Som Biotech, a company dedicated to "drug reprofiling" or the discovery of new therapeutic applications of drugs that are already in the market, has closed its first round of funding for 750,000€. The operation has been carried out by means of the participation of the Catalan capital venture company INNOVA31, six private investors, and public contributions from the Catalan Agency ACC1Ó, the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Science and Technology. The new capital will be wholly invested into the discovery of new medical applications using computational techniques, as well as into their experimental validation and subsequent intellectual protection and licensing.

The company, a start-up created exactly one year ago, is part of the Barcelona Science Park’s PCB-Santander Bioincubator, and has already submitted its first application for patents in the United States. The application protects an inhaled formula for the treatment of asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), based on a drug that has been recently authorized for a completely different application. The American application will afford priority for later patent coverage worldwide

In addition to the mentioned products for asthma and COPD, the company is also working on the discovery of new drugs for the treatment of bacterial and viral pathologies, cancer, osteoporosis, multiple sclerosis, malaria and coagulation disorders. Based on preclinical results, the SOM is expecting to patent the applications over the course of 2011. The final objective is to license new patents that cover an obvious medical need to the pharmaceutical sector”.

Som Biotech focuses exclusively on drug repositioning, a strategy that makes it possible to reduce the time and costs involved in the discovery and later development of a new drug. Furthermore, working exclusively with products that are already in the market, or have been in the past, minimizes the risk to human safety and industrial production.