Funding will enable company to conduct research program on collaborative large scale three-dimensional data management for biomolecules

Discngine, a software company specialized in developing applications for life sciences research, announces that it has received funding of €600,000 ($743K) from Bpifrance. This figure comprises an interest-free loan of €300,000 and an ‘innovation loan’ of €300,000. The objective is to carry out a research and development program, under the name 3decision®, which will enable users to consult, manage and communicate around the structural data of a wide range of biomolecules. The two-year program for the development and commercial launch of the application started in March 2018.
 
The field of drug discovery aided by macromolecular structures is undergoing radical transformation. It has a substantial impact on the outcome of the research and development of new bioactive chemical entities. In recent years, new methods for determining experimental structures have come to light and well-established methods, like X-ray crystallography, have been improved dramatically, increasing the yield. An exponential increase in the production of structural data is expected over the next decade.
 
The program draws on two years of internal research and development in an ongoing successful collaboration with Abbvie Inc. The 3decision application developed during these past two years handles the data derived from the experimental methods that determine the three-dimensional structure of biological macromolecules along with the knowledge generated by the researchers.
 
With this newly funded program, Discngine’s application will emphasize its collaborative features. Currently, research communities do not have the tools to facilitate the work around structural data within multidisciplinary teams. This application aims to ease communication on complex three-dimensional data, providing a common workspace where all research professionals can access the results of both internal research and publicly available databases at the same time.
 
Discngine will further develop unique and highly innovative tools that focus on the visual analysis and synthesis of large amounts of structural data, enabling the users to easily access highly informative summaries as ergonomically as possible. Scientifically, efforts will be centered on developing a comprehensive protein-protein contact analytic tool and on the addition of new types of macromolecules, including antibodies and other biological products, with dedicated analysis tools.
 
“Our goal is to develop a secure application that is easy to use and accessible to medicinal chemists, molecular modelling scientists and structural biologists. All this development will trigger new marketing activity,” said Eric Le Roux, founder and CEO of Discngine. “At the same time, we will develop an on-demand service in order to diversify our marketing channels and potential target markets. With this new application, Discngine targets not only the big pharmaceutical companies but also smaller institutions that could profit from the structural data in their drug research programs.”