As part of our SLAS Europe 2022 coverage, we speak to Dr. Sree Vadlamudi, VP BD at Iktos, on how we can adopt AI to help drive productivity within pharmaceutical research, as well as the current challenges facing the drug discovery industry.
Could you please introduce yourself and tell us about your role at Iktos?
I am Sree Vadlamudi, Vice President, Head of Business Development EU, RoW at Iktos. I lead strategic business development outreach, alliance management, marketing and communication activities at Iktos.
Iktos is an innovative company specialized in the development of artificial intelligence. Can you tell us more about the history of Iktos and your mission as a company?
Incorporated in 2016, Iktos has developed an innovative and patented technology platform for drug design and discovery based on the concepts of deep generative modeling. Today Iktos is a leading player in AI-based generative chemistry, delivering value in over 50 real-world research collaborations with some of the world’s most eminent pharmaceutical companies.
Shortly after its creation, Iktos started its first collaborative project in 2017. The initial success and the first real validation of the technology was achieved in 2018 in collaboration with Servier. In 2019, Iktos established its presence in North America by incorporating Iktos Inc. and secured seed funding as well as undiluted funding to grow its AI for drug design technology and software again. In the same year, Iktos won its first customer for Makya, the Iktos SaaS generative AI software platform. In 2020, Iktos released Spaya, the Iktos synthesis planning software, and made it publicly available for users to use and evaluate.
Iktos has developed its own HPC platform that enables parallelization of GPU and CPU computations on demand and can easily scale to meet any computing need. All Iktos technologies can also be easily deployed in partners’ virtual private cloud (VPC), either on AWS, Azure or Google if required.
Iktos’ mission is to provide solutions that drive productivity improvements in small molecule discovery.
Artificial intelligence for the design of new medicinesPlay
Iktos operates primarily in the early stages of the drug discovery value chain. Can you tell us more about what this entails?
The Iktos technology platform enables efficient exploration of the chemical space in early and advanced stage drug discovery programs, generating valuable insights for chemists according to the target product profile (TPP) to overcome the challenges of multiparametric optimization (MPO).
Iktos is the only company that offers state-of-the-art, ready-to-use generative modeling solutions with built-in synthetic accessibility for successful drug discovery projects. From hit discovery to lead generation and optimization, our technology integrates ligand- and structure-based approaches to design new molecules that address collaborators’ project goals. Our proprietary algorithms excel at multiparametric optimization (MPO).
The drug discovery industry, especially when it comes to designing new drugs, is a technical challenge. What are some of the main challenges that need to be overcome when designing new drugs, and how can Iktos solutions help with these?
Designing and optimizing a compound with well-balanced biological activity, selectivity and physical properties is a major challenge in drug discovery. This phenomenon is often referred to as multiparametric optimization (MPO).
At Iktos, we have developed a proprietary, disruptive, AI-based generative modeling technology for ligand- and structure-based de novo drug design, focused on multiparametric optimization (MPO). Our proprietary technology is based on the latest developments in deep learning algorithms for de novo drug design as well as AI-driven synthesis planning. Our generative modeling technology coupled with synthesis planning can be applied to the early-stage drug discovery value chain, from hit generation or scaffolding projects to generation and optimization of leads
In a very short period of time, we can design new, diverse, pharmaceutical and synthesizable molecules that are optimized to fit the project’s target product profile (TPP).
Image credit: Naumova Marina/Shutterstock.com
Drug discovery is very expensive for a company. How does the Iktos technology platform enable major productivity gains in pharmaceutical research and development?
Pharmaceutical drug discovery and development is a long and expensive process, with a small fraction of discovered drugs successfully reaching the market1. Recent advances in the AI-driven drug discovery technology space appear to contribute to productivity gains in drug discovery and development2. AI is contributing to the reinvention of the drug discovery process, opening up new avenues for researchers and can help speed up timelines and reduce costs for a molecule to reach clinical trials by almost 30%.3
At Iktos, we strongly believe that AI has the potential to transform the drug discovery process to achieve time and cost efficiency, improve molecular diversity and therefore improve the chances of clinical success. By combining AI with physics-based methods (e.g., accurate predictions of binding affinities), automation (robotic platform for synthesis and screening) could help improve complex and iterative search and optimization problems in the design and discovery of drugs.
What are some of the software products offered by Iktos to encourage productivity improvement in small molecule discovery?
Iktos is developing a patented and innovative solution based on generative deep learning models, which allows, using existing data, to design in silico optimized molecules to meet all the success criteria of a small molecule discovery project. Iktos offers its technology both as professional services and as a SaaS software platform.
Makya is the first easy-to-use SaaS platform for AI-driven de novo drug design focused on multiparametric optimization (MPO) for ligand and structure-based projects. It enables the design of new and easy-to-make compounds according to a multi-objective plan with unprecedented speed, performance and diversity.
Powered by Iktos’ proprietary retrosynthetic analysis AI, Spaya performs a comprehensive analysis of all possible synthetic routes for a given compound and ranks them according to various synthetic accessibility metrics.
Spaya API – Spaya’s retrosynthesis AI engine available via an API on a scalable infrastructure to evaluate the synthetic feasibility of thousands or millions of molecules.
Image credit: Iktos
During SLAS EU 2022, host a talk titled “Designing synergistic drugs with artificial intelligence and automation”. What can the public expect to learn from this event?
Iktos’ ambition is to make a difference in drug discovery by combining AI and robotics. In 2021, Iktos received major non-dilutive funding to build an AI-driven automated synthesis platform with a robotics hardware solution. This closed-loop drug discovery platform can dramatically improve the cycle times of design, implementation, testing and analysis in drug discovery. I will present the details of Iktos’ offerings in AI and Automation along with case studies.
The COVID-19 pandemic put an end to many in-person conferences and exhibitions. How important is it to be able to host talks like these in person instead of just online?
The COVID-19 pandemic had a significant impact on all areas of life, including conferences and exhibitions. Returning to face-to-face events like SLAS EU 2022, being able to give talks and exhibit a booth is very exciting, as I personally believe that virtual events cannot replace one-on-one interactions.
Looking ahead, what role do you think AI will play in medicinal chemistry and drug design? With increased attention, will we see more companies turning to automated solutions?
AI has the potential to transform drug discovery and does what humans do, but more efficiently, faster and at a lower cost. In addition, AI is bringing a disruptive change in drug design through fast, accurate and comprehensive chemical spatial navigation.
Global pharmaceutical giants such as Pfizer, Takeda, and AstraZeneca have partnered in multiple partnerships with AI companies in the drug discovery and development space. I believe that more and more companies want to explore closed-loop automated drug discovery solutions such as AI combined with robotics (for automated synthesis and screening) to improve complex and iterative search and optimization problems in design and drug discovery.
Image credit: metamorworks/Shutterstock.com
Are you hoping to see new therapeutics brought to market with continued innovation within the drug discovery space? What would this mean for global health?
A recent report in Nature Reviews Drug Discovery4 indicates that an increasing number of new chemical entities (NCEs) are being discovered using AI/ML and innovation in the drug discovery space. Ultimately, streamlining drug discovery and development with the help of innovative technologies such as AI/ML would help increase productivity in upstream R&D and ultimately benefit the global healthcare sector.
What’s next for Iktos? Is there an exciting project you are involved in?
Iktos’ ambition is to make a difference in drug discovery by combining AI and robotics. We look forward to sharing more exciting details about our AI and robotics offerings in the near future.
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About Sree Vadlamudi
Sree is the Vice President, Head of Business Development EU and RoW. Leads strategic business development outreach, alliance management, marketing and communications activities at Iktos. Sree has a successful track record in strategic business development, technology commercialization and alliance management…