Discussion

The European Lead Factory is a pan-European platform for drug discovery, supported by IMI, which was set to give a major boost to drug research in Europe. Comprising a collection of half a million compounds and a screening centre, the European Lead Factory will offer both researchers in academia and SMEs an unprecedented opportunity to advance medical research and develop new medicines.
High throughput Screening for the European Lead Factory is performed at the Pivot Park Screening centre in Oss, The Netherlands. In the first year of the European Lead Factory state-of-the-art systems have been made operational and efficient procedures have been implemented. The success of the European Lead Factory is witnessed by the completion of more than 10 screening campaigns in the first year and by the handing over of qualified hit lists to the target owners.
This paper describes workflows that have been implemented at the European Lead Factory and presents statistics on the first 18 months of operation.