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.
Alex Zhavoronkov, PhD, Founder and CEO of Insilico Medicine, said:
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. 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.
Min Fang, Managing Director, Head of China Healthcare at Warburg Pincus, said:
The application of artificial intelligence and machine learning for drug discovery has incredible potential to transform the way new therapies are developed. 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.
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™ and Chemistry42™ 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 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.
