바이오스펙테이터

바이오스펙테이터 Sungmin Kim 기자

Arum Therapeutics has licensed in a candidate for the first-in-class antiviral drug, which hinders human rhinovirus, from the Korea Research Institute of Chemical Technology(KRICT).

Arum Therapeutics announced on the 13th that they signed a contract with the Korea Research Institute of Chemical Technology on the 31st of last month to implement a technology contract for candidate substance to develop antiviral drugs.

Through this contract, Arum Therapeutics has secured worldwide exclusive rights to implement human rhinovirus treatments. They will establish intimate research cooperation with academic, research institutes and hospitals to carry out development in the fourth quarter of 2021, with the aim of entering the first clinical phase.

Arum Therapeutics will pay advance payments and technical fees for development milestones to the KRICT with no specific amount disclosed.

Human rhinovirus is a virus known to cause colds. The problem is that human rhinovirus worsens the path of disease in 25 to 60 percent of asthma patients and 24 to 40 percent of COPD patients. With medically unsatisfied demands, respiratory filed still doesn’t have an adequate drug or treatment available to prevent respiratory problems caused by rhinovirus.

The anti-viral drug treatment introduced by Arum therapeutics this time is a low-molecular compound that hinders specific targets involved in human rhinovirus cloning with excellent selectivity. It also has the advantage of being able to suppress all rhinovirus subtypes (A, B, and C). Rhinovirus has had difficulty in developing vaccines and drugs as it has 160 serotypes.

There is also a possibility of this new antiviral drug to be applied not only to human rhinovirus but also to other types of virus reduction in the future. The latest worldwide issue of the novel coronavirus is a single-stranded RNA virus, such as the Human Rhinovirus. KRICT will assess the possibility of Arum Therapeutics’ developing the anti-coronavirus drug in the future by using their newly introduced technology with this anti-virus drug.

CEO Baek Tae-gon said that "We will conduct a lead optimization on the initial development substance introduced by the KRICT and conduct an evaluation on the possibility of preventing asthma and COPD symptoms first, and then expand the research to other diseases related to human rhinovirus." “And we are expecting to strengthen development pipeline of Arum Therapeutics through this technical implementation contract."

"The compound of this technology is an early development material that showed anti-viral activity against Rhinovirus and Enterovirus, and is expected to be applied to a wider range of RNA viruses as well as these viruses," said Doctor Jeong Young-sik, a researcher at the KRICT.

Meanwhile, Arum Therapeutics was established in December last year as a company focused on targeting low-molecular compounds for diseases related new phosphorylase inhibitors. Their targeted diseases are cancer and rare diseases.

Baek Tae-gon, CEO of Arum Therapeutics, is an expert in medical chemistry who served as a director of the research center for new drug development and commercialization at Yuyu Pharmaceutical, before his startup company. He also served as a director of Exelixis, a U.S. anti-cancer drug company, CJ Healthcare Pharmaceutical Research Institute, and Seoul Asan Medical Center’s pre-clinical research support for global leading centers.