Pfizer Partners with Insilico Medicine to Leverage AI for Novel Target Discovery

36Kr has learned that AI-driven drug discovery company InSilico Medicine announced a research collaboration with Pfizer. The details of the partnership involve leveraging InSilico Medicine’s machine learning technologies and its proprietary Pandomics platform to identify potential therapeutic targets for multiple diseases and to gather real-world evidence.

Pandomics is a drug discovery tool launched by InSilico Medicine, applied in the treatment of aging and cancer.

InSilico Medicine is a company that leverages next-generation artificial intelligence technologies for drug discovery. The company has branches in the United States, the United Kingdom, China, Russia, South Korea, and Nigeria. Its core artificial intelligence technologies are Generative Adversarial Networks (“GAN”) and Reinforcement Learning (“RL”).

Last September, InSilico MedicinePublished a paper in the journal Nature Biotechnology, to demonstrate the capability of AI in accelerating drug discovery. With the assistance of the Generative Tensorial Reinforcement Learning (GENTRL) system, the process from target identification to candidate molecule selection, including validation through animal experiments, took only 46 days.

“Insilico is leveraging machine learning, generativebiological methods and synthetic data generation pipelines, advancing its latest target identification system. We are pleased“Collaboration with Pfizer on target identification,” said Dr. Alex Zhavoronkov, Founder and CEO of InSilico Medicine。

Pfizer has also expressed its openness to new technologies. Dr. Morten Sogaard, Vice President of Target Sciences at Pfizer Inc., stated, “Pfizer will continue to explore new technologies, and we look forward to collaborating with InSilico Medicine. This collaborationMay help identify targets and biomarkers, potentially paving the way for futureBreakthrough Therapies for Untreated Patients.”

Insilico MedicineSince its establishment, the company has raised over USD 52 million in cumulative funding, published more than 70 pioneering papers, and filed over 20 patent applications.

According to statistics from 36Kr, the AI-driven drug discovery sector disclosed six financing rounds in 2019, indicating stable development. For this sector, large-scale financing does not necessarily instill sufficient confidence in the industry; what companies and investors are more eager to see is the validation of the platforms’ AI capabilities. Such validation can come in the form of pharmaceutical companies purchasing access to R&D pipelines or through positive clinical trial results.