SME of the Month Sept - Digital Chemistry

Digital Chemistry develops innovative scientific software for use mainly within pharmaceutical research. Through its well established subsidiary, Barnard Chemical Information (BCI), the company has developed an enviable reputation for its science and technology, most notably Markush structure handling, relied on by numerous pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies worldwide. 

Typical technologies available include Clustering, Fingerprinting and Dictionary Generation, Diversity Analysis and Chemical Query Conversion for applications such as the fast screening of vast combinatorial or Markush compound libraries to identify drug leads.

Total number of people employed: 11FTEs (7 chemists)

Company start date:  September 2005

Company History

Digital Chemistry was started in order to build on the reputation for scientific excellence established by BCI over 20 years from 1985-2005. BCI was largely consultancy focused and some of the existing directors identified a real opportunity to build an innovative product portfolio offering more ‘off-the-shelf’ software that was previously available only as bespoke solutions to individual organisations.

The company was, from conception, managed by its Board of Directors, the existing 4 BCI Directors (John Barnard, Geoff Downs, Matthew Wright & Tony Cook) reporting to new Managing Director Julian Hayward. Two new managers were introduced in October 2005 to manage the areas of technical support and sales and marketing, reporting to the Product Director and Managing Director respectively.  The company has since grown organically based on sales and consultancy work without the need for external funding.

Marketing and Sales

Digital Chemistry was very fortunate in being able to utilise the excellent reputation of BCI within the industry.
BCI relied largely on word of mouth and speaking and networking at scientific meetings but Digital Chemistry expanded its marketing and promotions activities in 2005, with the appointment of a dedicated Sales and Marketing Manager, Samantha Bradley. 
A new company website was launched in March 2006 as the start of a promotional campaign to build awareness of Digital Chemistry and its product and technology portfolio, largely via conventional routes such as advertising and exhibitions.

Main obstacles to growth 
These were typical of small, start-up companies that are reliant on organic growth including inefficiencies due to the need to be cautious about expenditure and lengthy lead times to establish revenue streams

What the Future Holds

Looking to the future one of the main problems for the growth of Digital Chemistry is the need to move offices due to company expansion, which may involve opening a US office.  Despite this the company is very optimistic for the future and is particularly excited by the proposed launch of a new product, TorusTM, later in the year. 

Torus is a suite of scientific software offering the ability to store, search and analyse both Markush structures and discrete molecules within an Oracle environment. Torus’ strength lies in its ability to handle vast combinatorial libraries, including the generation of Markush structures from existing compound databases.  Longer term ambitions include a desire to extend the company’s Markush technology to fully handle chemical patents.

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