Chai Discovery, a San Francisco-based startup backed by OpenAI, is the most recent drug discovery firm to learn from a flurry of investments on the intersection of well being care and A.I. In its newest funding spherical, the corporate raised $130 million to speed up the event of recent medicine. The Sequence B spherical, introduced immediately (Dec. 15), was co-led by Oak HC/FT and Normal Catalyst. It brings Chai Discovery’s complete funding to greater than $225 million and greater than doubles its valuation to $1.3 billion.
Different contributors included OpenAI, Thrive Capital and Menlo Ventures. Yosemite, the oncology-focused enterprise agency based by Steve Jobs’ solely son, Reed Jobs, additionally joined the spherical, together with Emerson Collective, the funding agency led by Laurene Powell Jobs.
Based in 2024, Chai Discovery is led by CEO Josh Meier, a pc scientist who previously labored at Fb (now Meta) and OpenAI. The corporate goals to make use of A.I. to show biology from a descriptive science into an engineering self-discipline. Chai launched its newest mannequin, Chai-2, which might design novel antibodies to focus on illness.
Chai Discovery plans to deploy the brand new capital to broaden its commercialization efforts whereas accelerating analysis and product growth. “We’re in awe of the speed of progress on the fashions—what seemed like five-year issues simply months in the past at the moment are getting solved in weeks,” Meier mentioned in an announcement.
Chai Discovery is one in all a rising variety of drug discovery startups drawing intense curiosity from Silicon Valley. As enthusiasm builds round A.I.’s potential in well being care, distinguished tech leaders are backing ventures at a speedy clip. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has invested in Formation Bio, whereas LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman launched his personal drug discovery startup earlier this 12 months, Manas.
Among the many most well-funded firms within the house is Isomorphic Labs, an Alphabet subsidiary spun out of Google DeepMind in 2021. Led by Demis Hassabis, CEO of Google DeepMind, the corporate raised $600 million in March in its first exterior funding spherical. The capital is geared toward advancing its ambition to make use of A.I. to assist treatment most of the world’s illnesses.
That optimism has been matched by a surge in funding. Enterprise funding for seed- by way of growth-stage A.I.-powered well being tech firms has reached $10.7 billion this 12 months, in accordance with knowledge from Crunchbase, representing a greater than 24 % enhance in comparison with the $8.6 billion raised in all of 2024.
Meier is assured the spending will repay. “We’re standing on the precipice of a brand new period for the biopharmaceutical trade,” he mentioned, including that A.I. fashions “will unleash a brand new wave of first-in-class and best-in-class therapeutics, and the early adopters in pharma would be the huge winners.”
