Insilico Medicine Raises $60 Million in Series D Financing to Advance Pipeline and Launch AI-powered Drug Discovery Robotics Laboratory
PR96347
NEW YORK, June 6, 2022 /PRNewswire=KYODO JBN/ --
Insilico Medicine, a clinical-stage end-to-end artificial intelligence
(AI)-driven drug discovery company, announced today that it has completed a $60
million Series D financing from a syndicate of global investors with expertise
in investing in the biopharmaceutical and life sciences sectors.
New investors, including a large, diversified asset management firm on the US
West Coast and BHR Partners joined the round, along with current investors,
including lead investor of Series C financing round Warburg Pincus, B Capital
Group, Qiming Venture Partners, BOLD Capital Partners and Pavilion Capital.
Insilico's founder and CEO, Alex Zhavoronkov, PhD, also invested in the Series
D round.
Capital raised in the round will further bolster Insilico's financial position
and fuel the growth of its advancing pipeline, including its lead program which
is currently in a Phase I study, and continued development of its Pharma.AI
platform. The proceeds will also fund ongoing global expansion and planned
strategic initiatives, including a fully automated, AI-driven robotic drug
discovery laboratory, and fully robotic biological data factory to complement
Insilico's vast curated data assets.
"Despite unprecedented market conditions in the biotechnology sector, we raised
this Series D round from several of the most reputable US-based and global
investors," said Alex Zhavoronkov, PhD, Founder and CEO of Insilico Medicine.
"It is a testament to the strength of our end-to-end AI platform, which has
been validated by many partners, and produced our first novel antifibrotic
program discovered using AI and aging research, and designed using our
generative AI chemistry engine. This unique program completed a first-in-human
Phase 0 study in healthy volunteers and has entered Phase I clinical trials. We
have also nominated seven preclinical candidates across a number of other
disease indications since 2021. I am very excited about this progress and have
decided to personally invest in this round."
"The application of artificial intelligence and machine learning for drug
discovery has incredible potential to transform the way new therapies are
developed," said Min Fang, Managing Director, Head of China Healthcare at
Warburg Pincus. "For Insilico, 2022 is a year of incredible growth and
progress. They have demonstrated the value of combining deep scientific
expertise with cutting-edge technology capabilities to significantly accelerate
drug discovery. We're delighted to continue to partner with the Insilico team
and support a company that is at the forefront of this innovation."
Since the previous round of financing, Insilico has developed a growing
portfolio in frontier areas empowered by its proprietary AI platform. Seven
programs in its internal pipeline have progressed to the IND-enabling stage,
including a novel 3CL protease inhibitor for COVID-19 treatment(
and two synthetic lethality programs targeting MAT2A(
and USP1(
for oncology. It also successfully completed a Phase 0 microdose study and
entered a Phase I clinical trial(
with its first internally developed program targeting fibrosis.
"With the power of cutting-edge AI platforms developed fully in house and
validated by many global pharmaceutical companies and our innovative, highly
parallel, fully distributed drug discovery model, we nominated seven
preclinical candidates since I joined the company in 2021," said Feng Ren, PhD,
Insilico's Chief Scientific Officer and Head of Global Research and
Development. "I have 15 years of experience working in large pharmaceutical
companies and CROs and I am impressed by the speed and quality of our discovery
programs. We plan to continue expanding the breadth of the pipeline and enhance
our AI and robotics capabilities globally. Our rapidly growing team is composed
of talented and experienced scientists in drug discovery with diverse
backgrounds and relentless passion for novelty and innovation, and fully
committed to developing novel drugs with a sense of urgency for the waiting
patients."
Insilico has also expanded its collaborations with the pharmaceutical industry
through co-development and software licensing deals with a number of major
pharmaceutical companies. Since the launch of its PandaOmics(TM) and
Chemistry42(TM) in late 2020, nine out of the top 20 pharmaceutical companies
have licensed Insilico's AI platforms. In 2022, Insilico signed a multi-asset
partnership deal with Fosun Pharma and EQRX in January, and a drug discovery
co-development deal with EQRx in March. Notably, Insilico achieved its first
major milestone and nominated a preclinical candidate for the QPCTL program for
cancer immunotherapy(
in less than 40 days into the strategic collaboration with Fosun Pharma.
About Insilico Medicine
Insilico Medicine, a clinical stage end-to-end artificial intelligence
(AI)-driven drug discovery company, is connecting biology, chemistry, and
clinical trials analysis using next-generation AI systems. The company has
developed AI platforms that utilize deep generative models, reinforcement
learning, transformers, and other modern machine learning techniques to
discover novel targets and to design novel molecular structures with desired
properties. Insilico Medicine is delivering breakthrough solutions to discover
and develop innovative drugs for cancer, fibrosis, immunity, central nervous
system diseases and aging-related diseases.
SOURCE: Insilico Medicine
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