Genesis Therapeutics Secures $4.1M Seed Funding to Advance AI-Driven Small Molecule Drug Discovery

VCBeat (WeChat ID: vcbeat) has learned that on November 21, 2019, Genesis Therapeutics announced the completion of a $4.1 million seed funding round. The round was led by Andreessen Horowitz, with participation from Felicis Ventures.

The proceeds from this round of financing will be used by Genesis to actively recruit software engineers, AI engineers, and scientists to expand its artificial intelligence drug discovery team.

Genesis Therapeutics was founded in 2019 and is headquartered in South San Francisco, California, USA. The company is a biotechnology firm dedicated to leveraging AI technology to drive the discovery and development of novel small-molecule drugs for patients suffering from severe and debilitating diseases. It also actively collaborates with biopharmaceutical companies worldwide to jointly launch new therapies.

Genesis originated from the laboratory of Dr. Vijay Pande at Stanford University and was founded by Dr. Evan Feinberg, Ben Sklaroff, and Dr. James Schaeffer. At Stanford, Dr. Feinberg invented PotentialNet, the earliest component of the company’s expanding portfolio of proprietary AI technologies. Genesis was subsequently established to collaborate with biopharmaceutical companies in the development of drug candidates. The company combines novel deep neural networks, biophysical simulations, and large-scale scalable computational infrastructure to achieve industry-leading performance in molecular generation and property prediction.

Dr. Feinberg stated, “We have spun Genesis out of Stanford University so that we can focus on expanding our portfolio of cutting-edge AI technologies and recruit industry leaders in drug development to create a new generation of therapies for patients with serious diseases and urgent unmet medical needs. By continuously innovating in deep learning and establishing tight feedback loops between our software engineers and drug developers, we can discover more effective, selective, and bioavailable small-molecule therapies at an accelerated pace.”

Dr. Vijay Pande, Partner at Andreessen Horowitz, stated, “Genesis is leveraging biophysical simulation technologies and other proprietary deep learning techniques to continuously advance its AI platform. The company’s team has also grown into a proven group of drug developers. We chose Genesis as our bet in this emerging field due to our confidence in the team’s rigorous scientific approach, relentless innovation, and the strong track record of its founding board. We are excited to witness the impact Genesis will have on the healthcare industry in the coming decades.”

Andreessen Horowitz, founded in 2009, is a Silicon Valley-based venture capital firm managing $10 billion in assets. The firm focuses on investing globally in sectors such as software, biology, data storage, pharmaceuticals, and fintech.

Felicis Ventures, established in 2006, is a venture capital firm that has provided over $1 billion in support to 27 companies. Felicis focuses on investing in iconic companies and cutting-edge technology firms that are reshaping core markets.

(Compiled by Jiang Ying)