Lab10x will accelerate the commercialisation of digital therapeutics and data-driven drug discovery, and is being launched in partnership with Sensyne Health and Evotec.
University of Oxford, its tech transfer office Oxford University Innovation (OUI) and venture fund Oxford Sciences Innovation today unveiled Lab10x, an initiative that will exploit artificial intelligence (AI) to commercialise digital health research.
Clinical AI technology developer Sensyne Health and drug discovery company Evotec fill out Lab10x’s backers. The program is being funded with £5m ($6.5m) for three years initially, though it was unclear who provided the capital.
Lab10x will accelerate drug discovery and development across therapeutic areas, with a view of applying resulting technologies to generate and analyse anonymised patient datasets that can improve pharmaceutical R&D and improve clinical outcomes.
Projects will be sourced by OUI and will be supported by an as-yet unnamed expert-in-residence from Sensyne Health.
Researchers will be able to tap into Sensyne’s clinical AI capabilities to drive the development of a proof of concept. Evotec will offer access to its drug discovery platforms and expertise.
Both corporates will be entitled to equity in any spinouts that emerge out of the Lab10x initiative, while Sensyne will additionally have the right to license intellectual property if it is not spun out.
Sensyne, Evotec and Oxford Sciences Innovation will have the right to co-invest in seed rounds of any resulting spinout. Sensyne and Evotec are exploring additional areas for collaboration.
Lab10x follows on from Lab282, a $16m initiative launched by Oxford with Evotec in 2016 to accelerate the commercialisation of biomedical research out of the university.
Matt Perkins, chief executive of Oxford University Innovation said: “Building on Lab282, the pioneering public-private drug discovery partnership model that has now been replicated around the world, Lab10x aims to combine the rapidly growing body of world-class research in data driven health innovation at Oxford with expertise, resources and an industry standard development framework for digital health innovations.
“Today’s announcement provides a solution to a significant unmet need that has the potential to maximise the global impact of Oxford’s research and expertise, leading to better healthcare technologies, disease insights, treatments and cures.”
