Drug Discovery

Drug discovery is a high-cost, risky business because only a fraction of the therapeutic targets selected for study will actually yield products that achieve regulatory approval by the Food & Drug Administration (FDA). The average drug can take 10+ years to progress from the discovery phase to the clinic, with only one compound out of 10,000 evolving into a viable product. Need for discovery is driven by the need for new products to market and sell.

The number of new pharmaceuticals introduced to the market has dropped precipitously in recent years but has been on a downward trend for over a decade. At a time when basic biomedical knowledge is increasing exponentially, the gap between bench discovery and new pharmaceuticals appears to be expanding.

Through outsourcing portions of their drug discovery programs, many pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies have found an effective cost-cutting strategy that can also improve the hit-to-lead conversion and early identification of unsuccessful compounds. In view of the fact that outsourcing can accelerate the drug discovery process, the business of contract drug discovery has evolved from providing low-end research services to more value-added high-end research.