Oscotec (039200.KQ) CEO Yoon Tae-young will receive the Innovation Award from the Korean Society of Medicinal Chemistry in recognition of achievements in research, development and commercialization.
Oscotec said on the 30th that Yoon will receive the award on Oct. 1. The ceremony will take place at the society's second annual conference, held at Cheongju Osco.
The society's Innovation Award honors medicinal chemistry researchers who have contributed to industry development through creative technological innovation or product development in new drug discovery. Kim Yong-joo, chairman of Ligachem Biosciences, received the first Innovation Award last year. An Oscotec official said Yoon was recognized for "laying the groundwork for first-in-class innovative drug research and development in Korea, linking that work to multiple technology transfer deals and charting a direction for the Korean biotech industry."
Yoon will deliver an award lecture on Oct. 2, the day after the ceremony. In the lecture, he plans to share experience accumulated over the past 30 years at pharmaceutical and biotech companies in Korea and abroad, framed around the view that innovative drug development rests fundamentally on the process of validating mechanistic hypotheses about disease targets through proof of concept.
Oscotec has recently succeeded in advancing several drug candidates to the global commercialization stage. Before licensing out cevidoplenib, an autoimmune disease candidate, to Agios Pharmaceuticals of the United States in June, the company in March signed an exclusive global licensing option agreement with U.S.-based Yatiri Bio for denfivontinib, a candidate treatment for acute myeloid leukemia. Late last year, it licensed ADEL-Y01, an Alzheimer's disease candidate co-developed with ADEL since 2020, to global pharmaceutical company Sanofi.
"By successfully licensing out early-stage drug pipelines across a range of disease areas, Oscotec has earned recognition not only for its technology but also for its business development capabilities," Yoon said. "We will focus on developing first-in-class drugs, including treatments for fibrotic diseases and anticancer agents that overcome resistance, to build further results."
