At our Research Center, cutting-edge facilities and systems support unremitting research and development in a number of areas. A large number of new technologies are employed, including a biological approach to genetic predisposition to the onset or progress of illnesses; combinatorial chemistry, which allows rapid development of a large number of compounds; high throughput screening (HTS), which allows automatic evaluation of a large volume of pharmaceuticals; and bioinformatics, involving computer-aided genome sequencing and mapping.
With Janssen Pharmaceutica of Belgium, Taisho is engaged in joint R&D of drugs for depression and anxiety. Taisho's strong research organization and its alliances with major overseas pharmaceutical companies have resulted in the development of a substantial number of new pharmaceuticals, many of which have already advanced to clinical-trial stage. The Company has strong expectations for their market potential.
Capital and administrative ties with Toyama Chemical Co., Ltd. have allowed us to build a joint research structure with that firm, and we share a number of platforms, including an ethical drug compounds library, overseas development bases and facilities for investigating new drugs to improve efficiencies. We are moving forward by building together and sharing R&D personnel, in an effort to expand the new drug pipeline.