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9xchange in the press
Asset marketplace 9xchange augments toolbox with PhaseV trial analytics
Second machine-learning partnership follows BenevolentAI deal in the spring
BY PAUL BONANOS, DIRECTOR OF BIOPHARMA INTELLIGENCE
As the user base grows for 9xchange’s asset marketplace, the company is continuing to add tools to help drug developers identify stalled programs that can reach the right set of patients.
This month, the company announced a deal with PhaseV Trials Ltd. that will add machine learning-based clinical trials support tools to its marketplace. The partnership follows a spring 2023 agreement with BenevolentAI S.A. (Euronext:BAI), and figures to precede more deals, 9xchange Ltd. co-founder and CEO Anat Naschitz told BioCentury.
9xchange’s platform is designed to connect owners of available assets with other biopharmas that are interested in moving them forward, and facilitate deals. Sponsors list their assets anonymously, and buyers can post what they’re interested in obtaining.
The idea of the PhaseV deal, Naschitz said, is to give 9xchange’s users the ability to better identify patient populations, endpoints or trial designs to maximize a therapy’s likelihood of success.
PhaseV has built machine-learning tools for trial design and analysis. Co-founder and CEO Raviv Pryluk told BioCentury that retrospectively re-evaluating trial data using causal machine learning analytics can reveal an asset’s hidden potential. As a result, a potential buyer or in-licenser may see more value in it than the original owner sees.
“PhaseV can say, ‘Focus on this patient population and use these endpoints, and maybe you’ll have an edge,’” Naschitz said. “Or if you’re interested in buying an asset but are worried that the trials will be too expensive, PhaseV can recommend an adaptive trial design, so all of a sudden the cost is less, the timing is shorter and it’s a completely different story.”
For example, Pryluk pointed to a case study from Oramed Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ:ORMP), which applied its tools to identify better-responding subgroups in a Phase III trial of an oral insulin product to treat Type II diabetes. As a result, its partner Hefei Tianhui Biotechnology Co. Ltd. has submitted the analyses to regulators in China seeking the product’s approval.
Privately held PhaseV has a presence in Israel, where 9xchange is also headquartered; PhaseV also has a location in Boston. Viola Ventures and Exor Ventures led a $15 million round for PhaseV last month, with LionBird and angel investors also participating.
Naschitz declined to say whether the 9xchange platform has led to any completed deals thus far, citing confidentiality requirements for its user base. But she said there has been a “tremendous increase” in the number of people and organizations using the platform.
Naschitz was a managing director at OrbiMed Advisors, and co-founded its Israel operation. She left the firm early this year, with 9xchange already in the works.
9xchange biopharma marketplace partners with PhaseV to bring ML-powered clinical trial optimization technology to ecosystem members
The 9xchange platform releases drugs from owners who are unlikely to pursue them further, while providing access to the right AI technologies to unleash new value
BOSTON, November 6, 2023 -
PhaseV, a pioneer in causal machine learning (ML) for dynamic clinical trial analysis and optimization, announced today it has partnered with biopharma marketplace
9xchange, to bring PhaseV’s technology to 9xchange’s connected ecosystem transaction platform.
The partnership provides 9xchange members, including pharma, biotech, investors, entrepreneurs, and select academic centers, access to Phase V’s proprietary ML technology, enabling them to retrospectively analyze and optimally design and execute advanced clinical studies. This announcement follows a recent partnership between 9xchange and BenevolentAI (Euronext Amsterdam: BAI), a leading AI-enabled drug discovery and development company, leveraging BenevolentAI’s technology to support decision making related to indication expansion and drug repurposing for assets within the 9xchange platform.
“Too many deserving drugs never get to patients due to insufficient resource or attention, or objective issues such as suboptimal trial design. The seamless, online and initially anonymous transaction path offered by 9xchange removes friction and unveils unexpected availability and matches, while enabling members to tap into new value through a range of AI/ML technologies," said Anat Naschitz, CEO & Co- Founder at 9xchange "For our members, the PhaseV partnership means new opportunities. Owners can chart a new course for assets lost to trial failure, increase the value at sale and build confidence in a likely outcome. Buyers and investors can conduct due diligence on an asset and circumscribe the cost and probability of success. We build partnerships carefully, and are excited to collaborate with PhaseV, whose team and technology we find very impressive.”
The PhaseV platform offers two distinct service lines for AI clinical trial optimization. The first includes revealing the potential impact of adaptive trial design on the proposed study, followed by optimal trial design and execution. The second involves advanced retrospective analysis that enables detection ofhidden signals in clinical trial data and evaluates endpoints and subpopulations that will result in a successful next trial. Leveraging a wide range of parameters, this multifaceted approach has also shown significant value in drug repurposing efforts. The company's approach has shown positive results in a variety of therapeutic areas including oncology, endocrinology, autoimmune diseases, rare diseases, and more.
“The latest advancements in causal inference and ML, when used right, enable us to harness available data to make informed and optimal decisions in the clinical development stage. One of the benefits of the 9xchange platform is that it helps liberate assets from owners who are unlikely to pursue them further, while providing access to the right technologies to unlock the potential of such assets and support the optimal trial to ensure their success," said Raviv Pryluk, CEO & Co-Founder of Phase V. "We value our partnership with 9xchange, which will bring our novel and proprietary technology and methods to more biopharma innovators looking to uncover the real value of available assets and allow the successful development of new, much needed treatments that otherwise might be left behind.”
About PhaseV Leveraging the power of advanced causal inference and pushing the boundaries of machine learning, PhaseV detects hidden signals in clinical data and extracts actionable insights for planning the optimal next steps. The company's technology enables optimal design and closed-loop execution of adaptive clinical trials, increasing efficiency and success rates. PhaseV is advancing paradigm shifts in the clinical trial world to bring new treatments to more patients, in a more precise and efficient way. Learn more at
www.phaseVtrials.com and follow us on
LinkedIn.
About 9xchange 9xchange releases biopharma assets from owners who are unlikely to develop them, progressing potential drugs towards transactions through a seamless, online platform, while deploying AI/ML technologies to augment their value by adding indications, correcting trial paths and more. The curated, member-only platform includes leading pharma companies, prominent investors, biotech companies and select academic institutions. Learn more at
www.9xc.co
Contacts:
Making asset acquisition frictionless via digital marketplace and AI
Israeli start-up 9xchange is removing some of the friction from the asset sale and acquisition process through its digital marketplace. A partnership with BenevolentAI is also helping users identify repurposing or indication expansion opportunities. In Vivo spoke with 9xchange CEO Anat Naschitz and Benevolent AI's Matthew Fujisawa.
BY DAVID WILD
As biopharma companies look to bolster their pipelines, finding a promising asset takes time and meticulous due diligence. An Israeli start-up, 9xchange, is trying to take some of the friction out of the acquisition process through a digital marketplace where buyers are matched with sellers, and vice versa: a dating app for the biopharma industry.
In this episode of the In Vivo podcast, 9xchange CEO Anat Naschitz talks about the spark that led her to found the company, how it operates and the importance of "liberating and democratizing" sophisticated technologies.
Joining for the podcast is Matthew Fujisawa, SVP, strategy and corporate development at BenevolentAI Limited, to talk about the company's involvement in the 9xchange marketplace, how BenevolentAI is applying its AI tools to identify opportunities for drug repurposing and indication expansion and how the partnership represents an expansion of BenevolentAI's business and growth strategy.
Amid biotechs’ cash crunch, asset marketplace 9xchange poised to speed deals
Exchange adds BenevolentAI’s tools to further enhance connections between buyers and sellers of biopharma assets bound for new homes
BY PAUL BONANOS, DIRECTOR OF BIOPHARMA INTELLIGENCE
Anat Naschitz founded asset marketplace 9xchange with the conviction that there could be a better way for biopharmas to identify assets that would prosper in a different company’s hands, and start the dialogue to forge deals. Months into its launch, 9exchange is now adding tools to enhance the service via a partnership with BenevolentAI.
Naschitz, a co-founder of OrbiMed Advisers’ Israel operation with experience in spinning out programs that weren’t moving forward within other biopharmas’ walls, told BioCentury that the current cash-crunch environment will likely magnify the need for assets to find new homes. Smaller biotechs may also not have the business development resources to fully explore partnerships. “So many biotechs built very large pipelines when capital was abundant,” Naschitz said. “Now they need to sell assets to survive.”
9xchange Ltd.’s platform allows programs’ owners to list their assets anonymously, and buyers to post what they’re interested in obtaining. As potential partners explore the possibility of coming together, Naschitz said the platform is designed to gradually build trust as the parties reveal more about themselves, with messaging tools, private data rooms and a bidding process that “emulates the normal process.”
The latest additions, coming from an agreement with machine learning and drug discovery company BenevolentAI S.A. (Euronext:BAI), are meant to spur connections that potential partners may not have noticed on their own. “For example, if someone posts an asset that they think is for [Duchenne muscular dystrophy], but according to Benevolent it turns out it’s a pancreatic cancer drug, the universe of buyers is different. The value is different,” Naschitz said.
With those insights in mind, the seller could take the asset off the market or discuss it with a new set of potential buyers, and the price could change, she noted. Buyers, in turn, could learn about assets that weren’t on their radar screens. “When someone decides something isn’t good for them, they don’t always internalize that it could have value to someone else,” Naschitz said.
She said 9xchange launched with an invitation-only model, in part to avoid misuse or abuse, and has “curated the people” involved during its first few months. Naschitz said participants still need to apply, and she has interviewed some individually. “This is not something that’s open to the universe,” she said. “There are things you can and cannot do. You can’t find out information about people unless you’ve gone through certain steps.”
Naschitz said pharmas, biotechs, VCs and academic institutions are already exploring deals using the platform, though none of the parties has completed a deal yet. 9xchange’s own business model will be “a mix of things that are service-driven and transaction-driven.”
As a managing director at OrbiMed, Naschitz helped create 89bio Inc. (NASDAQ:ETNB) to advance an asset spun out from Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. (Tel Aviv:TEVA; NYSE:TEVA). 89bio’s lead program, FGF21 analog pegozafermin, has generated promising Phase IIb data to treat non-alcoholic steatohepatitis.
Naschitz also spent time at Apax Partners and McKinsey & Co. She was part of the 2001 spinout of Biovitrum AB from Pharmacia Corp.; the company is now Swedish Orphan Biovitrum AB (Stockholm:SOBI).
With 9xchange already in the works, Naschitz left OrbiMed early this year. She said the exchange will continue to iterate, with more features and tools rolling out as the platform evolves.
9xchange joins forces with BenevolentAI to integrate its AI technology into its innovative biopharma marketplace
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Marketplace and partnership promote information sharing and collaboration across the biopharma industry to accelerate new drug discovery and development
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BenevolentAI will provide its AI technology to evaluate drug repurposability and indication expansion in the 9xchange marketplace
Tel Aviv, Israel, 16 May 2023: 9xchange, a biopharma marketplace created for innovators to match, buy and sell drug assets, today announces it has partnered with BenevolentAI (“BenevolentAI” or the “Company”) (Euronext Amsterdam: BAI), a leading AI-enabled drug discovery and development company. The partnership aims to leverage BenevolentAI's AI-enabled technology to support decision-making related to indication expansion and drug repurposing for assets within the 9xchange platform.
The 9xchange marketplace is a curated, members-only biopharma marketplace that matches asset buyers and sellers and removes friction by anonymizing, automating and enhancing many steps required to get a deal done. CEO and Founder Anat Naschitz also co-founded and co-led OrbiMed Israel, where she built companies such as pharma spinout 89bio (Nasdaq:ETNB).
The power of BenevolentAI’s AI technologies will help 9xchange marketplace members, including biotech and pharma partners, VCs, investors, and select academic institutions, to investigate hypotheses on potential new indications for a given asset and ultimately transact based on these findings. By combining BenevolentAI's proven AI-enabled engine with the 9xchange platform, the partnership aims to uncover untapped potential in therapeutic portfolios, create new opportunities for drug discovery and pave the way for developing new treatments with unforeseen partners. BenevolentAI will provide insights related to the potential for repurposability and indication expansion of assets on the 9xchange platform, utilising an enhanced version of the workflows that helped identify baricitinib as a treatment for COVID-19 in early 2020.
Anat Naschitz, CEO & Co-Founder at 9xchange, said: "There is demonstrable value in deploying new scientific insights against existing, de-risked assets and bringing them to patients quickly and safely. Often, and increasingly given current markets, the right therapy is languishing on the shelf of biotech and pharma companies whose focus has shifted, or whose resources are insufficient to finance rich pipelines built when capital was abundant. As an investor and entrepreneur, I have experienced the inefficiency of finding the right match and completing a transaction. 9xchange was created to address all that and more. We are thrilled to partner with BenevolentAI, whose technology and capable team expand the solution space by adding repurposing insights, multiplying matches and value.”
Matt Fujisawa, SVP of Strategy, BenevolentAI, said: “Many drugs have failed in one area, but have the potential to work in other indications in a safe and efficacious way. This partnership unleashes this potential in the discovery of new therapeutic applications. By combining BeneolentAI’s powerful AI technology with the 9xchange platform, asset owners unlock trapped value while buyers acquire assets with newly-identified indications that were previously unknown or unexplored.”
About 9xchange
9xchange is a biopharma marketplace, unlocking the value of unloved, underfunded or hidden assets through a seamless, initially anonymous, online platform. 9xchange matches buyers and sellers who did not know they were mutually relevant and removes friction by automating or enhancing many of the steps required to get a deal done. Market dynamics often mean better terms. The curated, member-only platform includes leading pharma companies, prominent VCs, biotech companies and select academic institutions. 9xchange leverages decades of transaction and tech experience as well as the networks of its founders, across VC and company creation, and is grateful for and to its stellar advisory board composed of pharma industry leaders. Please visit us at
www.9xc.co.
About BenevolentAI
BenevolentAI (AMS:
Rep) is a leading AI-enabled drug discovery and development company listed on the Euronext Amsterdam stock exchange. Through the combined capabilities of this AI platform, its scientific expertise, and wet-lab facilities, BenevolentAI is well-positioned to deliver novel drug candidates with a higher probability of clinical success than those developed using traditional methods. The Benevolent Platform™ powers the Company’s in-house drug pipeline and supports successful collaborations with AstraZeneca, as well as leading research and charitable institutions. BenevolentAI is headquartered in London, with a research facility in Cambridge (UK) and a further office in New York.
Forward-looking Statements
This release may contain forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are statements that are not historical facts and may be identified by words such as "plans", "targets", "aims", "believes", "expects", "anticipates", "intends", "estimates", "will", "may", "should" and similar expressions. Forward-looking statements include statements regarding objectives, goals, strategies, outlook and growth prospects; future plans, events or performance and potential for future growth; economic outlook and industry trends; developments in BenevolentAI’s markets; the impact of regulatory initiatives; and/or the strength of BenevolentAI’s competitors. These forward-looking statements reflect, at the time made, BenevolentAI’s beliefs, intentions and current targets/aims. Forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties because they relate to events and depend on circumstances that may or may not occur in the future. The forward-looking statements in this release are based upon various assumptions based on, without limitation, management's examination of historical operating trends, data contained in BenevolentAI’s records, and third party data. Although BenevolentAI believes these assumptions were reasonable when made, these assumptions are inherently subject to significant known and unknown risks, uncertainties, contingencies and other important factors which are difficult or impossible to predict and are beyond BenevolentAI’s control. Forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance, and such risks, uncertainties, contingencies and other important factors could cause the actual outcomes and the results of operations, financial condition and liquidity of BenevolentAI or the industry to differ materially from those results expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. The forward-looking statements speak only as of the date of this release. No representation or warranty is made that any of these forward-looking statements or forecasts will come to pass or that any forecast result will be achieved.