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Centogene, Evotec Forge Drug-Discovery Alliance

NEW YORK (GenomeWeb) — German multiomics tools firm Centogene announced today that it has partnered with Evotec to discover and develop drugs for certain rare genetic diseases.

Under the terms of the strategic alliance, the companies will combine Evotec's induced pluripotent stem cell-based drug screening platform with Centogene's patient access and biomarker expertise to develop a high-throughput platform for evaluating novel small molecule treatments for rare hereditary metabolic diseases.

Additional terms were not disclosed.

"The identification and development of innovative small molecules to treat rare hereditary conditions is particularly challenging because of the absence of adequate cellular models and the general lack of specific biomarkers to monitor the different diseases," Centogene CEO Arndt Rolfs said in a statement. "With this innovative collaboration between Evotec and Centogene, we can accelerate the development of new drugs."

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