ChiroBlock

COMPANY PROFILE
ChiroBlock is the company filling the gap between basic chemical research and the product development at manufacturers. Since 1999, we have been working in the market of high-value, applied chemical contract research and the custom synthesis of sophisticated compounds. We offer our services and know-how to research departments of various industry branches, such as pharma, generics, biotech start-ups and innovative companies in the fields of ‘new materials’, sensors, cosmetics and others. The core of our business is to generate knowledge, quality and cost advantages through intelligent, unbiased synthesis design and not by simply manufacturing known compounds. As an independent, staff owned company with more than 50% academic employees and proprietary tools for managing risks, quality, projects and know-how, we always find custom tailored solutions to our clients’ problems. ChiroBlock just converts ideas into molecules.

BUSINESS MODEL
The challenges of today’s world with its mega trends of globalisation, communication, collaboration and open innovation can only be addressed with new, appropriate business models, especially in chemistry. ChiroBlock has been structured accordingly right from the start. Being focussed on only one but innovative spot of the value creating chain: Applied R&D in synthetic chemistry supplemented by the actual synthesis of new compounds. Consequently, we do not pursue any ‘traditional’ business model such as trading or large scale manufacturing of chemicals. ChiroBlock offers its innovative services via three business segments: “MoleculeFactory”, “ReDesignFactory” and “IP-Factory”.

DEVELOPMENT OF THE ENTERPRISE
With more than 15 years of track record and as a completely independent, debt-free company, ChiroBlock continues to grow organically by about 10 to 15% per year. As there are no economies of scale with our business model, we prefer to grow with respect to efficiency, quality and innovation rather than by headcount. Nevertheless, with the increasing complexity of projects, the number of employees also has been rising steadily from only 2 in 1999 to about 20 nowadays. At the beginning, we entirely focussed on proprietary chiral building blocks, the origin of the company’s name. Later, this was complemented by customer specific projects on making new sophisticated compounds available. Our advantage as flexible and highly competent chemical R&D entity enabled us to participate in open innovation processes with numerous partners around the world. With the introduction of our three business fields and the ISO 9001 certification in 2014, ChiroBlock now combines the best of both worlds: academia and industry. For the benefit of our customers, we tap on the latest scientific results and apply them in a unbiased way to the client’s needs. Efficiency, reliability and a thorough understanding of both IP issues and the industrial requirements are the cornerstones of our success.

TECHNOLOGICAL SERVICES
“Converting ideas into molecules” using our proprietary “Synthesis R&D Platform”:
- “MoleculeFactory”: Providing the very first samples of new, sophisticated, custom tailored compounds on a ‘fee-for-results’ basis for divers applications such as reference compounds, analytical standards, advanced intermediates for R&D or chiral building blocks
- “ReDesignFactory”: Developing of new synthetic routes and optimising know protocols with respect to efficiency, environmental impact, IP issues and overall costs
- “IP-Factory”: Offering results of our own internal R&D projects on new chiral building blocks, mainly non-natural derivatives of natural compounds (e.g. beta amino acids, poly amines, amino lipids) and on applications for molecules (e.g. catalysts, preserving agents)
- Transfer of developed routes to the customer or in-house synthesis on scales from 20 mg to 10 kg.

What we offer
As a chemical CRO, ChiroBlock offers all services regarding applied chemical R&D for customers who’s products are based on the properties of (new) molecules.

What we look for
We are constantly looking for partners who either complement our services technologically or who would like to take advantage of our expertise in successfully tackling even complicated problems in creating new molecules.

Our references
With more than five thousend different reactions, we serve about 60 customers a year – from small university labs to renowned global players. As usual with R&D, most projects are confidential. Only publications about our own R&D projects, patents and the results of independent QM-audits may give a very rough impression of ChiroBlock’s activities.