14 January 2013 - Evotec, a company involved in the discovery and development of novel small molecule drugs, has reached a milestone in drug discovery collaboration with Ono Pharmaceutical, a Japan-based company primarily engaged in the manufacture and sale of pharmaceuticals, it is reported today.

The collaboration is aimed at the progression of a compound into pre-clinical development, which accelerates an agreed milestone payment to Evotec under the collaboration that was signed in March 2008.

According to the contract, Evotec merged high throughput screening and fragment-based drug discovery platform in identifying novel compounds active against a protease target.