LG AI Research has signed a definitive agreement with D&D Pharmatech to jointly develop AI-powered peptide therapeutics. The partnership aims to accelerate discovery of new medicines for hard-to-treat diseases and precision medicine, leveraging AI models to generate novel peptide sequences and oral…
LG AI Research and D&D Pharmatech have signed a definitive agreement to jointly develop AI-powered peptide therapeutics targeting hard-to-treat diseases and precision medicine. The announcement came this week as part of a broader push within South Korea to become a leader in next-generation healthcare, where artificial intelligence is increasingly assisting scientists in imagining medicines that have never existed before.
South Korea is one of the most closely watched peptide markets in the world. Demand for peptide drugs is rising across therapeutics, biotechnology, and even cosmetics. According to projections, the country’s therapeutic peptide market is expected to reach $3.25 billion by 2033. That growth reflects a national ambition to lead in advanced healthcare and longevity innovation.
Under the partnership, LG AI Research will deploy its artificial intelligence models to analyze the structure of disease targets. Those models will then generate peptide sequences that conventional approaches might never have identified. Instead of requiring scientists to manually search for the right molecule, the AI system proposes entirely new candidates based on learned patterns. This approach raises the possibility that AI may not replace scientific discovery but is beginning to reshape where discovery begins.
The laboratory remains an essential part of the process. Every molecule generated by LG’s models will still need to be synthesized, tested, and validated by D&D Pharmatech before advancing further. However, AI now helps narrow the search from billions of possibilities to a more manageable set of candidates.
Beyond peptide sequence generation, LG AI Research has developed an AI platform called EXAONE Discovery. This platform allows researchers to interact with the system using natural language. Instead of spending days building computational models from scratch, scientists can ask questions, explore experimental ideas, and predict outcomes through conversation. The scientists still formulate the questions, challenge the results, and decide which ideas deserve further investigation. But AI is becoming an active participant in the research process rather than simply software that runs quietly in the background.
The integration of AI into drug discovery mirrors how architects use software to explore hundreds of building designs before laying the first brick. In the same way, researchers can now use AI to explore vast chemical possibilities before carrying out physical experiments. The partnership between LG AI Research and D&D Pharmatech is built on this principle: computational power combined with experimental rigor.
One of the biggest obstacles facing peptide medicines is not finding them but getting them into the body. Peptides are short chains of amino acids that interact with biological processes with remarkable precision, making them attractive for treating complex diseases. However, they are fragile. Once swallowed, stomach acids and digestive enzymes often break them apart long before they reach their target. That leaves injections as the most reliable delivery method for many peptide drugs.
D&D Pharmatech enters the picture here. While LG AI Research focuses on designing promising peptide candidates, D&D will develop oral peptide formulations and conduct preclinical and clinical studies. Together, the companies hope to pair smarter molecular design with smarter delivery.
D&D Pharmatech is a clinical-stage global biopharmaceutical company headquartered in Seongnam-si, South Korea, with operations in the United States. The company specializes in developing peptide-based therapeutics targeting metabolic disorders, fibrotic diseases, and neurodegenerative conditions. It leverages proprietary long-acting delivery technologies and oral peptide platforms to advance a diverse pipeline of GLP-1 receptor agonists and dual-receptor agonists. Its lead candidates are in Phase 2 development for metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis MASH and obesity. The company’s mission centers on addressing critical unmet medical needs in chronic metabolic and fibrotic diseases to enhance patient outcomes and quality of life.
The companies also plan to establish a closed-loop development system. In this system, laboratory results will be continuously fed back into LG’s AI models. Each round of testing provides the system with new information, allowing future designs to become increasingly refined. If successful, this iterative process could shorten development timelines while improving the odds of finding candidates worthy of clinical trials.
Many diseases associated with aging, from metabolic disorders to neurodegenerative conditions, remain notoriously difficult to treat because discovering effective medicines is slow, expensive, and uncertain. Anything that helps researchers explore more biological possibilities without compromising scientific rigor has the potential to accelerate progress. Peptides are already emerging as an important class of therapeutics, and AI may help unlock applications that would otherwise remain hidden among billions of molecular combinations.
The partnership between LG AI Research and D&D Pharmatech represents a concrete step in that direction. It combines advanced computational modeling with established drug development expertise. The collaboration aims to compress the traditionally long and costly timeline of drug discovery, particularly for diseases that have proven difficult to treat with conventional methods. By integrating AI into the design of peptide therapeutics, the two companies hope to identify new candidates more quickly and move them toward clinical testing with greater confidence.
The impact could be far-reaching, especially for conditions that disproportionately affect older populations. Metabolic disorders such as obesity and MASH are linked to aging and are major public health concerns. Neurodegenerative conditions like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s also remain areas of intense research with few effective treatments. Peptide-based drugs offer a path toward more targeted therapies because they can interact with biological processes with high precision. AI can accelerate the identification of the right peptides for those targets.
In summary, LG AI Research and D&D Pharmatech have signed a definitive agreement to jointly develop AI-powered peptide therapeutics. LG AI Research will apply its AI models to generate novel peptide sequences based on disease target structures. D&D Pharmatech will handle synthesis, testing, validation, and the development of oral delivery formulations. The collaboration includes a closed-loop system where lab results refine the AI models. D&D Pharmatech brings a pipeline of GLP-1 receptor agonists and dual-receptor agonists in Phase 2 development for MASH and obesity, along with expertise in long-acting delivery and oral peptide platforms. South Korea’s peptide market is projected to grow to $3.25 billion by 2033, underscoring the strategic importance of this partnership for the region and the future of precision medicine.
Peptides referenced: GLP-1.
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