Synthematix Inc, a software and informatics provider for synthetic chemists, and Plexxikon Inc, a structure-based drug discovery company, have signed an agreement in which Plexxikon will incorporate Synthematix' proprietary Arthur technology as part of its drug discovery platform.

"Plexxikon's Scaffold-Based Drug Discovery platform enables the discovery of novel scaffolds that can be rapidly synthesized into drug leads for new targets, addressing the key bottleneck in drug discovery today with novel and efficient chemistry. Synthematix' unique Arthur technology will provide us with the ability to build, search and mine synthetic chemical reactions and procedures to enhance and fully utilize our synthetic chemistry capabilities quickly and efficiently," said Dr. Michael Milburn, senior vice president of research for Plexxikon. "This technology also provides our chemists with a comprehensive solution for efficiently organizing, maintaining and enabling chemistry on our unique scaffolds."

The agreement provides Plexxikon with access to Synthematix' Arthur family of products consisting of two major components: a chemist-friendly database of synthetic organic reactions and experimental conditions combined with a unique search engine, and a suite of modules to enter, analog, annotate and mine the database. Together, the Arthur products allow chemistry organizations to create and electronically mine their own databases of chemistry with proven experimental conditions for the first time.