Orion, a Finnish pharmaceutical manufacturer with over a century of history, operates globally in the development, production and marketing of human and veterinary medicines alongside active pharmaceutical ingredients. The company's research efforts have long incorporated computational approaches, with such methods in use for more than two decades. Now, the LUMI supercomputer is playing an expanding role in accelerating Orion's product pipeline. The firm is simultaneously broadening its research footprint in the United Kingdom and United States to strengthen its position in the world's largest drug markets. Cancer and pain represent Orion's principal therapeutic focus areas, though its proprietary treatments address respiratory and neurological conditions as well.

Computational methods at the heart of drug development

Understanding disease mechanisms—including tumor progression, treatment resistance and cancer cell persistence—forms the foundation of pharmaceutical research, with this knowledge then driving new therapeutic design. Within Orion's development operations, computational approaches occupy a central position, particularly molecular simulations of prospective drugs, a practice with a proven track record of spurring breakthroughs.

Orion and CSC initiated their collaboration in summer 2024, following the Supercomputing for Business event organised by CSC. Discussions between Professor Antti Poso and CSC Development Manager Atte Sillanpää catalysed the partnership, enabling Orion to deploy the LUMI supercomputer for molecular dynamics simulations across its expansive drug development efforts.

From idea to practice

In the early stages, our computational workload was better suited to commercial cloud environments, but as our ambitions grew, the situation began to evolve. We quickly moved from ideas to practice when the time was right—and we're still on that path

Heikki Käsnänen, Head of Molecular Intelligence and Data at Orion Pharma

Käsnänen brought prior experience with CSC's supercomputing infrastructure from his doctoral research in the early 2000s, positioning him to champion high-performance computing as a tool for expediting Orion's development trajectory. The company procures its computing resources directly from CSC. Orion strengthened its research capabilities by recruiting Tuulikki Tuukkanen, a Principal Scientist and seasoned computational researcher, from Germany to lead molecular modeling efforts on LUMI.

Using physics-based molecular simulations and AI methods, we investigate, for example, how the target protein behaves at the atomic level, how the drug molecule binds to it, and how precisely it recognises the exact protein target. We also investigate how structural changes in the protein, such as mutations, can affect the drug's activity

Tuulikki Tuukkanen

Orion as a leader: toward a new generation of drug development

The pharmaceutical sector represents a cornerstone export industry for Finland and a source of future economic expansion. Orion leads the research agenda within Business Finland's Veturi project, a consortium encompassing more than 50 participants spanning startups, established enterprises and research institutions. This initiative seeks to modernise pharmaceutical R&D practices through enhanced data and artificial intelligence deployment, positioning Finland to maintain its competitive standing as the sector undergoes fundamental transformation.

LUMI is easy to use and well documented

Orion's engagement with LUMI has yielded positive results. Despite Tuukkanen's prior work outside Finland and unfamiliarity with CSC's computing systems, the transition proceeded without significant obstacles.

LUMI is very well documented, and you quickly become familiar with its special features. We've really only needed CSC's expert support during the implementation for installing a few new software packages

Tuulikki Tuukkanen

Our collaboration has since deepened, and in recent years we've received valuable assistance from Atte Sillanpää and his team. They have played a key role, for example, in the successful implementation of a key workflow. We greatly appreciate their contribution and are extremely grateful for their valuable assistance

Tuulikki Tuukkanen

CSC's science support team provides ongoing assistance to Tuukkanen's group, including automation of GROMACS-based software execution within the HPC setting and optimisation of resource allocation. Through the BioExcel project partnership, CSC maintains direct relationships with the developers of these tools, enabling the in-depth technical support that has proven essential.

CSC's science support team assists Tuukkanen's team as needed with, among other things, automating the use of GROMACS-based software for job runs in the HPC environment and optimising resource utilisation. CSC has close ties with the developers of these software tools through the BioExcel project collaboration, and the direct, in-depth support we've received from them has been invaluable

Atte Sillanpää

Advancing Finnish drug development

For Orion, the key benefits of using LUMI are its computational speed, parallel processing capabilities, and reliability. Orion plays a central role in Finland's drug research ecosystem, and we want to actively strengthen Finnish product development

Heikki Käsnänen

In the future, we will be able to tell our Finnish customers that the drugs developed to meet their needs were created using Finnish expertise and the LUMI supercomputer

Tuulikki Tuukkanen

Käsnänen notes that Orion is navigating a period of substantial expansion and transformation, encompassing workforce development and broadened deployment of simulation and machine learning capabilities. LUMI will remain instrumental in this evolution.

Dan Still, Partnership Manager at CSC, views the relationship as strategically significant. "Orion is a very interesting client for CSC. The pharmaceutical industry is one of the fastest-growing sectors, and research and computing play a permanent role in it. It is important for us to understand the industry's evolving R&D needs, and our collaboration with Orion has provided valuable experience in this regard," Still stated.