San Diego, CA — Model Medicines, an AI-first biotechnology company engineering first-in-class small-molecule therapeutics, today announced its participation in the BIOCOM Global Partnering Conference 2026, taking place February 24–26, 2026, at The Lodge at Torrey Pines in La Jolla, California. 

Regarded as one of the premier partnering and investor events of the year, BIOCOM Global Partnering convenes senior leaders from venture capital, biotechnology, and pharmaceutical companies to drive strategic collaboration, licensing, and investment activity. Model Medicines will deliver a presentation at the conference to advance partnership discussions across its virology and oncology pipelines.

“BIOCOM Global Partnering is where real scientific lineages and real commercial intent intersect,” said Daniel Haders, PhD, Founder and CEO of Model Medicines. “Our programs are a natural continuation of the most important antiviral and transcriptional biology work of the past decade, now enabled by computation at a scale that finally allows these ideas to reach patients.”

Advancing Toward the Clinic

At BIOCOM Global Partnering, Model Medicines will highlight progress across its two lead drug candidates:

MDL-001 — a direct-acting, non-nucleoside, broad-spectrum antiviral targeting a conserved viral polymerase mechanism, with demonstrated preclinical activity across respiratory and hepatic viruses and high-risk co-infections. MDL-001 is being developed across major respiratory infections, including influenza, COVID-19, and RSV, as well as chronic hepatitis infections, including HCV, HBV, and HDV, representing an estimated combined global antiviral market exceeding $30 billion annually. By targeting a conserved polymerase mechanism shared across viral families, the program is designed to provide a unified, oral therapeutic approach spanning both seasonal respiratory outbreaks and chronic liver disease, including high-risk co-infected patient populations. The program is currently completing IND-enabling studies. IND submission is targeted for late 2026 with clinical trials estimated to commence in early 2027. 

MDL-4102 — a highly potent and selective BRD4 inhibitor with no measurable activity against BRD2 or BRD3. The program was optimized for BRD4 selectivity, transcriptional impact, and drug-like properties simultaneously. MDL-4102 is designed to overcome the dose-limiting hematologic toxicities that hindered prior pan-BET inhibitors, positioning it as a next-generation transcriptional therapy with the potential for durable efficacy across BRD4-driven malignancies. Beyond oncology, BRD4 biology extends into fibrosis, cardiovascular disease, and autoimmune disorders, expanding the potential addressable market to more than $60 billion annually across these therapeutic areas. By enabling selective transcriptional modulation with improved tolerability, MDL-4102 is positioned as a differentiated, next-generation approach to targeting core disease-driving gene expression programs. The program is currently in IND-enabling studies. IND submission is targeted for 2027.

A Platform Built for Partnership

The discovery of MDL-4102 is a direct result of Model Medicines' unprecedented 325-billion-molecule virtual screen conducted in 2025 in a 24-hour period. This record-breaking capability, enabled by the ultra-large virtual screen, enabled the development of a next-generation BRD4 inhibitor. Model Medicines announced this screen and the subsequent discovery of MDL-4102 at the second-annual Google Cloud Cancer AI Symposium in New York City.

This powerful capability is driven by Model Medicines' proprietary platform, which enables these ultra-large virtual screens (ULVS). Following the 2025 record, the company has set an ambitious goal to conduct a 1 trillion-molecule screen in 2026 in a 24-hour period. By translating breakthrough models into tangible drug candidates, the company accelerates both novel target discovery and the precision engineering of small molecules against conserved biological choke points. This ULVS capability offers a unique opportunity for partners to rapidly identify and develop novel programs. The company is actively seeking partnerships, licensing, and strategic collaborations in the areas of oncology, virology, and inflammation.