September 14, 2020 – San Diego–based virtual reality (VR) startup Nanome, Inc. has today announced that it has entered into an agreement with Fujitsu to bring its signature product—an immersive scientific design and collaboration platform—to the Japanese market. The software is already used by more than 15 US-based biopharmaceutical companies, according to the company.
Nanome first launched its immersive real-time collaboration VR software platform for scientific discovery in 2015. The company states that its software environment helps to accelerate scientific decision making by allowing users to visualize, modify, and simulate biological and chemical compounds, facilitating effective communication of data and integrating with existing computational chemistry workflows.
“Our software enables the analysis of complicated structures in 3D space,” said Nanome COO, Keita Funakawa. “It can help gain insights into data that were not accessible using 2D tools.”
Starting this month, Fujitsu, a multinational information technology equipment and services company headquartered in Tokyo, Japan, will sell Nanome software licenses to Japanese pharmaceutical companies, placing Nanome in one of the largest markets in the world. The startup added that it hopes to be able to expand upon the partnership to address the needs of chemical engineering and materials science companies as well.
“The number of corporations in Japan using VR software is projected to more than double by 2025,” said Akihiko Harada of Fujitsu. “We were keen to partner with Nanome to bring this innovative platform to Japan. This partnership is right in line with our efforts to drive new value from cutting-edge digital technologies that not only transform the way we work and live, but contribute to solving global social challenges.”
According to Nanome, since the COVID-19 pandemic began late last year, the startup’s software has been used by researchers globally to evaluate the ability of antibody and small molecule drug candidates to bind the viral proteins. Nanome added that in June it became the first US-based company to join European Union government supercomputing efforts against SARS-CoV-2 by providing virtual reality headsets and access to its software for selected members of the Exscalate4Cov consortium.
“Our partnership with Fujitsu will enable us to provide real-time scientific collaboration tools to companies at the forefront of the fight against SARS-CoV-2,” said Steve McCloskey, CEO of Nanome. “By making it easy and intuitive for researchers to evaluate candidate molecules, we hope to help decrease the time it takes to get an effective drug to market and enable scientists to stay one step ahead.”
For more information on Nanome and its collaborative VR software platform, please visit the company’s website.
Video credit: Nanome / YouTube
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Sam is the Founder and Managing Editor of Auganix. With a background in research and report writing, he has been covering XR industry news for the past seven years.