Innovation UK > News > Innovation News > Spin-out signs up with GSK

Activiomics, a new spin-out from the Institute of Cancer at Barts and the London School of Medicine and Dentistry at Queen Mary, University of London, has signed its first commercial agreement.?

Scientists at Activiomics developed a novel method of analysing and interpreting cell signalling pathways. This technology enables the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industry to identify biomarkers and better select new drugs for diseases such as cancer, autoimmunity and diabetes and help reduce their time to market.?

Now the company has signed up with GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) through its Respiratory Centre of Excellence for Drug Discovery (CEDD), in a collaborative effort to investigate inflammatory signalling mechanisms.?

?Activiomics partners with Pharma and Biotech using its innovative mass spectrometry-based method to analyse and interpret cell signalling pathway activity, generating high value information for the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industry. Errors in cellular information processing are responsible for human disease.??

Its unique TIQUAS (Targeted In-depth Quantification of cell Signalling) platform has advantages over existing methods in that it is quantitative, antibody-free, label-free and applicable to any cell or tissue sample. This is of significant benefit in the drug development cycle, aiding clinical trial candidate selection and biomarker discovery, thereby reducing development times.? ?

Dr Pedro Cutillas ? scientific founder of the company, with Professor Bart Vanhaesebroeck ? said: "It is personally very rewarding seeing discoveries made in the lab moved into commercial development with the ultimate aim of patient benefit".?

Dr Mark Warne, Interim CEO of Activiomics, said: "We are delighted to have signed our first commercial agreement and look forward to working with GSK to identify novel modulators of inflammatory signalling. We believe our unique technology has significant advantages over existing methods and it is pleasing to see it already gaining traction in the marketplace."?