Metallophile™ Technology
Approximately one-third of all approved drugs and one-half of all approved small molecule agents are enzyme inhibitors. This general class of therapeutic agents has demonstrated tremendous commercial potential with annual worldwide sales of over $65 billion. More than one-third of all validated (i.e., an inhibitor is either marketed or in phase 3 development) enzyme targets are metalloenzymes. In addition, Viamet has determined that approximately 10% of all marketed drugs are metalloenzyme inhibitors. Viamet develops traditional small molecule compounds that exploit validated metalloenzyme targets in the fields of inflammation, infectious disease and oncology.
Viamet's primary focus is to develop improved metalloenzyme inhibitors against validated targets whose current inhibitors are not optimal from a therapeutic perspective. Utilizing its proprietary Metallophile™ Technology, the Company can rapidly develop analogues of known metalloenzyme inhibitors by optimizing their metal-binding component, yielding new chemical entities with reduced chemistry and biology risk and reduced timeline to the clinic. The Metallophile™ Technology includes:
- Metallobase™: a proprietary database of metalloenzymes and known metalloenzyme inhibitors;
- Metallophiles™: novel and superior metal-binding groups; and
- Metallophile™ Indices: a series of proprietary, in silico predictive tools for the rapid selection of optimal Metallophiles™ for any given metalloenzyme target.
The Metallophile™ Technology allows Viamet to rapidly and predictably develop novel, small molecule inhibitors of key metalloenzymes which address deficiencies of current inhibitors through:
- improved safety; and/or
- improved potency; and/or
- improved PK/ADME properties.