Our discovery team has been working with several interesting drug targets during the last two years, with the aim to select a new preclinical program. It is exiting to be able nominate PKCtheta and to leverage experiences and successes from Aqilion’s other preclinical and clinical kinase inhibitor programs
It is very pleasing and strategically important that we have appointed Gustaf as the new CFO. He will bring broad and relevant experience and expertise to enhance the Aqilion’s finance function and contribute to the company's future financing. At the same time, I would like to take the opportunity to thank Torgeir Vaage for his contributions to the company over many years.
We thank our shareholders for their support. The capital injection will primarily be used for our early research projects with focus on new innovative treatments for chronic inflammatory diseases where there is a pronounced medical need, but only few or no treatments
With our new Scientific Advisory Board, three internationally renowned scientists are joining our team as advisors. Both their outstanding scientific and clinical expertise and an active network of researchers in EoE will be invaluable for Aqilion
We are delighted and proud to announce this collaboration with Merck as it validates our business strategy of generating highly innovative discovery projects in combination with pro-active business development and early deal-making. We are looking forward to working with Merck as this will speed up the process of bringing novel effective treatments to conditions with high unmet medical needs.