In October 2016, Deerfield, along with esteemed partners Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, The Rockefeller University, Weill Cornell Medicine, Takeda Pharmaceuticals, and Bay City Capital together launched Bridge Medicines, a new company that will advance healthcare by transitioning academic research projects into IND-ready drug candidates.
The model for Bridge is like no other. It builds upon the existing Tri-Institutional Therapeutics Discovery Institute (Tri-I TDI) from the aforementioned academic institutions, which pools early-stage drug discovery projects among the three members and helps facilitate required pre-clinical work to validate those projects. Now, Tri-I TDI projects can graduate to Bridge, which is responsible for their clinical development.
Drug development has evolved from a drug in search of a disease to instead a disease in search of the right targeted therapy, where even pre-clinical studies can have implications for ultimate commercial viability and success. Accordingly, a challenge for Tri-I TDI has been how to take their potential drug candidates and put them through the full range of IND-enabling and proof-of-concept studies. Complexities include the determination of what studies are necessary, which can vary according to molecule and therapeutic area(s), financially supporting those studies, and creating the right infrastructure around that when appropriate.
Deerfield, through its deep bench of investment professionals and Institute experts, has the ability to address Tri-I TDI’s concerns and to determine the correct studies necessary, as well as the desire and incentive to help manage that development process over a longer timeline to see Bridge projects through to successful outcomes. Often this kind of expertise is either completely absent for nascent projects, or comes in the form of a one-time competitive asses