Nuformix’s CEO, Dan Gooding, explains “The virtues of lean and mean virtual pharma are well documented and have served us well, but more recently Nuformix has achieved major success taking R&D in-house. We’re able to operate both reactively and proactively when needed with increased speed and at a lower cost than working exclusively through partners. This increased autonomy has had an immediate impact on the value of our company and I’m excited to see how increasing this activity continues to impact our ability to develop new products over the next 6 months”.

CTO, Dr Joanne Holland adds “Focussing our in-house resources onto critical path R&D problems has been a great success. Whereas we will always need some degree of external support, I believe we have the right approach to broadening the scope of our future internal activity and that we will see the benefits of increased in-house efforts sooner rather than later”.

Costly synthesis and formulation requirements combine to make it one of the world’s most expensive drugs. However, Nuformix have successfully reengineered NX017’s solid form to significantly enhance key physical properties.

Such advances can increase bioavailability, enable standard formulation or an alternative release profile, all of which will be crucial for a fast growing and high-cost drug. Nuformix is currently seeking partners to further develop its product portfolio, of which NX017 is the latest validated addition.

NX006 is a leading treatment in pain management with annual sales exceeding £340m in 2009. However, patients treated using the currently marketed form require a high daily dosage of over 3000 mg of this very low solubility API.

In-vivo testing of the new solid forms of NX006 created by Nuformix demonstrate an increase of up to 220% in bioavailability. Across the range of forms studied, the results conclusively demonstrate that dramatic reductions in patient dosage are achievable, as are improved release profiles and more cost-effective manufacturing.

These options are made possible by Nuformix simply via re-engineering of the solid form and were expected following significant physical property changes when compared to the parent compound.

Nuformix have therefore completed critical steps in its strategy to discover, scale-up and validate vastly improved forms of currently marketed drug products and is currently seeking collaborative partnerships to enable market approval of this product.

With current annual sales growing to over £240m in 2009, NX007 is currently in late stage clinical trials for numerous new indications. The novel solid forms of NX007, re-engineered by Nuformix, offer greatly increased bioavailability for this very poorly water soluble drug.

The existing year-on-year sales growth of NX007 and high likelihood of approval for important new indications combine to make this filing a critical step forward for Nuformix in delivering against it’s strategy. As with NX006, the NX007 patent application was conceived together with Jeffrey A. Lindeman at the firm J. A. Lindeman LLC.

NX006 is a leading muscle relaxant with annual sales exceeding £340m in 2009. The novel solid forms of NX006, re-engineered by Nuformix, offer new options in terms of achieving increased bioavailability of this highly insoluble drug.

The patent application was conceived together with Jeffrey A. Lindeman who is an esteemed Intellectual Property consultant and world renowned thought leader in the field of legal issues relating to pharmaceutical solid form at the firm J. A. Lindeman LLC.

Nuformix will immediately benefit from increased autonomy and flexibility across all stages of its product development process from discovery to characterisation and subsequent scale-up.

In addition, this additional funding will enable Nuformix to take its products further up the value chain, creating greater value by de-risking products for customers. Overall, GRD funding will enable a more rapid development plan that will deliver higher-value products than would have otherwise been possible.

Initial activities will focus on solid form optimisation studies across a range of current drugs identified as having sub-optimal performance as a result of poor solid form selection. It is expected that the funds raised will be sufficient to complete an extensive R&D programme in addition to product validation and out-licensing activities.

This first phase of Nuformix’s existence will validate the value of solid form in shortening product development cycles, reducing risk in product development and the creation of new opportunities in life cycle management and drug reprofiling.