Fusion Antibodies progresses AI antibody collaboration

Preclinical antibody discovery specialist Fusion Antibodies updated the market on its ‘AI/ML-Ab’, or AIM-Lab, service on Monday.

The AIM-traded firm had announced the signing of memoranda of understanding with two companies specialising in artificial intelligence and machine learning in May.

On Monday, it confirmed that it had formalised an agreement with one of the firms - a top-tier US-based AI/ML enterprise.

The board said the collaboration would entail a joint marketing strategy encompassing the AI/ML-based design of antibodies, and their subsequent in vitro production and assessment.

Under the agreement, each party would earn a commission for any fresh business avenues that they introduced to the other.

Commercialisation ventures for the combined service offerings had already started, with both entities currently addressing multiple potential leads sourced from their collective networks.

The company said the AI/ML-Ab offering presented a merger of AI technology, focussed on the in silico design of antibody sequences, and Fusion's proficiency in antibody expression and evaluation.

Moreover, the service would be enhanced by Fusion's newly-publicised proprietary Mammalian Display platform, which would allow for the screening of specialised libraries born out of AI/ML designs.

The board said the combination would allow clients the capability to evaluate thousands or even millions of sequences, with projects of such a nature typically limited to examining just tens or hundreds.

By expanding the screening capacity exponentially, the chances of pinpointing the most viable leads from AI/ML projects would be considerably increased.

“We are delighted to be able to announce the successful delivery of the AI/ML-Ab service utilising our established production and evaluation capabilities and an option to include our proprietary Mammalian Display technology, which can significantly improve success rates, output affinities while reducing the cost per sequence test to as little as 1% of the cost of lower throughput methods,” said chief executive officer Adrian Kinkaid.

“The Mammalian Display technology is an output from our OptiMAL research programme.

“As our industry rapidly turns to find new ways to hasten the discovery of better bio-therapeutics to take to the clinic, we anticipate deploying these capabilities to ensure Fusion is at the forefront of antibody discovery and development process including those using AI/ML.”

At 1319 BST, shares in Fusion Antibodies were up 13.17% at 7.64p.

Reporting by Josh White for Sharecast.com.