First investment for Colorcon Ventures in AI drug discovery leader

Atomwise technology removes the barriers of physical screening that have limited the success of traditional methods for small molecule drug discovery.

The company’s technology, called AtomNet, removes the barriers of physical screening that have limited the success of traditional methods for small molecule drug discovery. Today, AtomNet screens libraries of more than 16 billion molecules against novel biological targets in less than 2 days.

R&D productivity is, according to Martti Hedman, CEO at Colorcon, a "major pain point" for the pharmaceutical industry. To help ease this, Atomwise uses AI for small molecule drug discovery, enabling significant time and cost savings for customers around the world.

With the new investment, Atomwise will continue to scale its AI technology platform — the largest AI-driven drug discovery portfolio in history — and team.

“Over the past 3 years, our platform AtomNet has tackled — and succeeded — in finding small molecule hits for more undruggable targets than any other AI drug discovery platform,” said Abraham Heifets, Atomwise’s co-founder and CEO.

Colorcon Venture's support will also help Atomwise expand $5 billion+ deal pipeline for small molecule drug discovery.

The company also plans to expand its work with corporate partners, which currently include major players in the biopharma space such as Eli Lilly, Bayer, Hansoh Pharmaceuticals, and Bridge Biotherapeutics, as well as emerging biotechnology companies including StemoniX and SEngine Precision Medicine.