On September 5, 2022 Vernalis Research ("Vernalis"), a fully owned subsidiary of HitGen Inc., and Unison Medicines Inc. ("Unison") reported a research collaboration on an undisclosed bacterial target (Press release, Vernalis, SEP 5, 2022, View Source [SID1234619120]).

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Under the terms of the agreement, Vernalis will use its expertise in drug discovery to design small molecules against this particularly challenging target, which has long been considered to be undruggable. Unison will finance all activities at Vernalis and Vernalis will be entitled to receive downstream milestones and royalties should the compounds from the collaboration progress further into development and commercialization. As part of the agreement, Vernalis has also invested in Unison’s first round of financing.

Dr. Mike Wood, Managing Director of Vernalis, said: "We are extremely pleased to work with Unison on this promising and difficult bacterial target. This collaboration demonstrates once again that Vernalis is an attractive partner for biotech and pharma companies facing challenges in drug discovery. And the investment in Unison’s financing round demonstrates the flexibility of our business model and the willingness to share the risk with our partners. We are looking forward to a successful collaboration with Unison."

Doug Witt, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Unison, said: "We are delighted to begin our collaboration with Vernalis. The team at Vernalis has an unmatched track record against difficult targets and we are confident that together we are positioned for success. The investment in this project by Vernalis and others demonstrates the opportunity we see in tackling the Anti-Microbial Resistance problem with highly innovative approaches."

Dr. Jin Li, Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer of HitGen Inc., commented: "I am very pleased to see Vernalis and Unison enter this collaboration, which reflects Vernalis’ deep expertise and experience in FBDD/SBDD field to solve challenging problems in drug discovery research. Since Vernalis became part of HitGen at the end of 2020, the research teams from Vernalis and HitGen Chengdu have been working closely to advance the synergistic opportunities of the DEL and FBDD/SBDD technology platforms. I believe that the collaboration between Vernalis and Unison will mark important progress in our concerted efforts, and I wish the collaboration every success in this very important area of healthcare."