Hikma Ventures invests in Octave Bioscience, a precision care platform for Multiple Sclerosis and other neurodegenerative diseases

LONDON, July 26, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- Hikma Pharmaceuticals PLC (Hikma), the multinational pharmaceutical company, announces that its venture capital arm, Hikma Ventures, has invested in Octave Bioscience, the developer of a first-of-its-kind platform to accurately and objectively measure and help manage complex and high-cost neurodegenerative diseases, starting with multiple sclerosis (MS).

Founded by William Hagstrom, CEO, and Melinda Thomas, COO, Octave's multimodal precision care solution provides comprehensive, objective, and actionable insights that bring scientific clarity to the patient's disease over time.

"There is an immense unmet need within the MS space with outdated diagnostic tools, a lack of technological advancement, and limited support in addressing neurodegenerative diseases. Octave's precision care solution is creating a new paradigm, where physicians and patients have a holistic view of a patient, their disease activity, and the impact of treatments on their disease progression," said Lana Ghanem, Managing Director of Hikma Ventures. "By offering an end-to-end solution which optimizes and personalizes care, Octave is revolutionising the way MS is treated and managed. We're thrilled to support their important mission, which aligns with Hikma's role as a leading provider of MS treatments in the Middle East and North Africa."

"We appreciate Hikma Venture's thoughtful and collaborative approach in identifying and partnering with companies that have the potential to make a big impact in neurodegenerative diseases with novel digital health solutions," said William Hagstrom, Founder and CEO of Octave Bioscience. "We share a vision for how digital health can improve patient care and outcomes, and we're delighted that our partnership with Hikma will help bring our precision medicine solution to more MS patients and expand into other neurodegenerative diseases."

MS is globally considered to be an important disease area with an underserved population and high unmet need ranging from diagnostics to care management. The challenges of this disease have been devastating and visible through misdiagnosis, difficulties in monitoring disease progression and evaluating the prescribed medication's efficacy. This has also been reflected in high failure rates for MS R&D clinical trials, which have been notoriously difficult to conduct.

Octave Bioscience will use the proceeds to support their commercialization efforts in MS and to explore expansion opportunities into other neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson's and Alzheimer's.

About Hikma
(LSE: HIK) (NASDAQ Dubai: HIK) (OTC: HKMPY) (rated BBB-/stable S&P and BBB-/positive Fitch)
Hikma helps put better health within reach every day for millions of people around the world. For more than 40 years, we've been creating high-quality medicines and making them accessible to the people who need them. Headquartered in the UK, we are a global company with a local presence across the United States (US), the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) and Europe, and we use our unique insight and expertise to transform cutting-edge science into innovative solutions that transform people's lives. We're committed to our customers, and the people they care for, and by thinking creatively and acting practically, we provide them with a broad range of branded and non-branded generic medicines. Together, our 8,800 colleagues are helping to shape a healthier world that enriches all our communities. We are a leading licensing partner, and through our venture capital arm, are helping bring innovative health technologies to people around the world. For more information, please visit: www.hikma.com.

About Hikma Ventures 
Founded in August 2015, Hikma Ventures operates as the corporate venture capital arm of Hikma Pharmaceuticals. Hikma Ventures invests in global start-ups where Hikma's expertise can accelerate revenue growth and enhance value creation by providing ventures with access to the resources of a multinational pharmaceutical company. For more information, please visit www.hikmaventures.com.

About Octave
Octave was founded to deliver a fully-integrated precision care solution for multiple sclerosis as well as a full range of neurodegenerative diseases. The solution provides neurologists and their patients with quantitative, objective metrics to facilitate informed care and shared decision making to drive better patient outcomes.

Octave's Precision Care Solution is the first-of-its-kind that accurately and objectively measures, and helps manage, complex and high-cost neurodegenerative diseases, starting with multiple sclerosis. Octave developed the first and only multivariate blood test to measure MS disease activity, enhanced MRI analytics and protocols, and a digital clinical program with Octave MS care partners to provide continuity of care.

Provider: The solution provides neurologists with a longitudinal and holistic perspective of the patient along with comprehensive and actionable insights, enabling more confident and informed care decisions.

Payer: The integrated and multi-dimensional approach allows payers to reduce total cost of care by optimizing healthcare medications and utilization (hospitalizations, ER visits, MRIs, labs).

Pharma: Octave enables pharma to optimize the entire lifecycle of drug discovery & development as well as clinical trials and post marketing with real world evidence.

Through purposeful problem solving and innovative technologies, Octave's platform generates, analyzes and combines data to create a new paradigm of MS care, leading to improved patient outcomes.

SOURCE Hikma Pharmaceuticals USA Inc.