In an exclusive interaction , Dr Vasan Sambandamurthy , Senior Vice President , Bugworks Research India shares his views on the current biotech and startup scenario , his company ’ s journey so far , R & D initiatives , future outlook and much more .
BY RAHUL KOUL
BioTech
Take us through the company ' s journey so far including the key milestones achieved in the last 9 years ?
Bugworks has transformed into a clinical-stage biopharma company at the forefront of discovering novel antibiotics and immunooncology ( IO ) drugs to address major health challenges afflicting humanity – antimicrobial resistance ( AMR ) and cancer . Few of our key milestones include building a proprietary ELUDE platform – a novel modelling tool to overcome efflux mediated drug-resistance in Gram-negative bacteria ; and developing strong patent portfolio of 45 global patent applications filed for AMR and IO . Till date , 17 patents have been granted across India , US , EU , SA , China and Japan .
We have also been funded by global investors from Japan , South Africa , India , EU , US Government . Over the time , we have successfully built a world-class network (> 50 academic / industrial partners ) to leverage funding , innovation and product development . We have also advanced a novel antibacterial drug candidate into first-in-human study in healthy volunteers besides setting up PICASO platform , a laboratory within a cancer hospital to evaluate translational research to support the IO program .
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