Ncardia and Evotec Enter Licencing Agreement for Disease Modelling Using iPS Cells

December 04, 2017, GOSSELIES, Belgium—Ncardia, a leader in standardised, validated iPSC assays for safety, phenotypic screening and disease modeling, announced today that they entered into a global non-exclusive IP licensing agreement with Evotec (Frankfurt Stock Exchange: EVT, TecDAX, ISIN: DE0005664809). The financial terms of the agreements are not disclosed.

Under the terms of the agreement, Evotec has broad access to Ncardia’s stem cell derived cellular disease modelling IP. The patent family encompasses the use of in vitro derived cells for testing drug efficacy, safety and target discovery.

Dr Stefan Braam, CEO Ncardia, commented: “Ncardia’s mission is to support and enable our clients to develop better medicines faster. The combination of iPSC derived disease models with phenotypic screening is an extremely powerful method to identify new drug candidates. This second license agreement in the course of two months validates Ncardia’s IP position and marks a further step in Ncardia technology strategy aimed at addressing the potential of stem cell applications in the drug discovery and development market.”

Dr Cord Dohrmann, Chief Scientific Officer of Evotec, commented: “In addition to our substantial internal efforts and collaborations, this agreement with Ncardia further strengthens Evotec’s position as a leading iPSC-based drug discovery platform.”

“This licensing agreement is consistent with our strategy to promote disease modelling as a validated approach for drug discovery and development and to offer access to this technology,” said Felix von Haniel VP sales and BD from Ncardia. “We are pleased to collaborate with Evotec, a well- established biotechnology partner, and pioneer in establishing stem cell derived disease models for drug discovery and development.”

About Ncardia

Ncardia develops, produces and commercializes highly predictive human cellular assay systems for safety and efficacy testing. The product portfolio encompasses a broad panel of hiPSC derived cryopreserved cardiomyocytes and neurons. In addition, the company delivers the CardioPlateTM product line of quality controlled ready to use assay plates. Using its cell products, Ncardia develops and provides its customers with a broad portfolio of cardiovascular services from safety pharmacology and disease modeling to cardiovascular drug efficacy screening. Ncardia is based in Belgium, The Netherlands, Germany, and the USA. The company is privately held and was established in September 2017 following the merger of Pluriomics and Axiogenesis, two well-known pioneers in the field of stem cell derived cells for safety and toxicology assessment.

For more information please visit www.ncardia.com.

About Evotec

Evotec is a drug discovery partnership company providing drug discovery solutions. With a large pool of highly experienced scientists, state-of-the-art technology platforms, first-class scientific operations and key therapeutic expertise in the areas of neuronal diseases, diabetes and complications of diabetes, pain and inflammation, oncology and infectious diseases. Evotec drives research and development projects in numerous alliances and partnerships with Pharma and biotech companies as well as academia. The Company’s headquarters are located in Hamburg, Germany. Additional major operating sites exist in Europe and USA. Evotec has more than 2,000 employees worldwide. For additional information please go to www.evotec.com and follow us on Twitter @EvotecAG.

For additional information please go to www.evotec.com and follow us on Twitter @EvotecAG.