FRONTEO and Maruishi Pharmaceutical Enter into Strategic Business Alliance Agreement for Drug Discovery Research and Development

Agreement reached on a new contract model to comprehensively support enterprise -wide drug discovery strategies beyond specific diseases/research areas by leveraging the AI drug discovery support service “Drug Discovery AI Factory,” and to share future outcomes.

Tokyo, Japan, February 16, 2026 - FRONTEO, Inc. (Headquarters: Tokyo, Japan; President & CEO: Masahiro Morimoto; hereinafter “FRONTEO”) and Maruishi Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. (Headquarters: Osaka, Japan; President & Representative Director: Katsuhito Inoue; hereinafter “Maruishi Pharmaceutical”) have entered into a strategic business alliance agreement. This agreement aims to support Maruishi Pharmaceutical's enterprise-wide drug discovery strategy by utilizing FRONTEO's AI drug discovery support service, “Drug Discovery AI Factory (hereinafter ‘DDAIF’) ^*1”.

Based on this agreement, combining Maruishi Pharmaceutical's proprietary insights and database information with FRONTEO's analysis information on drug discovery seeds^*2 identified using its proprietary analytical methods will strengthen Maruishi Pharmaceutical's decision-making process for licensing in^*3 drug discovery seeds.

Furthermore, from the next fiscal year onward, the partnership scope is planned to expand beyond overall drug discovery research and development to include drug development and lifecycle management^*4.

As compensation for its involvement in these drug discovery seed evaluation efforts, FRONTEO will receive analysis and consulting fees from Maruishi Pharmaceutical. Furthermore, FRONTEO will receive milestone-based payments upon the successful advancement of the seeds into the research and development phase and subsequent commercialization.

This service model under the strategic business alliance agreement represents a new initiative by DDAIF to provide cross-functional support for pharmaceutical companies' global drug discovery strategies, without being limited to specific disease areas or research departments. FRONTEO anticipates achieving discontinuous revenue growth commensurate with results by expanding this initiative to other pharmaceutical companies.

Background of This Initiative

This agreement follows the co-creation project^*5 utilizing DDAIF that FRONTEO and Maruishi Pharmaceutical commenced in January 2025.

Maruishi Pharmaceutical is promoting the use of AI-driven drug discovery to enhance success rates and development speed in pharmaceutical R&D, as well as to strengthen competitiveness. The company selected FRONTEO as its partner, and both companies have been working on co-creation projects related to drug repositioning and biomarker discovery.

In particular, for candidate indications identified through co-creation projects focused on drug repositioning, dose-dependent efficacy has been confirmed through wet validation (biological testing using cells, animals, etc.), yielding tangible results that support progression to the next development phase. Recognizing the high value of these outcomes, the two companies have entered into this agreement to further deepen their collaborative relationship.

Solutions to the Global Challenge of “Depletion of Drug Targets”

In recent years, the increasing complexity and diversity of diseases have made the search for new target molecules^*6 in drug discovery increasingly difficult, and the “depletion” of target molecules has become a global challenge. Against this backdrop, the Japanese government is promoting the enhancement of drug discovery capabilities as a national strategy through the establishment of a drug discovery ecosystem, including the launch of the “Public-Private Council for Improving Drug Discovery Capabilities” ^*7 in 2024.

This initiative supports pharmaceutical companies in strategically and continuously building their pipelines through a novel AI-driven approach, addressing the global challenge of dwindling drug discovery targets. It aims to become a model for an effective drug discovery ecosystem that accelerates the creation of innovative medicines originating in Japan.

The enhancement of drug discovery capabilities is increasingly important not only for enhancing industrial competitiveness but also from the perspective of medical security. We believe this initiative will directly contribute to strengthening the foundation for both objectives.

Comment from Yoshiro Yamamura, Executive Officer/Head of Research Division, Maruishi Pharmaceutical

We are delighted to launch this new co-creation project with FRONTEO. Through our two previous collaborations in drug repositioning and biomarker discovery, we have become convinced that DDAIF is more than just an AI drug discovery tool. FRONTEO's expertise and deeply involved support serve as a ‘value creation factory’ that elevates AI predictions into well-founded hypotheses. Simultaneously, it has been a ‘growth platform’ enabling our discovery team to gain perspectives beyond existing frameworks. We strongly anticipate that this collaborative project, positioned as ‘Next-Generation Open Innovation’ based on FRONTEO's advanced AI technology, will yield highly impactful results. These results will transcend mere technical problem-solving and directly lead to critical decisions that will shape our business strategy.

Comment from Hiroyoshi Toyoshima, Director/Chief Science Officer (CSO), FRONTEO

We are deeply honored that Maruishi Pharmaceutical has highly valued the results of our co-creation project and that we can now commence this initiative.

The new scheme under this agreement represents a groundbreaking model that supports decision-making at the corporate drug discovery strategy level for pharmaceutical companies, without limiting it to specific disease areas or research departments. We will contribute to strengthening the competitiveness of Japan's pharmaceutical industry as we work toward solving the global challenge of the depletion of novel drug targets.

FRONTEO contributes to the research and development of innovative drugs and therapies, advances in medical and pharmaceutical research, the growth of the pharmaceutical industry, and improvements in healthcare quality and patient quality of life through the research, development, and societal implementation of cutting-edge AI technologies and solutions. We aim to grow the pharmaceutical industry into a core industry alongside automobiles and semiconductors, create innovative medicines originating from Japan, and create a fair world where appropriate medicine reaches everyone who needs them.

Notes:

*1 DDAIF: An AI-driven drug discovery support service where FRONTEO's drug discovery experts, well-versed in AI and drug discovery, leverage the natural language processing technology of their proprietary AI “KIBIT” and unique analytical methods to provide target molecule and indication discovery, along with supporting hypotheses.

*2 Drug discovery seeds: Compounds, antibodies, drug discovery technologies, etc., considered effective for treating diseases, serving as the “seeds” for pharmaceutical R&D.

*3 Licensing in: In pharmaceutical companies, besides conducting R&D internally, there are cases where development rights or sales rights for drug candidate compounds, etc., are acquired from other companies or institutions; the latter is called licensing in.

*4 Lifecycle Management: Strategic management and measures to maximize asset value throughout a pharmaceutical's lifecycle, from R&D through post-launch and beyond patent protection.

*5 January 9, 2025 Press Release: FRONTEO and Maruishi Pharmaceutical Launch Collaborative Project for Biomarker Discovery Using Drug Discovery AI Factory, https://www.fronteo.com/news/pr/20250109

*6 Target Molecule: A molecule (gene) targeted by a drug for its activity

*7 Cabinet Office “Public-Private Council for Improving Drug Discovery Capabilities”, https://www8.cao.go.jp/iryou/kanmin_kyogikai.html

About Maruishi Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd.

Maruishi Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. was founded in 1888 as a manufacturer of Japanese Pharmacopoeia pharmaceuticals (basic drugs). Making use of the technology, knowledge, and know-how that have been cultivated over 130 years of history, Maruishi continues to contribute to the healthcare and improvement of QOL of the patients. 

In recent years, based on our business base in the perioperative medical field, infection control field, and basic drug field, we have also been expanding into acute phase/emergency medical care and supportive medical care (cancer supportive care).

For further details, please visit https://www.maruishi-pharm.co.jp/.

About FRONTEO Drug Discovery AI Factory (DDAIF)

[Reference: Initiatives with pharmaceutical companies and Academia]
https://www.fronteo.com/news/ddaif-list

FRONTEO Drug Discovery AI Factory (DDAIF) is an AI-based drug discovery support service that combines KIBIT (patented in Japan, Europe, the U.S., and South Korea), an Equation-driven AI specialized in natural language processing, with the expertise of FRONTEO’s drug discovery researchers and AI engineers. It powerfully supports researchers’ decision-making in drug development through the analysis of disease-related gene networks and the construction of hypotheses regarding target molecule candidates. This service has already been adopted by multiple major pharmaceutical companies and has a proven track record.

*The technology used in Drug Discovery AI Factory is covered by a total of 21 patents held by FRONTEO in Japan, Europe, the U.S., and South Korea.

https://lifescience.fronteo.com/products/drug-discovery-ai-factory/

About FRONTEO, Inc. https://www.fronteo.com/en/

FRONTEO provides its proprietary Equation-driven AI "KIBIT" to support the judgment of experts in various fields who face social challenges day and night, and creates the starting point for innovation. Unlike general-purpose AI, its unique natural language processing technology (patented in Japan, Europe, the U.S., and South Korea) enables high-speed, high-precision analysis without reliance on training data volume or computational power.

Additionally, patented technology that maps (visualizes structure) analyzed information allows KIBIT to directly influence expert insights, and in recent years, KIBIT has been applied in hypothesis generation and target discovery for drug development.