Drug discovery specialist backs start-up
INTEGRATED drug discovery company Signature Discovery, based at Alderley Park’s BioHub in Cheshire, has invested in new start-up, Peak Proteins.
The investment, through its parent Sygil Group, is part of an ongoing strategy to build and expand the group’s capabilities.
The partnership with Peak Proteins adds protein production and crystallography to Sygnature’s current range of drug discovery capabilities.
Peak Proteins was founded by Dr Mark Abbott in 2014 and has been trading since summer 2015.
Collectively, the highly experienced ex-AstraZeneca team provides engineered, tailored protein reagents and 3D atomic level structures of proteins using X-ray crystallography to enable the rational design of new drugs.
Sygnature Discovery’s founder and chief executive Dr Simon Hirst said: “Computational structure-based design is a very important part of modern drug discovery and Peak Proteins’ team of highly experienced scientists offer a rare skill set in protein crystallography which compliments and supports our existing capabilities.
“This is much more than a financial investment as we will be able to share our management expertise with Peak Proteins and support their future growth.”
“Our involvement means that we can now offer protein production and crystallography alongside our client projects, or separately, and this expands our capabilities further. The two companies will also be able to work together to develop new services and technologies that will be advantageous to our clients.”
Abbott said: “It is great to have the expertise and involvement of Simon and his team at Sygnature Discovery. There is a lot we can learn from their successes as we grow our business. Working together in this way will give us the necessary cash injection to accelerate our growth as well as making some important capital investments in equipment.”
Dr Mark Abbott, Dr Tina Howard and Dr Derek Ogg, of Peak Proteins, are joined by Dr Simon Hirst and Dr Stuart Onions, of Sygnature Discovery, on the board of directors.
