Sosei Heptares Receives Grant Funding from Wellcome to Advance the Development of Potent, Differentiated Oral Anti-Viral Small Molecules to Treat COVID-19

• Funding comes through the Covid-19 Therapeutics Accelerator, which was set up by Wellcome, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and Mastercard

TOKYO and CAMBRIDGE, United Kingdom, Dec. 7, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Sosei Group Corporation ("the Company"; TSE: 4565) today announced it has received grant funding from Wellcome, through the COVID-19 Therapeutics Accelerator. The funding will be used to advance the pre-clinical development of the Company's novel oral anti-viral small molecules targeting the main protease of SARS-CoV-2 (M^pro), an enzyme critical to SARS-CoV-2 replication, as potential treatments for COVID-19.

Sosei Heptares initiated its COVID-19 R&D program in April 2020 with the aim of applying its world-leading structure-based drug design capabilities to design drug candidates that selectively inhibit M^pro. The Company has also been leveraging the highly conserved structure of SARS-CoV-2 M^pro as a basis for the design of small molecules that could be effective against predicted future variants of SARS-CoV-2 and other related human viruses.  

The Company's most advanced candidate resulting from this program, SH-879, has demonstrated potent anti-viral activity against SARS-CoV-2 as well as potential for oral dosing and a differentiated profile from other anti-viral drugs for COVID-19 that are either approved or in late-stage development.

Sosei Heptares will deploy the funding from Wellcome to accelerate development of SH-879 and other potential candidates through preclinical studies, targeting the nomination of a single clinical candidate for human trials with a convenient dosing regime and the potential for use without the need for co-dosing with other anti-viral therapies.

This work is being supported by a Wellcome grant through the COVID-19 Therapeutics Accelerator. The COVID-19 Therapeutics Accelerator was launched in March 2020 by Wellcome, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and Mastercard, with additional funding from a range of donors to accelerate the development of COVID-19 therapeutics that address gaps in existing treatment research.

Miles Congreve, Chief Scientific Officer of Sosei Heptares, commented: "The past 18 months has seen incredible progress in the development of vaccines and therapeutics for COVID-19. We are very proud to be participating in this global effort and excited by our progress and the future potential of our own program to create an effective anti-viral agent that can be dosed as a single agent. The program will benefit from the significant additional funding received from Wellcome and we are delighted to have this prestigious organization as a partner in this endeavor."

Sosei Heptares acknowledges its collaborators on this program, including Syngene International, Domainex, Fidelta, o2h Discovery, Piramal, WuXi AppTec and the Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative (DNDi).

About Wellcome
Wellcome supports science to solve the urgent health challenges facing everyone. We support discovery research into life, health and wellbeing, and we're taking on three worldwide health challenges: mental health, global heating and infectious diseases.

About Sosei Heptares
We are an international biopharmaceutical group focused on the discovery and early development of new medicines originating from our proprietary GPCR-targeted StaR® technology and structure-based drug design platform capabilities. We are advancing a broad and deep pipeline of novel medicines across multiple therapeutic areas, including neurology, immunology, gastroenterology and inflammatory diseases.

We have established partnerships with some of the world's leading pharmaceutical companies and multiple emerging technology companies, including AbbVie, AstraZeneca, Biohaven, Genentech (Roche), GSK, Neurocrine Biosciences, Novartis, Pfizer and Takeda. Sosei Heptares is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan with corporate and R&D facilities in Cambridge, UK.

"Sosei Heptares" is the corporate brand and trademark of Sosei Group Corporation, which is listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange (ticker: 4565). Sosei, Heptares, the logo and StaR® are trademarks of Sosei Group companies.

For more information, please visit https://soseiheptares.com/
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Enquiries:

Sosei Heptares – Media and Investor Relations
Hironoshin Nomura, SVP Investor Relations and Corporate Strategy
+81 (0)3 6679 2178 | [email protected]

Shinichiro Nishishita, VP Investor Relations, Head of Regulatory Disclosures
+81 (0)3 5210 3399 | [email protected]

Citigate Dewe Rogerson (for Japanese Media)
Yas Fukuda
+81 (0)3 4360 9234 | [email protected]

MEDiSTRAVA Consulting (for International Media)
Mark Swallow, David Dible, Eleanor Perkin
+44 (0)20 7638 9571 | [email protected]

Forward-looking statements
This press release contains forward-looking statements, including statements about the discovery, development and commercialization of products. Various risks may cause Sosei Group Corporation's actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements, including: adverse results in clinical development programs; failure to obtain patent protection for inventions; commercial limitations imposed by patents owned or controlled by third parties; dependence upon strategic alliance partners to develop and commercialize products and services; difficulties or delays in obtaining regulatory approvals to market products and services resulting from development efforts; the requirement for substantial funding to conduct research and development and to expand commercialization activities; and product initiatives by competitors. As a result of these factors, prospective investors are cautioned not to rely on any forward-looking statements. We disclaim any intention or obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

SOURCE Sosei Heptares