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Search and analyze
February 2011
EDIT CONNECT
SHARING OPTIONS:
BUDAPEST, Hungary—The IP Solutions business of Thomson
Reuters has forged a strategic partnership with ChemAxon in which Thomson
Reuters will provide its chemical IP Data Feeds, Markush Structures and patent
data to users of ChemAxon's JChem
chemical software platform.
According to the companies, this search and analysis
solution will speed
drug discovery and allow life science researchers to easily
integrate critical content into their existing systems and workflows.
The Markush structures from London-based Thomson Reuters are
part of the company's Derwent World Patents Index database, a source
of global
patent information. According to Cindy Poulos, vice president of product
management for Thomson Reuters, the
collaboration makes sense because it pairs
"ChemAxon, a leader in cheminformatics software for the life science industry,
and Thomson Reuters Derwent
World Patents Index. Our offerings are
complementary and we share the same goal: to make the workflow of R&D
professionals in the life sciences
industry more efficient."
According to Poulos, the Markush database contains essential
data on the
relationship or "families" of 550,000 patents, making it a leading
source for life sciences patentability research, competitive intelligence and
IP
screening. As a products/service company serving the industry, for
ChemAxon there are many advantages to Markush
structures, which have
historically been poorly supported by informatics vendors and content holders compared
to other chemical structures. As a
result, there is significant potential to
bring value. As a centrally deployed toolkit, Markush can be deployed easily
and because the features are
added to existing end user GUI, such as
MarvinSketch chemical editor, the users can easily pick up Markush capability
without learning a new chemical
editor or requiring a new environment to be
created and deployed. This also allows system architects to build workflows
using other functionality to
automate works with Markush structures.
Moreover, Markush structures play a central part in chemical
IP/patent
processes and the patent is the primary method of protecting the
investment in R&D. Scientifically, storing and manipulating Markush
structures
represents an interesting and valuable unsolved problem in life
sciences informatics. Solving complex structure issues also suggests a strong
capability with "standard" (non Markush) chemical structures.
According to ChemAxon, this fits well with the company
's
other offerings, discovery platform toolkits and desktop discovery
applications, which are working chemical (not Markush) structures.
ChemAxon's JChem software allows life science professionals
to structure and visualize chemical compounds for
property prediction, virtual synthesis,
screening and drug design. Through the partnership R&D end users can now
research and analyze Markush
structures using ChemAxon's JChem chemical
software platform, a means they had no access to before. The ability to quickly
retrieve this information
will now allow R&D end users to save time and
capitalize on R&D investment.
"The Markush
partnership is a result of pull from the users
and push from Thomson Reuters and is proving to be very attractive and relevant
by filling gaps in the
automation, of discovery IP," says Alex Driver, CEO of
ChemAxon. "Long-term, we feel this technology and content will grow in
relevance and usage as
researchers and IP specialists realize the potential of
the technology and ChemAxon and Thomson Reuters respond with features."
According to Poulos, the ability to search and visualize
complex chemical patents is critical to the work of life science
research and
development professionals.
"To date, however, this has been a challenge, as there
wasn't a tool that enabled R&D end users to do this type of work
themselves," she says. "Thomson Reuters and ChemAxon are making a comprehensive
worldwide database of chemical compounds widely accessible in a user-friendly,
flexible format to end users."
Based in Budapest, Hungary, ChemAxon is a leader in
providing cheminformatics software development platforms and applications for
the
biotechnology, pharmaceutical and agrochemical industries. ChemAxon officials said in a statement that Thomson
Reuters
made the right partner for this collaboration because of the quality and extent
of its content. The company is well positioned within the
market with a quality
brand and organization.
ChemAxon users will acquire access to TR Markush structure
content and separately license ChemAxon technology to enable import and use of
the content. ChemAxon will apply TR content purely for development of
the
features and performance of the technology to improve things going forward. Driver says the Markush structures
database has "become a
vital backbone of pharmaceutical research in the digital age."
"By
delivering this data directly to the end user in an
intuitive, flexible format, our clients have access to the functionality and
data necessary to stay
competitive in today's fast-paced, complex marketplace,"
he says.
Poulos says the collaboration is already
proving to be
successful as "leading companies are already implementing it throughout their
organizations, giving R&D end users access to chemical
structures. The
ongoing success of our partnership will be evidenced by the broadest base of
R&D professionals being enabled to access this data
and speed drug
discovery."
Code: E021110 Back |
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