Chinese startups accelerate innovative drugs R&D for COVID-19

China-based startups Insilico Medicine and Westlake Pharma have announced a strategic partnership to jointly develop innovative small-molecule drugs for COVID-19. The cooperation will be based on the anti-COVID-19 drug R&D project by Westlake Pharma, which aims to develop broad-spectrum small molecule inhibitor drugs for key enzymes of coronavirus and has achieved positive results in the preliminary stage. According to the agreement, both startups will combine the advantages of Insilico Medicine’s artificial intelligence (AI)-powered platforms for drug R&D, and further utilize interdisciplinary molecular design methods such as AI, computer simulation and pharmacodynamic to design, synthesise and optimise novel selective small molecule inhibitors to accelerate the advancement of pre-clinical and clinical research on the anti-COVID-19 project. The close collaboration between Insilico Medicine and Westlake Pharma aims to strengthen multi-party communication and jointly achieve a scientific and technological breakthrough to bring efficient solutions to the R&D of innovative therapies for COVID-19, severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) and other coronaviruses.