Theragen ETEX said Friday that the Korea Drug Development Fund (KDDF) would support the development of TEJ-1704, its Lou Gehrig's disease treatment candidate. TEJ-1704 is an oral treatment for Lou Gehrig's disease that the company co-developed with J2H Biotech.

Accordingly, the two companies will receive research and development funding for the phase I clinical trials and non-clinical trials of the Lou Gehrig's disease treatment, TEJ-1704, from the KDDF.

They are planning to start trials by the second half of next year and complete its research by June 2020.

If approved, patients will no longer have to visit hospitals regularly for intravenous therapy and can expect to maintain a consistent systemic concentration of the drug without a drug withdrawal period.

“We will cooperate with KDDF to carry out this research successfully and lay the foundations for the development of a new drug,” Theragen ETEX CEO Ryu Byung-hwan said. “The company plans to make the drug a global new drug.”