Concept Life Sciences and Accelero Biostructures partner to advance X-ray crystallography in early drug discovery
Up to 10 times faster drug development expected
UK-based Concept Life Sciences (Concept) and Accelero Biostructures (Accelero) in the US have formed an industry-leading partnership which will help pharma businesses worldwide speed up drug development by up to tenfold.
The collaboration accelerates the timeline for progressing from drug discovery to clinical trials through the integration of Accelero’s specialised X-ray crystallography and structural biology platforms.
Concept offers comprehensive drug discovery expertise, including biophysics, medicinal chemistry, pharmacology, and GMP API Manufacture. Its track record over the last 10 years includes advancing numerous drug candidates, with 32 projects reaching preclinical stages, 21 moving to clinical trials, and four ultimately brought to market.
Accelero, based in San Francisco, specialises in high-throughput protein X-ray crystallography—an essential cornerstone in understanding protein-ligand interactions in structure-based drug discovery and structural biology. Its proprietary platforms, ABS-ServicesSM and ABS-OneStepSM, enable precise hit identification and validation of target engagement for a wide variety of targets, including “undruggables”. These methods feed directly into Accelero’s AI-driven drug discovery initiatives, accelerating the path from initial screening to drug candidate selection.
The partnership combines Concept’s integrated drug discovery process with Accelero’s crystallography-based fragment screening for hit generation and iterative crystallography-driven inhibitor optimization. Together, they will provide clients with efficient hit-to-lead development, improving key factors such as target affinity, selectivity, and ADME properties. This is expected to significantly reduce development timelines and deliver faster transitions from discovery to clinical stages, which in many cases could be faster by ten times.
Debanu Das, Co-Founder and CEO of Accelero Biostructures, commented: “This collaboration brings together two teams dedicated to pushing the boundaries of what’s possible in drug discovery. By uniting our expertise, we’re equipped to tackle complex challenges in a way that enhances the quality and pace of discovery. We’re excited to have already initiated several collaborative projects and look forward to seeing their impact.”
Ben Cliff, CEO of Concept Life Sciences, added: “Partnering with Accelero allows us to leverage our combined capabilities in a way that strengthens support for biopharma companies aiming to advance new therapies. This alliance underscores our commitment to driving scientific rigour and efficiency, ultimately helping more candidates progress smoothly through the discovery pipeline.”
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