Google AI company strikes $3bn in drug discovery deals

AN ARTIFICIAL intelligence (AI) business backed by Google has secured $3bn (£2.4bn) worth of deals with the pharmaceutical industry to discover new drugs.

Isomorphic Labs, which was spun out of Google’s AI lab Deepmind, has signed deals with Eli Lilly and Novaratis to help develop new treatments.

Founded in 2021 by Demis Hassabis, the Deepmind chief executive, Isomorphic is trying to find commercial uses for the laboratory’s breakthroughs in protein mapping.

Deepmind’s AI breakthroughs have allowed it to map nearly all known protein structures using the company’s “Alphafold” tools.

Revealed in 2020, Alphafold has been credited with major advances in predicting the structure of proteins, solving the so-called “protein folding problem” that had eluded scientists for decades.

It is hoped the discovery will help uncover new ways to tackle diseases.

The AI technique has already been used to catalogue the 3D structures of 200m proteins.

By mapping the structures, researchers can use the technology to predict how different medical treatments will work. The technology has been hailed as a major breakthrough in biomedical science and could have uses in tackling antibiotic resistance and plastic waste.

Alphafold has already been used for drug development, with scientists synthesising a new drug to treat a common form of liver cancer.

Fiona Marshall, president of biomedical research at Novartis, said: “Cutting-edge AI technologies such as Alphafold hold the potential to transform how we discover new drugs and accelerate our ability to deliver life-changing medicines for patients.”

Isomorphic, which is owned by Google’s parent company, Alphabet, will receive $45m from US pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly in a deal that could be worth up to $1.7bn.

Swiss group Novartis will also pay $37.5m upfront in a deal that could be worth up to $1.2bn.

London-headquartered Deepmind was acquired by Google in 2014 for $400m.

‘AI holds the potential to transform how we discover new drugs and deliver life-changing medicines’