ValiRx (AIM:VAL), an AIM-listed early-stage cancer therapeutics and women's health company, has concluded and terminated its evaluation agreement with the University of Dundee and its Drug Discovery Unit, after the technology under assessment failed to clear the bar set for licensing on pre-agreed terms.
The collaboration, first announced in February 2024 and extended in January 2025, involved mechanism of action studies led by Professor Cleo Bishop at Queen Mary University London, supported by a £50,000 grant from the Queen Mary University London Impact Fund.
ValiRx's own financial contribution was £9,000, supplemented by in-silico modelling and in-kind support from Inaphaea Biolabs.
Despite what the company described as progress on target deconvolution, the technology did not satisfy the strict criteria required for ValiRx to exercise its option at the close of the evaluation period.
Responsibility for maintaining the intellectual property now reverts to the Dundee Drug Discovery Unit and Queen Mary University.
The termination removes a potential pipeline asset from ValiRx's early-stage portfolio, with no financial penalty disclosed.
