FRONTEO Inc. (Head office: Minato-ku, Tokyo; President and CEO: Masahiro Morimoto; hereinafter referred to as FRONTEO) and Daiichi Sankyo Co., Ltd. (Head office: Chuo-ku, Tokyo; President and COO: Hiroyuki Okuzawa; hereinafter referred to as Daiichi Sankyo) have announced that they have jointly developed Drug Discovery AI Factory (hereinafter referred to as DDAIF).^*We are pleased to announce that we have signed a contract to utilize this service to analyze toxicity test databases and toxicity test report text information.

Under this agreement, FRONTEO will support the introduction of a system that allows Daiichi Sankyo to easily check toxicity interpretations on its current toxicity test database, and the construction of a discovery AI system that supports the discovery of new knowledge and ideas through the analysis of toxicity test reports.

* An AI drug discovery support service in which FRONTEO's drug discovery experts, who are well versed in AI and drug discovery, utilize the natural language processing technology and unique analysis methods of the company's specialized AI "KIBIT" to search for target molecules and indications and provide supporting hypotheses.

The system uses KIBIT to analyze the text information of the vast amount of toxicity test reports that Daiichi Sankyo owns or will accumulate in the future, as well as the paper information published in PubMed, and presents the relationships between the toxicity test report of interest and conceptually similar academic papers and toxicity test reports in the form of maps or lists that can be understood comprehensively and visually.

Based on this information, it will be possible to identify previously unanticipated relationships and trends in toxicity information, which will enable the generation of hypotheses about new mechanisms of toxicity, potentially facilitating drug discovery that is not limited by conventional ideas.

figure:KIBIT converts papers and reports into vectors (numerical values) of several hundred dimensions, compresses them into two dimensions, and plots them on a vector plane. Because conceptually similar papers and reports are distributed in close proximity, it is possible to get a bird's-eye view of the relationships between information, and discover similarities and relationships between toxicity test reports and papers that would not be noticed with conventional approaches.

In recent years, research into technology and methodologies for efficiently accessing the information researchers are looking for from the vast amount of literature information has progressed, but the reality is that new discoveries from known literature information still depend on the researcher's own imagination and chance. FRONTEO will develop DDAIF using KIBIT, which makes it scientifically and systematically possible to discover unknown associations that have not been described from known literature information, and contribute to innovative research and development in pharmaceutical companies.

■ About FRONTEO　URL:https://www.fronteo.com/
FRONTEO supports the judgment of experts in various fields who face social issues day and night through the provision of its proprietary specialized AI "KIBIT," and creates the starting point for innovation. Unlike general-purpose AI, our proprietary natural language processing technology (patented in Japan and the United States) enables high-speed and high-precision analysis without relying on the amount of training data or computing power. In addition, by utilizing patented technology that maps (visualizes the structure) the analyzed information, "KIBIT" can directly influence the insights of experts, and in recent years, KIBIT's technology has also been used in hypothesis generation and target discovery in drug discovery.
Through KIBIT's unique technology and approach, we aim to realize the philosophy of "providing solutions that do not overlook risks and opportunities buried in records, and realizing fairness in the information society." We are promoting social implementation in various fields of legal tech AI.
Founded in August 2003, listed on TSE Mothers (currently TSE Growth) on June 8, 2007. The company operates in Japan, the United States, South Korea, and Taiwan. Obtained a first-class medical device manufacturing and sales business license and registered a controlled medical device sales business. Capital: 6 yen (as of March 26, 898,618).

*FRONTEO, KIBIT, and Drug Discovery AI Factory are registered trademarks of FRONTEO in Japan.