Yungjin Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. (CEO & President Chae Joon Lee) announced on July 7 that it has concluded a research agreement between the Korea Drug Development Fund (KDDF, CEO Hyungsang Muk) for the development of Myc-overexpressing cancer cell targeted therapies using the CDK7 inhibitor.

The new drug development project is a national R&D project that supports drug development beyond the government departments and aims to build a business portfolio developing more than 10 global new drugs by 2020.

With the conclusion of this agreement, Yungjin Pharmaceutical has been awarded government subsidy for about 2 years for lead compound optimization, drug efficacy evaluation, clinical transition research, toxicity study, manufacturing process development and mass production for the development of CDK7 target anticancer drug.

Yungjin has secured the experience and capability to develop new drug, 'KL1333', a new in-house developed drug, that have been licensed to NeuroVive, a Swedish company specialized in mitochondrial diseases. Also, Yungjin intends to strengthen their new drug pipeline through open innovation and spontaneous in-house development.

Dr. Kwang-Ok Lee, the Director of R&D, said, "Previous studies on CDK7 target anticancer drugs have shown that the active substance is highly effective in inhibiting proliferation of Myc-overexpressing cancer cells, and related information will be presented at the upcoming American Association for Cancer Research (AACR 2019). We also hope to develop a competitive global anti-cancer drug through the support from KDDF. "