Seoul Bio Hub announced on the 9th that it held an awards ceremony for two bio/medical startups that were finally selected through the 'Korea AstraZeneca-Seoul Bio Hub Global Open Innovation Program'.
This program aims to help promising domestic biotech companies quickly achieve global standards by providing tailored R&D mentoring directly from field experts from global pharmaceutical companies, potential partners for future technology transfer and joint development. A total of 33 companies applied, and two were ultimately selected in the R&I and rare disease treatment areas and tissue-specific drug delivery technology areas.
AAVATAR Therapeutics (CEO Seung-hee Cho), selected in the drug delivery technology field, is a Seoul Bio Hub graduate developing gene therapies based on AAV capsid vectors, leveraging AI and large-scale biological data. Curogen (CEO Chang-woo Lee), selected in the R&I and rare disease treatment field, is developing autoimmune disease treatments in the form of small molecules and fusion proteins, and is preparing to enter the US clinical development stage this year. Curogen is also the first Korean company to recently attract investment from Gordon MD Global Investment, a US bio investment firm.
Selected companies will receive: customized R&D mentoring from AstraZeneca's global experts; one-year residency at the Seoul Bio Hub; and a research grant of 35 million won per company. Furthermore, companies seeking to reside at the AstraZeneca BioVenture Hub in Gothenburg, Sweden, will have opportunities to exchange resources with local researchers if selected.
The mentoring program will begin with a kickoff meeting in January 2026 and will run for approximately one year. It will be operated as a step-by-step program, including setting topics and reviewing performance tailored to each company's R&D needs and development stage.
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