NEW YORK, NY and SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO, CA -- EVQLV, Inc., an artificial intelligence-enabled technology company accelerating biologics discovery, announced today a collaboration with Twist Bioscience Corporation (NASDAQ: TWST), a company enabling customers to succeed through its offering of high-quality synthetic DNA using its silicon platform, to discover novel antibody-based therapies.
Under the terms of the co-development agreement, EVQLV will computationally generate and rapidly screen a large set of diverse antibody candidates to a specific target using its proprietary algorithms. The sequences of potential antibodies will then be submitted to Twist Bioscience for molecular synthesis, antibody expression, and functional analysis using its synthetic DNA platform.
“We were impressed with the creative and thoughtful approach the team at EVQLV has taken to antibody design using artificial intelligence and deep learning,” commented Aaron Sato, Ph.D., Chief Science Officer of Twist Biopharma, a division of Twist Bioscience. “This collaboration allows us to continue to expand the benefit of our synthetic DNA platform by manufacturing specific antibody therapies designed by computational modeling that potentially could have a better chance of success.”
Using an amino acid sequence as an input, EVQLV applies its proprietary AI-generated model of evolution. The model uses billions of public and proprietary data points, including sequence, structure, and biophysical properties to learn the patterns of human antibody formation against the target. This generates variants on a scale of 1-2 million per antibody chain in a process that takes less than 6 hours, a process that can take months in the laboratory. The sequences of the antibodies with the most chance of success will be sent to Twist Bioscience for manufacture and validation.
“Our AI is designed to allow us to quickly and intelligently design biologics, in this case therapeutic antibodies, with a lower risk of failure,” said Andrew Satz, CEO and co-founder of EVQLV. “Twist can then deploy its incredible technology to rapidly synthesize and validate those antibodies. This collaboration combines synthetic biology with computational biology and pushes the boundaries of sci-tech. By working with Twist, we can advance the fusion of science and tech and accelerate the design and development of healing.”
About EVQLV
EVQLV develops artificial intelligence, engineered with life science data and biological knowledge, to accelerate the speed at which biologic therapies reach patients. Comprised of experts in machine learning, molecular biology, computational biology, pharmacology, software engineering, antibody design, cloud computing, and preclinical/clinical development, EVQLV is on a mission to transform how healing reaches those in need.
Follow us on: LinkedIn | Twitter
About Twist Bioscience Corporation
Twist Bioscience is a leading and rapidly growing synthetic biology and genomics company that has developed a disruptive DNA synthesis platform to industrialize the engineering of biology. The core of the platform is a proprietary technology that pioneers a new method of manufacturing synthetic DNA by “writing” DNA on a silicon chip. Twist is leveraging its unique technology to manufacture a broad range of synthetic DNA-based products, including synthetic genes, tools for next-generation sequencing (NGS) preparation, and antibody libraries for drug discovery and development. Twist is also pursuing longer-term opportunities in digital data storage in DNA and biologics drug discovery. Twist makes products for use across many industries including healthcare, industrial chemicals, agriculture and academic research.
Follow us on: Twitter | Facebook | LinkedIn | YouTube
Legal Notice Regarding Forward-Looking Statements
This press release contains forward-looking statements. All statements other than statements of historical facts contained herein, including without limitation Twist’s ability to discover new antibody therapeutics together with EVQLV, are forward-looking statements reflecting the current beliefs and expectations of management made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties, and other important factors that may cause Twist Bioscience’s actual results, performance, or achievements to be materially different from any future results, performance, or achievements expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements. Such risks and uncertainties include, among others, the risks and uncertainties of the ability to attract new customers and retain and grow sales from existing customers; risks and uncertainties of rapidly changing technologies and extensive competition in synthetic biology could make the products Twist Bioscience is developing obsolete or non-competitive; uncertainties of the retention of a significant customer; risks of third party claims alleging infringement of patents and proprietary rights or seeking to invalidate Twist Bioscience’s patents or proprietary rights; and the risk that Twist Bioscience’s proprietary rights may be insufficient to protect its technologies. For a further description of the risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ from those expressed in these forward-looking statements, as well as risks relating to Twist Bioscience’s business in general, see Twist Bioscience’s risk factors set forth in Twist Bioscience’s Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q dated May 12, 2020. Any forward-looking statements contained in this press release speak only as of the date hereof, and Twist Bioscience specifically disclaims any obligation to update any forward-looking statement, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.
EVQLV Contact:
Andrew Satz
954-281-2799
info@evqlv.com
Twist Bioscience Contacts:
Investor Contact:
Maeve Conneighton, Argot Partners
212-600-1902
maeve@argotpartners.com
Media Contact:
Angela Bitting
925- 202-6211
media@twistbioscience.com