IOTA Pharmaceuticals Ltd

IOTA Pharmaceuticals is a research-based SME, located in Cambridge, UK, devoted to pharmaceutical drug discovery and development. IOTA works in two therapeutic areas: 1) human cancer (with a focus on Glioblastoma); and 2) neglected parasitic diseases (focusing on Trypanosomiasis, Leishmaniasis, Schistosomiasis and Chagas Disease). IOTA research has centred on the roles that phosphodiesterases and protein kinases play in disease. They have a particular interest in the molecular mechanisms underlying drug resistance.

IOTA has world-leading expertise in early-stage drug discovery, especially in target-based drug discovery (TDD), fragment-based drug discovery (FBDD), high-throughput screening (HTS) and mechanism-informed phenotypic screening (MIPS). Two of IOTA’s Directors, as well as running drug discovery groups in pharma companies, have held senior management positions in large US (Californian) biotech companies.

Dr David Bailey

Dr David Bailey, CEO of IOTA, has expertise in company leadership (Pfizer, Incyte) and has been involved in structure-based drug design (De Novo Pharmaceuticals) and fragment-based approaches for many years. He has: co-authored 10 internal drug discovery Project Operating Plans for Pfizer; participated in the discovery of two billion-dollar drugs (Viagra & Fluconazole); managed three international biotech projects within Pfizer’s PfizerGen Initiative; chaired the UK Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC)'s Chemicals and Pharmaceuticals Directorate; represented Pfizer on the Biotechnology Committee of the UK Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry (ABPI); and participated in establishing a multi-billion-dollar biotech company in California.

Role in GENIALG

IOTA collaborates with other SMEs (e.g. in the Eurostars KINOMED programme, a partnership to develop combination therapies based on the use of FBDD in protein kinase drug design), and is currently involved in the FP7 programme PDE4NPD (Parasite-specific cyclic nucleotide phosphodiesterase inhibitors to target neglected parasitic diseases), where it provides drug design, chemical synthesis and compound screening expertise to a consortium of nine partners working on anti-parasitic drug discovery. Similar activities will be deployed in the GENIALG project. IOTA plays a role in WP4 (Seaweed biorefinery prototype design and implementation) and WP5 (Market validation and life-cycle analysis).