The R&D pharma company Accure Therapeutics, a member of CATALONIA.HEALTH, has received two grants totalling 1.6 million of dollars, $1.12M in grants awarded by The Michael J. Fox Foundation (MJFF) and $0.48M by the Luxembourg National Research Fund (FNR) for two separate development programs on its drug candidate ACT-02.
ACT-02 is a novel asset with disease-modifying potential, inhibiting Prolyl Endopeptidase (PREP), a promising but previously overlooked target in Parkinson’s disease (PD). The ACT-02 program is at an advanced preclinical stage, supported by comprehensive positive efficacy data in Parkinson’s in vivo models and a GLP (Good Laboratory Practice) toxicology and safety pharmacology data set.
The grant from MJFF will fund the project titled ‘ACT-02 as a disease-modifying therapy for Parkinson’s (MJFF-025939)’. This project is a collaboration between the Institute of Pharmacology, Toxicology and Pharmacy at Stiftung Tierärztliche Hochschule Hannover, and Accure Therapeutics. The funding will be used to finalize the preclinical activities required for completing investigational new drug (IND) studies, with a view to filing an application for a phase I IND study in 2026.
The grant from FNR will support the Transcend-PD project: ‘Pharmacological targeting of Prolyl Endopeptidase in human induced pluripotent stem cells-derived neurons for the development of precision medicine therapeutic strategies in Parkinson’s disease’. This project is a collaboration between the Luxembourg Centre for Systems Biomedicine (LCSB) Translational Neuroscience group, and Accure Therapeutics.
Laurent Nguyen, co-founder and CEO at Accure Therapeutics, said “We are grateful to MJFF and the FNR for their funding support of our ACT-02 asset as a potential therapy for people with PD. These two grants are significant steps forward for us and our academic partners in the development of our first-in-class drug candidate, ACT- 02, for Parkinson’s disease. Following the footprints of ACT-01 our first neuroprotective program which recently achieved positive phase II clinical trial results in neuro-ophthalmology, we aim with ACT-02 to develop a game changer drug to treat patients suffering from PD.”
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