GalChimia was born in 2001 as a university entrepreneurship initiative under the Entrepreneurship Programme of the University of Santiago de Compostela (USC). The idea was to create a chemical research laboratory with entirely Galician capital to provide an outlet for the research potential and talent of the universities of the Community, becoming a professional outlet first for the founders and, later, for graduates and doctors in Chemistry.

GalChimia was the first Galician company with a business model based on contract research. "Our business focuses on offering specialised services with high added value in synthetic organic chemistry, mainly aimed at the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries," the company explains. GalChimia's value proposition is based on the team's high degree of knowledge and experience in organic synthesis, oriented to support the processes of discovery and development of new drugs. "GalChimia's greatest assets are, without a doubt, its human capital and its innovative vocation, which allows us to continuously improve and adapt our services to the needs of the market. Our team is highly qualified and motivated, which allows us to play in the league of multinational pharmaceutical companies at an international level," they say.

Today, with more than 20 years of experience behind them, they have a turnover of more than 3 million euros, 75% of which currently corresponds to the international market. In 2020 they increased their production capacity with the construction of new facilities located in the Galician countryside, specifically in Touro. The GalChimia team also increased to more than 50 people, who are currently spread over 3 work centres located in the aforementioned headquarters in Touro (A Coruña), Tres Cantos (Madrid) and Barcelona.

Business lines

Initially, GalChimia focused on the early stages of the drug discovery process, especially on the design and synthesis of compound libraries, but they have gradually added more capabilities and can now support all aspects of chemical synthesis related to the pre-clinical stages of research. 

GalChimia's chemists work for more than 330 customers in 35 countries, in projects related to four business lines: research chemistry (aimed at designing and synthesising new chemical entities in drug discovery projects); process chemistry (implemented in 2004 in response to the demand of pharmaceutical customers who also required the optimisation and scaling up of active ingredient manufacturing processes); analytical chemistry (purity determination services, chiral separation, stability studies, method development, shelf life analysis, etc.); and finally the catalogue line (GalChimia offers through its online shop a catalogue of chemical products, which currently has more than 250 references consisting of pharmaceutical and pesticide standards); and finally the catalogue line (GalChimia offers through its online shop a catalogue of chemical products, which currently has more than 250 references consisting of pharmaceutical and pesticide standards).); and finally the catalogue line (GalChimia offers through its online shop a catalogue of chemical products, which currently has more than 250 references consisting of pharmaceutical and pesticide standards).

A commitment to R&D&I

Galchimia is characterised by its eagerness to innovate and its commitment to scientific excellence. In fact, it has been awarded the Innovative SME Seal by the Ministry of Science and Innovation and was recognised in the Galicia Innovation and Design Awards granted by the Xunta de Galicia.

In recent years, they have continuously reinvested more than 10% of turnover in R&D&I activities, devoting up to 15% of the workforce to research projects. In addition, the company participated in 17 collaborative projects with leading entities in regional, national and international calls for proposals. These collaborations allow the company to establish alliances with leaders in other areas of specialisation and improve its competitiveness by positioning itself as a global benchmark in chemical synthesis. 

Its R&D successes include the creation in 2018 of the spin-out Origo Biopharma, a biotech created to continue the advances of its drug discovery programme supported by the Galician Innovation Agency. "Origo completed the first phase of preclinical trials with very positive results, being acquired by the Belgian group Agomab Therapeutics in 2021, which continued to advance Origo's projects and recently announced the start of clinical phase 1 of the compound for the treatment of Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis and clinical phase 2 for the compound focused on Chron's disease," they explain.

Currently, with the USC Biopharma group, they have a small molecule discovery programme underway for the treatment of castration-resistant prostate cancer (Maoprost project, supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation). In addition, they are working with two international consortia on projects for the treatment of glioblastoma, the most aggressive brain tumour for which there is currently no cure. "The projects propose two different but equally innovative approaches: the ECM-CART project, in which we received support from the CDTI, combines nanotechnology with CAR-T cell therapy, while the new NuCapCure project proposes a new biosynthetic mechanism to improve the efficacy and selectivity of neutron and proton therapy in hard-to-reach tumours. NuCapCure is one of the projects approved in the Horizon Europe - Pathfinder Open call, one of the most competitive calls of the European Innovation Council (EIC), and we will start working on it in early 2024," they explain.

Its main challenge now is to consolidate its position as a leader in organic synthesis at the international level. "We have plenty of capacity, but we move in a very agile and fast-moving industry, and we need to keep pace with both our customers and our competitors. To adapt quickly to the needs of the industry, we need to be an agent of innovation in every sense. This is where we expect our R&D strategy to give us the final push," they explain.

Regarding the situation of the Galician biotech ecosystem, they highlight the fact that Galicia is currently the second most bio-entrepreneurial community in Spain, demonstrating the good moment the sector is going through. "Our innovative ecosystem is one of the most active at national level, thanks in large part to the dynamic actions of the Galician Life Sciences Technology Business Cluster (Bioga). The road ahead of us now is to consolidate the biotech fabric and achieve that critical mass that will make Galicia a reference beyond our borders. As we always say, from Galicia to the world!".