Evotec gets Gates Foundation grant to progress TB research

German biotech Evotec (EVT: Xetra) has entered into a five-year partnership with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to discover new treatment regimens that better address tuberculosis (TB), a severe global health burden and one of the leading causes of death due to infectious diseases worldwide.

The current standard treatment regimen for TB consists of a minimum of six months of treatment with four drugs administered under direct observation, but treatment is much longer when TB is drug resistant.

Evotec will receive a grant of approximately $ 23.8 million for a period of up to five years from the foundation. The main objective of the grant is to generate standardized, high-quality pre-clinical data to support novel regimen selection and development. The regimen should be safer, shorter in duration and more efficacious than the current standard of care. With this new grant from the Gates Foundation, Evotec has been selected once more as an essential partner for charities and foundations, such as CHDI, The Michael J Fox Foundation and the Mark Foundation, in their research and development efforts to address complex, rare and difficult diseases, the company noted.

"We are honored to join with The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to fight tuberculosis, one of the world's most deadly infectious diseases. With our contributions of industrialized, high quality infrastructure and innovative methodology, we are confident that this combined international effort is the best possible starting point to bring huge benefits to the large number of patients who suffer from TB around the globe," commented Evotec chief executive Dr Werner Lanthaler.