Portfolio
To address AMR and protect the lives of people around the world, PACE is providing funding and support for a portfolio of early-stage projects to help grow the pipeline of high-quality antimicrobial therapeutics and associated diagnostics.
Supporting the best innovations to address the global threat of AMR
We are supporting a diverse portfolio of projects aimed at developing new tests and treatments for bacterial infections with high unmet need. Through a series of funding rounds available to academics and SMEs worldwide, we are selecting, investing in and supporting the most promising projects. We are offering a collaborative approach to project development through access to advisors, mentors, potential project partners and enabling technologies and capabilities. By supporting the projects in this way, we are helping to give them the best chance of success and position them for onward funding, investment and development. More projects will enter the portfolio as the programme progresses. This page highlights the innovators and projects that are currently in the PACE portfolio.
Number of projects supported
PACE funds committed to projects
Number of organisations funded
ArrePath
ArrePath was founded upon the mission to discover new and differentiated classes of anti-infectives to address antimicrobial resistance (AMR) through the application of state-of-the-art technologies and novel strategies.
We apply world-class science and innovation in imaging and AI / ML technologies to identify and develop novel drugs to address global health issues. Our advanced machine learning (ML) drug discovery platform enables a rapid and efficient identification of new drug classes with desired activity profiles and clinical utility, coupled with a deep understanding of mechanism of action at the outset of the discovery process.
Glox Therapeutics
Glox Therapeutics are developing precision antibiotics to combat antimicrobial resistance. Our goal is to create potent, species-specific antibiotics that, unlike conventional antibiotics, do not harm the host microbiome. We are producing engineered bacteriocins from our proprietary platform technologies to target Gram-negative pathogens.
University of Sheffield
The University of Sheffield’s mission is to deliver life-enhancing research, innovation and education that not only transforms the lives of our graduates, but shapes the world we live in. Our diverse community is made up of 30,000 students from 150 countries, 8,000 staff, including 1,500 of the world’s leading academics and over 300,000 alumni in 205 countries. Our research-led teaching inspire, enthuse and challenge a diverse community of outstanding students. Our graduates will be equipped to stand out as confident global citizens guided by strong values, ethics and standards, able to make meaningful contributions to society.
Our research and innovation will produce the highest quality outputs to drive intellectual advances and address global challenges. The University of Sheffield is a member of the Russell Group and is ranked within the Top 100 universities in the Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2025.
Xiretsa
Xiretsa is a spinout from UC Santa Barbara developing novel membrane-remodelling small molecule antibiotics called Anti-infective Conjugated Electrolytes (ACEs). Discovered serendipitously as derivatives of compounds designed for use in microbial bioelectronics, ACEs evade resistance, destroy biofilms, and selectively target bacteria. Xiretsa is dedicated to tailoring the ACE platform to combat AMR and address the greatest Gram-negative, Gram-positive, and Mycobacterial threats.
Centauri Therapeutics
Centauri Therapeutics is an immunotherapy company, with a unique and proprietary platform technology applicable across a wide range of therapeutic indications. The Company’s initial focus is on infectious diseases, driven by an urgent unmet need for anti-infectives to treat the most vulnerable and at-risk patients. Centauri also has strong initial proof-of-concept data in oncology.
Centauri’s Alphamer® platform has a unique mechanism of action, utilising an antibody recruiting molecule to harness the body’s natural immune response, and redirect antibodies to target diseases.
Justus Liebig University Giessen (JLU) and Infex Therapeutics
Founded in 1607, Justus Liebig University Giessen (JLU) is a research university with a long-standing tradition which attracts around 25,700 students. Apart from the wide range of subjects on offer ‒ extending from classical natural sciences, law and economics, social and educational sciences to linguistics and cultural studies it offers a selection of life science subjects that is unique not only in Hesse: human and veterinary medicine, agricultural, environmental and nutritional sciences and food chemistry. The leading personae who carried out research and taught at JLU include a number of Nobel Prize winners, such as Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen (Nobel Prize for Physics in 1901) and Wangari Maathai (Nobel Peace Prize in 2004). Since 2006 JLU has been receiving continuous funding from German central and state governments in the Excellence Initiative and the Excellence Strategy.
Infex Therapeutics is a clinical-stage anti-infectives development company that acquires, develops and licenses innovative drugs to treat pandemic infections. They have expanded to develop a broader portfolio of new therapies to meet the rising burden of critical priority infectious disease. Based at Alderley Park in the North West of England, their work addresses unmet patient needs and will bring a new portfolio of drugs into clinical trials to treat patients suffering from life-threatening infections.
PhalconBio
PhalconBio is a pioneering Swiss biotech startup, leveraging over a decade of academic and industry research on engineered bacteriophages to combat the growing threat of antibiotic resistance. Its innovative phage therapy platform is designed to revolutionise antibacterial treatments by enhancing therapeutic efficacy and minimising drug resistance while providing a highly targeted, species-specific mechanism of action.
PhalconBio’s current focus is on pulmonary infections caused by Pseudomonas aeruginosa, a major contributor to chronic lung diseases and hospital-acquired pneumonia. But thanks to its adaptable technology platform, PhalconBio is well-positioned to tackle other critical ESKAPEE pathogens and set a new benchmark for precision antibacterial therapies, advancing the fight against multidrug-resistant infections.
Oxford Drug Design
Oxford Drug Design has developed a powerful computational platform for computer-aided drug discovery using a unique combination of generative AI, advanced mathematics and novel chemical representations. These groundbreaking methods support its pipeline of internal discovery programmes in therapeutic areas of high unmet medical need.
Two programmes target members of the aminoacyl-tRNA synthetase family of enzymes, of which they have developed a deep understanding and generated a large body of proprietary data, including co-crystal structures as input to the computational methods. Each programme pursues a novel mechanism of action, and for each, it has discovered novel, potent, inhibitor chemotypes and demonstrated in vivo proof of concept.
Oxford Drug Design’s aim is to identify pre-clinical candidates within the next 12-18 months as the next step towards entry into clinical trials.
Ineos Oxford Institute of Antimicrobial Research
The Ineos Oxford Institute for antimicrobial research (IOI) is a world-leading centre of research, training and education based at the University of Oxford. The IOI is developing solutions to fight antimicrobial resistance by developing new antibiotics. IOI’s research is guided by its global surveillance programmes in countries most affected by the threat of AMR, including countries in Africa and South Asia. These international collaborative projects enable the IOI to assess the impact of AMR on health and agriculture across the world and develop the most effective solutions to tackle them.
