About Us

Our vision is a world devoid of severe malaria cases and deaths.
Major parts of the African continent and the Far East are held in suspense by the disease and every 2 minutes a child dies of Malaria somewhere on our planet.
Still representing an effective first-line treatment of uncomplicated falciparum malaria after many years, artemisinin as a monotherapy and the artemisinin combination therapies recommended by the WHO are coming of age. Artemisinin-resistant plasmodia have become a growing problem in Far East and first genotypes associated with resistance have begun to emerge in Africa.
We at DMG are committed to developing new, innovative combination therapies to make our vision come true.

The company operates under the direction of the Managing Director, Dr David Hutchinson. With its focus on antimalarial chemotherapy, Dr Hutchinson brings a wealth of experience gained from the successful development of atovaquone and proguanil (Malarone) as the first antimalarial to have originated from the pharmaceutical industry in over thirty years.

Qualifying in medicine at St Bartholomew’s Hospital, London in 1962 with the degree of MB.BS, he gained a Diploma in Tropical Medicine and Hygiene from the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine in 1971.
He joined the Wellcome Research Laboratories in 1974 as a Clinical Research Physician with responsibility for anti-parasitic chemotherapy, reflecting the Company’s longstanding interest in developing effective, safe and affordable treatments for protozoal and helminthic infections.
His major contribution was in identifying rapid metabolic degradation as the cause of the failure of the hydroxynaphthoquinones when administered to human subjects leading to the synthesis of atoavquone and its subsequent development in combination with proguanil.

Following the merger of the Wellcome Foundation and GlaxoSmithKIine, he acted as Consultant to the newly formed company of GlaxoWellcome during the international registration of Malarone, co-authoring a number of key publications at the same time.

Dr Hutchinson has been at the forefront of the clinical development of fosmidomycin since its inception as a candidate antimalarial in 1999 while maintaining an active role in clinical medicine.

Interview with Dr David Hutchinson

Interview between Dr David Hutchinson, Managing Director of DMG Deutsche Malaria GmbH, and Frank W. Oertel, M&A Advisor in Hamburg, Germany.

FO: David - I understand that you are confident in having found a new therapy for malaria. Can you give me some background on this?

DH: Yes, indeed. The drug is called fosmidomycin. It results in a 100% cure rate in combination with a second drug called piperaquine in just 3 days of treatment. Fosmidomycin works quite differently from other antimalarials. It specifically kills the malaria parasites and has no effect on the human body.

FO: Are you saying that it doesn’t have serious side effects like other antimalarials?

DH: Exactly, this means it is very well tolerated, because it has no target in the human body. It is particularly suitable for children who suffer heavily not only from the disease, but also from the side effects of malaria drugs. More than two thirds of all malaria deaths occur in children under 5 years.

FO: Couldn’t fosmidomycin then be the key to cure malaria-infected children?

DH: That is exactly our focus. Children are the most severely affected victims of malaria. And we have the next generation malaria therapy that is ideal to cure children.

FO: So your antimalarial is for children only?

DH: Absolutely not. What is well tolerated by children is equally well tolerated by adults. And we have cured not only the children, but also all adult patients that had been enrolled in the clinical trial of our fosmidomycin-piperaquine combination therapy.

FO: What about severe malaria, the most life-threatening stage of the disease?

DH: Especially children with severe malaria are in such a bad shape that they are unable to swallow tablets or capsules. In contrast to many other drugs, fosmidomycin can y be administered by injection into a vein in addition to being given orally as capsules.

FO: Besides the problem of curing children – why is there a need for next generation malaria drugs?

DH: Spreading resistance to the current first line treatments poses a devastating threat and puts millions of lives at risk. It is here that fosmidomycin-based therapies would step in.

FO: I understand that DMG Deutsche Malaria GmbH is a privately funded startup based in Hamburg. Are you looking for further financial resources?

DH: We are looking for roughly 15 million dollars to bring our children’s life-saving malaria therapy to the market. We are convinced to be able to achieve attractive returns for investors.

FO: Thank you!

July 2018

The Company was established as Jomaa Pharma GmbH in 2003 following the acquisition of Jomaa Pharmaka GmbH by BioAgency AG. Jomaa Pharmaka GmbH had been founded five years previously by Hassan Jomaa and Ewald Beck as an extension of their academic posts at the University of Giessen for the purpose of attracting venture capital to support innovative drug discovery primarily in the field of infectious disease.

Following its dissociation from BioAgency AG in 2013, Jomaa Pharma GmbH became a privately owned company, financed by corporate and individual investors. It is structured as a German/UK alliance with offices in Hamburg and Westerham respectively, and changed its name into DMG Deutsche Malaria GmbH in November 2017.

DMG Deutsche Malaria GmbH is pursuing several strategies to roll back malaria which are using fosmidomycin to enforce existing therapies as well as developing new antimalarial therapeutic alternatives. 

The company has built a promising record of drug development culminating in successful clinical studies in Far East and Africa.
The efficacy, safety and tolerance of DMG's oral fosmidomycin-piperaquine 3-day NACT therapy was established in a study in Gabon by treating a total of 100 patients consisting of adults and children aged one to 14 years and achieving a cure rate of 100% with no drug related safety issues and excellent tolerance.
In parallel, DMG is developing a triple combination against severe malaria, in which the synergistic antibiotic properties of fosmidomycin and clindamycin against both plasmodia and the concomitant bacteriaemia are enhanced by the high efficacy of the artemisinin derivative artesunate. A phase I/IIa clinical trial is in preparation.