Alivexis, Inc. (Headquartered in Minato-ku, Tokyo; CEO S. Roy Kimura) is pleased to announce that it has entered into a Research Collaboration Agreement with Astellas Pharma Inc. (“Astellas”), representing the second collaboration program between the two companies. It follows the initial collaboration launched in June 2024, under which Astellas exercised its option in September 2025 to obtain rights to the research outcomes.

The collaboration aims to utilize Alivexis’ computational drug discovery platform, including ModBind™, to discover new small molecule compounds which will regulate the function of a novel drug target molecule selected by Astellas. In addition to in silico evaluation using the computational drug discovery platform, Alivexis will be responsible for integrated drug discovery research, including the development of experimental assays and compound evaluation using those assays. Under the terms of the collaboration, Astellas will have the option to acquire rights to the research deliverables.

About ModBind™.
ModBind™ is a proprietary physics-based simulation technology developed by Alivexis that enables high-speed, highly accurate prediction of absolute binding strength between small molecule compounds and target proteins, without the need for experimentally-derived biological activity data. Leveraging ModBind™ along with other platform technologies, we have already advanced five compounds to clinical candidate status. MDI-0151 program resulted in a licensing agreement with a Swiss company in June 2024, valued at approximately 42.5 billion yen, demonstrating the practical and commercial utility of our technology. In addition, we have conducted multiple joint research projects with pharmaceutical companies, with ModBind™ serving as the core technology in these collaborations.
In addition, we were selected for the third round of the “GENIAC (Generative AI Accelerator Challenge)” program, a project led by the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) and the New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO) which aims to strengthen domestic development capabilities in generative AI. By integrating ModBind™ with AI training, we aim to build and implement a generative AI foundation model for drug discovery that predicts the biological activity of small-molecule compounds with world-leading accuracy. In addition, the company is advancing collaborative research with pharmaceutical companies utilizing these platform technologies and has already generated multiple outcomes.

【CEO S. Roy Kimura’s Comments】
“I am excited to announce the signing of a second drug discovery collaboration with Astellas focused on the use of our proprietary and ground-breaking ModBind™ simulation technology to accelerate early drug discovery for a selected disease target. Through our collaboration, we look forward to gaining further validation of our technology while contributing to the discovery of novel clinical candidate compounds for diseases with significant unmet medical needs.”

Alivexis and Astellas Pharma Inc. to Collaborate on Novel Drug Target(PDF)