected] Generate:Biomedicines Media Contact Megan McLaughlin [email protected] SOURCE Samsung Biologics WANT YOUR COMPANY'S NEWS FEATURED ON PRNEWSWIRE.COM? 440k+ Newsrooms & Influencers 9k+ Digital Media Outlets 270k+ Journalists Opted In GET STARTED

Protein-making AI models have fueled the launch of a $1 billion startup and a Nobel Prize win in 2024, but are they ready to actually make drugs? Leaders of some of the largest startups working on that question say the technology is promising but not yet ready. But a tiny startup called Nabla Bio is far more bullish, posting a preprint Thursday highlighting its progress in creating antibodies from scratch that look therapeutically viable against some hard-to-drug targets in what it’s calling a first for the field. This isn’t the holy grail of having fully optimized drug candidates at the push of a button. But Nabla’s research is a step forward. The biotech’s leaders say their antibodies showed strong binding affinities and, in general, looked and behaved more like drug candidates than previous de novo efforts. Nabla said these are the first computer-generated antibodies against the family of proteins called GPCRs, which are notoriously hard to drug. The research includes eight examples of de novo antibodies against a range of targets, including proteins found in the membrane of cells like Claudin-4 and CXCR7. “The antibodies are developable, and they could potentially be real drugs,” said Frances Anastassacos, co-founder and president of Nabla. “They will have to go through lead optimization, but unlocking target space is a very exciting space to be. That’s the real promise of de novo design.” Other startups appear to be close behind, if not in lockstep, with Nabla, and that makes its first-ever claims hard to judge. For instance, a California startup called Abalone Bio told Endpoints News it has also generated de novo antibodies targeting GPCRs, the same hard-to-hit protein family cited in Nabla’s preprint. Abalone has not published those results, but presented some of its findings at an antibody engineering conference earlier this month and also framed them as a first for the field. “To our knowledge, these are the first designed GPCR antibody sequences that are functionally active,” its research poster stated. Protein design has arguably become the hottest space when applying AI to biology in 2024. David Baker, a pioneer in the field, won a share of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry last month. He also co-founded Xaira Therapeutics, which launched earlier this year with $1 billion to bring AI into drug R&D, specifically designing antibodies. A year ago, Flagship Pioneering’s Generate:Biomedicines published its own de novo model , called Chroma, and has raised nearly $750 million to build an extensive pipeline of antibody drugs. The leaders of those startups have also acknowledged the limitations of their recent work. Xaira CEO Marc Tessier-Lavigne recently told Endpoints News the AI models can generate initial hit candidates, but those still need to be improved by “old-school methods.” Generate R&D head Alexandra Snyder said earlier this year that designing from scratch isn’t yet ready for prime time, echoing what Baker has acknowledged in his own lab’s research. Despite having a fraction of the resources of Xaira or Generate, Nabla hopes to lead the field. It recently closed a $26 million Series A round and employs 16 people in its 4,500-square-foot lab in Cambridge, MA. CEO Surge Biswas, who co-founded Nabla in 2020 based on his PhD work in Harvard University geneticist George Church’s lab, said technology, rather than capital, is the key limit to progress. “Developing a system like we developed, the scarce commodity is not that you have $100 million to solve this problem,” Biswas said in an interview. “It’s not cheap, but you don’t need to raise giant amounts of capital to unlock some of these technologies.” In an interview, Church called Nabla’s preprint one of “relatively few actual success stories” in applying de novo work for so-called undruggable targets. “My hat is off to them for choosing targets well and not settling for a bunch of academic papers that settle five-decade-old challenges,” Church said. Nabla’s preprint details an AI system called JAM, or Joint Atomic Modeling, in which scientists provide the sequence and structure of a desired drug target. The system then generates antibodies that may fit that target. The most promising creations showed strong binding affinities and looked developable in lab testing, according to the preprint. There are still limitations to Nabla’s findings. They mainly made nanobodies rather than full-sized monoclonal antibodies that are commonplace in the drug industry. The paper included one example of a de novo monoclonal antibody, but that larger size also contributed to a lower binding success rate of 0.0017% for that project. Nabla doesn’t plan to advance these antibodies itself, as the company is focused on partnering with pharma, with ongoing deals with AstraZeneca, Bristol Myers Squibb and Takeda.

Potential total transaction valued at more than $1 billion with $65 million in total upfront consideration SOMERVILLE, MA, USA I September 24, 2024 I Generate:Biomedicines (“Generate”) today announced a multi-target collaboration with Novartis (NYSE: NVS) to discover and develop protein therapeutics across multiple disease areas. The collaboration leverages Generate’s proprietary generative AI platform, ​“The Generate Platform,” to create potentially first- and best-in-class molecules through AI-based optimization and de novo generation. The collaboration will combine The Generate Platform, which integrates machine learning with high-throughput experimental validation, with Novartis expertise and capabilities in target biology, biologics development, and clinical development to create novel therapeutics and to accelerate the pace of drug discovery and development. “We are delighted to collaborate with Generate to explore the promise of generative AI in enhancing and accelerating the discovery of next-generation biologics,” said Fiona Marshall, President of Biomedical Research at Novartis. ​“This collaboration offers an opportunity to leverage the unique strengths of our respective companies, from target biology and biologics discovery to machine learning/​AI and clinical development, in order to bring forward new medicines with transformative potential for patients.” “Partnering with a world-leading drug discovery and development organization like Novartis allows us to broaden the use of our cutting-edge generative biology platform to tackle even more areas of unmet medical need,” said Mike Nally, Chief Executive Officer of Generate:Biomedicines. ​“We look forward to working closely with the team at Novartis to continue to demonstrate the transformative potential of programming biology to create better medicines for patients, faster.” Under the terms of the collaboration agreement, Generate will receive a total upfront payment of $65 million in cash from Novartis, which includes $15 million for the purchase of equity in Generate. Generate is also eligible to receive more than $1 billion in performance-based milestone payments, in addition to tiered royalties up to low double-digits. The number of targets and therapeutic areas are not being disclosed. About Generative Biology Generative biology represents a fundamental shift in therapeutic development driven by generative artificial intelligence (AI). This approach creates never-before-seen therapeutic molecules targeting specific biological processes involved in disease that can be modulated with a wide range of protein modalities—from short peptides to complex antibodies, enzymes, and cytokines. The promise of generative biology goes beyond existing proteins found in nature, creating novel proteins that are purpose-built to address specific therapeutic needs. As a result, generative biology promises to leave trial-and-error drug discovery methods behind, ushering in a new era of programmable drug generation. About Generate:Biomedicines Generate:Biomedicines is a technology company founded at the intersection of machine learning, biological engineering, and medicine that is advancing a new era of programmable biology to engineer better medicines for patients, faster. The Generate Platform’s infusion of technology into biology allows us to address historically undruggable and hard-to-drug targets as well as known targets in new and more effective ways. Our platform has enabled the generation of a broad pipeline of therapies across multiple therapeutic areas and protein-based modalities, addressing health challenges out of reach of traditional approaches. Founded by Flagship Pioneering in 2018, Generate is a clinical-stage company leading a fundamental shift from drug discovery to drug generation. Learn more at www​.gen​er​ate​bio​med​i​cines​.com or follow us on X, LinkedIn and YouTube. SOURCE: Generate:Biomedicines