The AI platform from the Vancouver company will generate chemical compounds based on Merck therapeutic purposes.
The Vancouver Startup using artificial intelligence (AI) to detect new drugs made a deal with a pharmaceutical giant Merck value “up to 349 million US dollars (482 million US dollars).
“This partnership meaningfully increases our profile in Discovery with AI support.”
Valentin Beuchillot, Variation AI
In the agreement, it will lead to variation of AI to use its AI drug detection platform, which is studying at the Merck Proprietary Data to generate molecular candidates for therapeutic purposes. Merck will have the exclusive right to develop and commercialize any compounds that arise as a result of cooperation, while variations receives an unsolved, preliminary payment. The variation will receive complete compensation if it completes the unsolved milestones.
Senior manager Variation, Valentin Beiullot, does not disclose the financial terms of the agreement in an electronic letter to Betakit, but said that he follows “ordinary “Biobucks” structureureputation”
“In Merck, we are working to use the AI potential to increase the efficiency, speed and quality of candidates earlier in the discovery continuum,” said Robert Garbaccio Vice President Merck Research Laboratories. “We are looking forward to working with variation of AI in order to apply our Enki platform to complex therapeutic purposes.”
Variations Enki platform It helps to design molecules for detecting drugs in a similar way, other AI models can generate images. Enki generates molecular structures based on the target product profile, which is installed through a series of tips describing molecules using the chemical language.
Variational was founded in 2019 by General Director Handol Kim, Technical Director Jason Rolf and the head of the Ali Saburali platform, who worked in the D-Wave Canadian Quantum Company in front of him. moved In the United States. According to Beauchilot, the company has about 20 full -time employees. He would not say how many customers the company serves.
The new contract is a product of working relations established between Merck and variations in January 2024, when Merck became Earry user Enki through CQDM Quantum Leap The relationship program went deeper at the beginning of this year, when Merk participated in variations of 5.5 million US dollars (7.6 million cap). Round of seed expansion Through its global innovation fund in the field of healthcare. Beuchillot said that the new contract between the two companies is separated from the CQDM project, but “emphasizes strong technical compliance” between the teams.
“This partnership meaningfully increases our profile in Discovery with AI support with AI,” Beukilot said. “This is a strong voice of confidence in the severity of our science and the quality of our platform, and this emphasizes that variations are a reliable, large -scale partner in this industry.”
There are a number of Canadian firms involved in the detection of AI drugs that are trying to make pharmaceutical production cheaper and less labor -intensive. Toronto -based protein Praised 11 million dollars For its own platform for the detection of drugs with AI at the beginning of this year. The platform is focused on treatment methods using peptides or smaller versions of proteins. Other Canadian leaders include Shop And Deep genomicField
The image function is provided by UNSPLASH. Image by Paul EinerhandField
