Overview

To succeed, biotechs must leverage the competitive edge their unique platform, novel modality, or deep expertise in a scientific pathway offers. Biotechs put together an initial portfolio of drug discovery projects (aka targets) to get started. However, they need to periodically refine to improve their probability of success. Often this means picking targets with lower risk, especially around their biological validation. They also need to select protein targets that align with their strategy and financing. The target selection must also assess genetics, target history, 35 million publications, genomics, clinical trials, and druggability. Although the biotech team typically possesses expertise in the platform or the therapy area, it often lacks the ability to truly leverage its competitive edge.

At BioInfi we have 25+ years of pharmaceutical experience in strategic advising, target selection, indication positioning, and drug repurposing. We help biotechs and pharma groups optimize their portfolio to deliver much-needed medicines to patients. We also advise on selecting project likely to get the next round of funding or a pharma partnership by examining the competitive landscape and industry trends.

We offer a biomedical recruiting solution to find the best candidates based on data analytics for any biomedical job opening. This includes full-time scientific staff, C-Suite executives, advisors, consultants, and board members. This is based on analyzing publications, citations, clinical trials, author seniority, industrial experience, medical school, and Medicare data to find the true expert in any area. It is perhaps the best way to be DEI-compliant (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) as it is purely data-driven.

We partner with   TCS logo and Strand Life Sciences.

Target ID and Repurposing Consultative Solution: TaRCoS

Why target selection is important
Biotech success depends on its portfolio of drug discovery programs. We find that the project selection can often be improved to reduce risk and reach critical go/no-go decisions sooner. We follow a multi-stage process:

These early decisions are crucial to your success and will increase your ROI significantly. Our recommendations are collaborative and we are confident that when you see them they will seem both obvious and yet invaluable.

TaRCoS Process
Salient features:

TaRCoS Data
Please email us to initiate a discussion. We are available to present a seminar on our approach.

Conclusion TaRCoS

The TaRCoS approach is backed by our numerous publications in high-impact journals. We have extensive experience with a variety of techniques and data types. We carefully select the most effective methods and data sources to use in each project. Our published work demonstrates the success of our approach. We are committed to staying current with the latest state-of-the-art methods in order to provide the best possible service to our clients.

Key publications spanning multiple techniques and data types used in TaRCoS:
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  1. Connectivity Map, Indication Expansion, Validation: Reisdorf W., , Agarwal P. Preclinical evaluation of EPHX2 inhibition as a novel treatment for inflammatory bowel disease. PLoS One. 2019 Apr 19;14(4):e0215033.
  2. AI, Strategy, OpinionVijayan V, Rouillard A, Rajpal D, Agarwal P. Could Artificial Intelligence provide the new paradigm for data integration in drug discovery? Expert Opin Drug Discov. 2019.
  3. Machine Learning, Expression: Rouillard A, Hurle MR, Agarwal P. Systematic interrogation of diverse Omic data reveals interpretable, robust, and generalizable transcriptomic features of clinically successful therapeutic targets. PLoS Computational Biology 2018: 14 (5), e1006142.
  4. Networks, Pitfalls: Ji X, Freudenberg J, Agarwal P. Integrating biological networks for drug target prediction and prioritization. Methods Mol Biol. 2019; 1903:203-218.
  5. AI, Pitfalls: Yao J, Hurle MR, Nelson MR, Agarwal P. Predicting clinically promising therapeutic hypotheses using tensor factorization. BMC Bioinformatics. 2019: 20:69.
  6. Genetics, Pathways: Jhamb D, Magid-Slav M, Hurle M, Agarwal P. Pathway analysis of GWAS loci identifies novel drug targets and repurposing opportunities. Drug Discovery Today 24 (6), 1232-1236.
  7. Indication Expansion, Validation: Middleton SA, …, Agarwal P, Kumar V. BET Inhibition Improves NASH and Liver Fibrosis. Sci Rep. 201; 8: 17257.
  8. Open Targets: Khaladkar M, Koscielny G, Hasan S, Agarwal P, Dunham I, Rajpal D, Sanseau P. Uncovering novel repositioning opportunities using the Open Targets platform. Drug Discov Today. 2017 Dec;22(12):1800-1807.
  9. Public data, Strategy, Opinion: Reisdorf WC, Chhugani N, Sanseau P, Agarwal P. Harnessing public domain data to discover and validate therapeutic targets. Expert Opin Drug Discov. 2017 Jul;12(7):687-693.
  10. Genetics, Strategy: Hurle MR, Nelson MR, Agarwal P, Cardon LR. Trial watch: Impact of genetically supported target selection on R&D productivity. Nat Rev Drug Discov. 2016: 15 (9), 596-7.
  11. Strategy, Novelty: P. Agarwal, P. Sanseau, L.R. Cardon. Novelty in the target landscape of the pharmaceutical industry. Nat Rev Drug Discov. 2013 Aug;12(8):575-6. doi: 10.1038/nrd4089.
  12. Review, Methodology: M.R. Hurle, L. Yang, D.K. Rajpal, P. Sanseau, P. Agarwal. Computational drug repositioning: from data to therapeutics. Clin Pharmacol Ther. 2013 Apr;93(4):335-41.
  13. Genetics, Indication Expansion: P. Sanseau, P. Agarwal, M.R. Barnes, T. Pastinen, J.B. Richards, L.R. Cardon, V. Mooser. Use of Genome-Wide Association Studies for Drug Repositioning. Nat. Biotech. 2012 Apr 10;30(4):317-20.
  14. Clinical, Indication Expansion: L. Yang, P. Agarwal. Systematic Drug Repositioning based on Clinical Side-Effects. PLoS One. 2011;6(12):e28025.
  15. EHRs, Indication Expansion: L.Yao, Y. Zhang, Y. Li, P. Sanseau, P. Agarwal. Electronic health records: Implications for drug discovery. Drug Discov Today. 2011 Jul;16(13-14):594-9.

Complete publication list: PubMed, Google Scholar
 
Other services offered include:
  1. Indication evaluation and expansion for your (pre)clinical asset.
  2. Evaluation of molecular biomarkers for an indication.
  3. Pharmacodynamic biomarkers for your drug.
  4. Recruiting the impossible to find scientist or physician based on their science.
Each of these is supported by proprietary data builds, analytics, and consulting to provide clean solutions to biotech challenges. We specialize in non-oncology indications and rare diseases.

Business Model

Our business model offers flexible, flat-fee pricing based on your specific objectives. With decades of industry experience across a wide range of diseases, platforms, and therapeutic modalities, we are well-equipped to provide actionable guidance for your project. We offer risk-sharing option with milestone driven payments.

Our comprehensive service includes:

AI-based Healthcare Experts and Physician Recruiting

FindExpertMD Recruiting
Human capital is an important element for healthcare and drug discovery. Surprisingly, there are few resources that connect medical and scientific talent to patients, drug discoverers, and biotechs. We have developed two solutions:
  1. FindExpertMD (https://FindExpertMD.com) enables patients, doctors, and scientists to rapidly identify medical experts based on objective scientific publications, clinical trials, Medicare ratings, payments from corporations, and funding data.
  2. We have a data-driven solution to biomedical recruitment that will connect you by email with impossible to find specialized physicians. Email us to discuss your job descriptions from attending physicians to Department Heads. We will provide you a competitive edge in finding doctors with high-degree of expertise, response rate, and with ties to the region. See testimonial below. The same technology works across all biomedical jobs that require scientific innovation.

    "Having an open search continue for months, is both defeating and concerning. After having tried all known industry sourcing tactics, I stumbled upon FindExpertMD. After a reach out via e-mail, we made a connection and brainstormed ideas to use the expertise of FindExpertMD to help source this unique candidate needed for our health system to provide much-needed access to care. The collaborative and open nature of FindExpertMD was both appreciated and valued. We devised a game plan, crafted appropriate messaging with a dedicated landing page, and hoped for the best. The fact is, the result was better than expected with an unheard-of 35% click rate with all the needed analytics behind the email campaign. Just as important as the click-thru rate, we had multiple uses of the list created. This allowed us to send personalized and appropriate follow emails to our original. As an added bonus, physicians who were not interested in the opportunity because the timing wasn’t right for them, engaged with us providing us with valuable feedback about the opportunity. I am excited to continue this new partnership with FindExpertMD to fill more open positions and provide access to care to the patients we are privileged to serve."
    ...Senior Director, Physician Recruitment


These solutions leverage and vastly expand on the technologies we published:
  1. P. Agarwal, D.B Searls. Can Literature Analysis Identify Innovation Drivers in Drug Discovery? Nat Rev Drug Discov. 2009 Nov;8(11):865-78.
  2. P. Agarwal, D.B Searls. Literature Mining in Support of Drug Discovery. Brief Bioinform. 2008; doi: 10.1093/bib/bbn035.

About Us

Pankaj Agarwal: Founder, BioInfi

The principal, Dr. Pankaj Agarwal, has 25+ years strategic and tactical experience utilizing bioinformatics to enable drug discovery and create pipeline value. He has collaborated extensively with numerous pharmaceutical project teams, academic/biotech partners, and top informatics talent. Dr. Agarwal has 50+ publications in top journals, including Nature Rev Drug Discovery, Nature Biotechnology, and Clinical Pharmacology & Therapeutics, and multiple methodological and gene patents. In 2016, he was among a group of select few scientists appointed as Senior Fellows at GSK. Dr. Agarwal has also served on NSF, NIH, FDA and PhRMA panels. He possesses a B.Tech. in Computer Science & Engineering from IIT, Delhi and a Ph.D. in Computer Science from the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences at NYU. He is a founder and senior member of the International Society for Computational Biology (ISCB). Most importantly, Dr. Agarwal is passionate about drug discovery, rare diseases, and helping patients.

Our engagements at BioInfi include:

  1. Strategy evaluation, platform assessment, and portfolio recommendations for an innovative biotech with target degrading antibodies.
  2. Genomics strategy for orthologs and human genetics based targets for a genomics platform biotech.
  3. Recruitment for a Neurologists, Cardiologists, Executive Directors, and OBGYNs for a hospital group.
  4. Recruitment for a Department Head for Stem Cell Transplants in Oncology for a large regional hospital.
  5. Multiple due dilligences on AI drug discovery companies on the behest of the Gates Foundation, Investment Companies, and Biotechs.
  6. Target identification for a series B startup.
  7. Indication Expansion for a clinical asset for a biotech
  8. Strategic plan for a disease area for mid-size pharma (including targets, biomarkers, clinical discovery and repurposing)
  9. Medical recruitment for an hospital (identifying specialized medical experts and contact protocol design)
  10. Strategic evaluation and alignment of a biomarker application
  11. Advice and Implementation of Recommended UTI Antbiotics based on RT-PCR assays
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Dr. Agarwal's projects and accomplishments during his tenure at GSK include:

  1. Led numerous target identification projects using the best-in-class tools with clear actionable shortlist of targets. Collaborated with bioinformaticians, disease biologists, and phenotypic screening experts on these projects.
  2. Led an internal biotech for repurposing: Systematic Drug Repositioning (SyDR), which developed multiple computational techniques, assessed all internal pipeline molecules and experimentally validated the most promising hypotheses across 10+ disease areas.
  3. Analyzed the potential for setting up a rare disease unit within GSK and identified the seed portfolio of repurposing and target opportunties.
  4. Collaborated with multiple disease areas on due diligences, in-licensing, and suitable target identification using multiple drug modalities.
  5. Identified and actioned six rare to common drug targets based on agnostic evaluation of their genetics, biology, literature, and druggability.
  6. Led a comprehensive evaluation of targets for gene therapy.
  7. Led the training of the Bioinformatics team in deep learning and AI. Within a month, the team was using sophisticated Tensorflow methods directly on drug discovery projects. A team member discovered that phase 3 target success could be predicted using an Autoencoder on GTEx data.
  8. Collaborated on a machine learning project to predict oncology response biomarkers and combinations for pipeline and marketed drugs.
  9. Comprehensively discovered and patented numerous gene targets first from ESTs and then the human genome using automated overnight computes. This was enabled by extensive collaborations with top gene-finding experts and joint publications.
  10. Invented and patented the first gene set enrichment method and extended it to work across multiple genetic loci from the precursor to GWAS studies. Established a comprehensive collection of gene sets across public domain and private data.
  11. Developed the largest collection of protein interaction data through licenses with early providers establishing a large biomedical knowledge graph. Co-built and published a network algorithm to mine it.
  12. Led the design and development of a comprehensive portal and toolkit with over a 1000 internal pharmaceutical users with gene, disease and Omic tools.
  13. Led the comprehensive analysis of scientific innovation in disease areas for the Head of R&D. The results of this project were used to scientifically redesign R&D. Selected results were published in Nature Reviews Drug Discovery.
  14. The above project included a strategy for identifying KOLs and potential hires in each area as well as an in-licensing analysis and strategy.

Publications: PubMed, Google Scholar