BioAscent expands into US market, appoints Julian Abery to spearhead growth
New role builds on growing interest in BioAscent’s integrated discovery services
NEWHOUSE, UK (September 9th, 2019) – In order to support the growing demand for its integrated drug discovery services, BioAscent Discovery Limited (www.bioascent.com) has announced the appointment of Julian Abery as Director of Business Development, North America. Mr Abery joins the BioAscent team as a consultant to drive the company's continued growth into the expanding US market. Julian brings a wealth of knowledge and experience in the US-based pharma and biotech research market, having previously served in senior positions in both discovery services and instrumentation companies.
BioAscent offers a fully integrated range of drug discovery services, from biochemical and biophysical assay development and screening, to medicinal, synthetic and computational chemistry, as well as full compound management services and on-demand access to its Compound Cloud diversity library of 125k compounds. The company’s services reflect the strategic outlook of the industry, which continues to outsource more and more of its R & D. With growing investment in US biotech, US-based companies are also finding it increasingly difficult to hire talent1 - a further driver for the outsourcing of research. The UK has become a leading location for this outsourced research due to the quality of research, IP security, cost-effectiveness, and language. Commenting on his appointment, Mr Abery said: “While it can seem like a crowded field, what attracted me to the BioAscent role was the fact that it’s not just an integrated discovery services company, but the quality and credentials of the scientific team at BioAscent. In addition, almost uniquely BioAscent also offers compound management and on-site access to a large, diverse IP-free compound library as well, so even smaller biotechs can access ‘big pharma’ facilities easily and dependably.”
“Over the last 12-18 months we’ve seen a growing number of enquiries for our services from US-based clients,” said Paul Smith, BioAscent’s CEO. “While this follows the trend, what sets BioAscent apart is the percentage of enquiries that have become clients, which is significantly above the industry average. This ongoing period of really strong growth is based on our unique combination of scientific excellence, state-of-the-art facilities and range of services, and I’m really pleased to welcome Julian to the team to head up our US expansion.”
For more information, about BioAscent, visit https://www.bioascent.com/
References
- JLL Research Report: Life Sciences Outlook, US 2019.
Editor’s notes
BioAscent Discovery Ltd.
Founded in 2013, BioAscent is a leading provider of integrated drug discovery services based at the former Organon / Merck Sharpe and Dohme (MSD) R&D site in Newhouse, Scotland. Our drug discovery services include de novo assay development, target analysis and bespoke screening strategies, compound screening, medicinal and synthetic chemistry, computational chemistry and data management. Our team of expert scientists has experience of successfully working from assay development through to preclinical and clinical candidates across all biological target classes and major therapeutic indications. As part of its compound management service, BioAscent currently holds and manages over 1 million compounds for our customers, in both liquid and solid formats. Through the Compound Cloud service, the company provides rapid access to an IP-free library of ~125,000 lead like compounds in screening-ready format. Since 2013, the BioAscent team has been responsible for:
>100 biochemical and biophysical assays for drug discovery projects
>50 hit validation/characterisation projects
>30 hit-to-lead campaigns
>80,000 screening plates delivered to our global customers/partners