ChemAxon

ChemAxon (/ˌkɛmˈæksɒn/) is a cheminformatics and bioinformatics software development company specializing in cloud based, end user solutions, back end platforms and consultancy services for chemical and biological research.[1][2] Headquartered in Budapest, Hungary with 121 employees (as of November 2018).[3] The company also operates business and consultancy offices in Cambridge, MA, San Diego, CA, and in Prague.[4][5][6] ChemAxon has distributors in China, India, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, and Australia.[7][8][9] ChemAxon provides solutions, platforms, applications, and consultancy services for handling chemical and biological entities for the pharmaceutical, biotechnology, new materials, fine-, petro- and agrochemical, food and cosmetics industries. ChemAxon supports academic institutions through special software licensing programs for students, teachers, academic researchers, and high school curriculums.[10] Tools and software solutions are offered to academic research groups wishing to integrate cheminformatic functionalities into open website platforms via web hosting services.[11][12]

ChemAxon
TypePrivate
IndustryCheminformatics
FoundedFebruary 14, 1998 (1998-02-14) in Budapest, Hungary
FounderPéter & Ferenc Csizmadia
Headquarters
Budapest
,
Hungary
Number of locations
  • 4 offices
  • 9 distributors
Area served
Worldwide
Products
Services
Number of employees
160 (2018)
Websitechemaxon.com

History

ChemAxon was founded in 1998 by two brothers, Ferenc and Péter Csizmadia.[13] The company name was created by combining the words chem, indicating chemistry, and axon referring to a vast network of connections between the scientific and informatic domains. Initially, ChemAxon offered consultancy services and later moved into product development. As a startup company ChemAxon had very strong ties with local universities engaging in software development projects with PhD students. Emerging technologies and software languages were studied. As a result a platform independent, back end product line, relying on Java started to come together. The first ChemAxon software product was Marvin, a chemical editor. Its first version was released in January 1999. Marvin was followed by the development of the JChem technology, adding chemical intelligence to common database management systems with the first release in early 2000; also providing the first company sale that same year.[14]

ChemAxon's first software developments were summed up in scientific articles and posters presented in cheminformatics journals and conferences.[15][16] The company revenue and user number rocketed in the early 2000s calling for the first user meeting in 2005.[17] In 2004 ChemAxon decided to support academic research and education by offering a free software license package.[18] ChemAxon also established representatives in the US from 2000, and in Japan via an official distributor company in 2005.

Growing user requests led to the development and the release of more software products. The company's product portfolio expanded with physical and chemical calculations and predictions, desktop based chemical database management applications and chemical naming intelligence. The growing trend affected employee numbers and required a larger head office space. The first official office headquarters opened in 2003 in the Máramaros köz, Budapest, Hungary. A software development office opened in Prague, Czech Republic in 2006.

ChemAxon's desktop-based, cheminformatics product portfolio maturited in late 2000s. GlaxoSmithKline contracted with them in late 2009.[19] The company started to experiment with agile software development approach in 2010, eventually adopting scrum methodology in the following year. ChemAxon encourages an agile office environment with cross-functional teams. This philosophy is supported by a publicly available online company culture guide.[20] With the wave of change came new product development directions that mimicked the trends in the industry towards the end of the 2000s. The demand for online services emerged in research to allow lab colleagues to access chemical applications from all devices, enabling contract research organizations and other suppliers to collaborate with chemical data, and cut IT costs at the same time. ChemAxon started to build its cloud-based software systems in 2008 - the first one being Chemicalize - and continuously expanded in this area. On the other hand, the rise of the biologics within newly developed pharmaceutical drugs influenced ChemAxon to start developing its biopolymer informatics portfolio in 2015. In 2011, ChemAxon moved its office headquarters to Graphisoft Park, one of Budapest's tech hubs, where the company is currently located. More offices were established: in 2014 a US East Coast headquarters opened in Cambridge, Massachusetts, followed by an office opening in San Diego in 2018.

Software

ChemAxon Products include tools for visualization and drawing of molecules, chemical database searching and management, and for drug discovery. Products are licensed free of charge for academic use.[21]

ChemAxon’s desktop applications include Marvin which is free chemistry software for drawing and visualizing chemical structures, and Instant JChem, a desktop application for end user scientists; JChem for Excel which integrates the structure handling capabilities of JChem and Marvin within a Microsoft Excel environment.[22]

The software can be used to predict pKa values[23] and logP values.[24]

The company developed Markush structure storage and search capabilities (without enumeration), with Markush structures from Thomson Reuters Derwent World Patents Index (DWPISM) database.[25]

Pearson Education uses ChemAxon's JChem, MarvinSketch, and MarvinView as the chemistry tools in many of Pearson MasteringChemistry courses.[26]

Methods

Molecule characterization data in the form of a simplified molecular-input line-entry system (SMILES) string can be uploaded into the Marvin software.

See also

References
  1. Bunin, Barry A.; Siesel, Brian; Morales, Guillermo; Bajorath, Jürgen (2007). Chemoinformatics: Theory, Practice, & Products. Dordrecht, the Netherlands: Springer Netherlands. p. 87. ISBN 978-1-4020-5000-8.
  2. "ChemAxon Company Overview". ChemAxon. 2017. Retrieved 19 September 2018.
  3. "ChemAxon Kft". Céginformáció. 2018. Retrieved 15 November 2018.
  4. McBride, Ryan (1 Oct 2012). "ChemAxon opens shop in 'heart' of Boston biotech hub". Retrieved 11 May 2014.
  5. Bódy, Géza (2013). "Biliárd munkaidőben" [Billiards during work hours]. Manager Magazin (in Hungarian). 2013 (11): 8–10.
  6. "ChemAxon around the globe". ChemAxon. Retrieved 2018-10-09.
  7. "Distributors in Asia & Pacific". ChemAxon. Retrieved 2018-11-15.
  8. "ChemAxon Japan". Patcore Inc. Retrieved 2018-11-15.
  9. "ChemAxon - Cheminformatics solved". Advent Informatics. Retrieved 2018-11-15.
  10. Lattu, Matti (31 March 2017). "Abittiin lisää MAFYKE-välineitä". Retrieved 2018-09-21.
  11. "Discounted licenses". Retrieved 2018-11-15.
  12. "ChemAxon - Introducing a cheminformatics company & its software portfolio". ChemAxon. Retrieved 2018-11-15.
  13. Szegő, Iván Miklós (7 March 2011). "Magyar sikerek és előretörés az infóvegyészetben". Retrieved 19 November 2018.
  14. "ChemAxon - Introducing a cheminformatics company & its software portfolio". 1 Dec 2018. Retrieved 24 April 2019.
  15. Csizmadia, Ferenc (2000). "JChem: Java Applets and Modules Supporting Chemical Database Handling from Web Browsers". Journal of Chemical Information and Modeling. 40 (2): 323–324. doi:10.1021/ci9902696. PMID 10761134.
  16. György, Pirok; Nóra, Máté; Jenő, Varga; József, Szegezdi; Miklós, Vargyas; Szilárd, Dóránt; Ferenc, Csizmadia (2006). "Making "Real" Molecules in Virtual Space". Journal of Chemical Information and Modeling. 46 (2): 563–568. doi:10.1021/ci050373p. PMID 16562984.
  17. "ChemAxon - Introducing a cheminformatics company & its software portfolio". 1 Dec 2018. Retrieved 24 April 2019.
  18. "ChemAxon announces academic license package". 27 Jul 2004. Retrieved 29 April 2019.
  19. Bolton, Richard (28 May 2014). "GlaxoSmithKline: 5 years with ChemAxon". Retrieved 5 June 2019.
  20. Csizmadia, Ferenc (1 January 2018). "Guide to ChemAxon's Culture". Retrieved 21 September 2018.
  21. "Chemaxon Announces Free Software for the Academic Community Via the Jchem and Marvin Academic Package". 27 Jul 2004. Retrieved 11 May 2014.
  22. "Company Overview of ChemAxon Kft". Retrieved 11 May 2014.
  23. Toure, O.; Dussap, C.-G; Lebert, A. (2013). "Comparison of Predicted pKa Values for Some Amino-Acids, Dipeptides and Tripeptides,Using COSMO-RS, ChemAxon and ACD/Labs Methods". Oil & Gas Science and Technology – Rev. IFP Energies Nouvelles. 68 (2): 281–291. doi:10.2516/ogst/2012094.
  24. Chen, Jonathan; Swamidass, S. Joshua; Dou, Yimeng; Bruand, Jocelyne; Baldi, Pierre (2005). "ChemDB: a public database of small molecules and related chemoinformatics resources". Bioinformatics. 21 (22): 4133–4139. doi:10.1093/bioinformatics/bti683. PMID 16174682.
  25. IP data Feed Archived August 17, 2013, at the Wayback Machine
  26. "Pearson Adds ChemAxon's Suite of Chemistry Tools to MasteringChemistry Products". 6 Dec 2012. Retrieved 11 May 2014.
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