Bayer and Exscientia collaborate to leverage the potential of artificial intelligence in cardiovascular and oncology drug discovery

Exscientia, the leading Artificial Intelligence (AI)-driven drug discovery company, announced today that it has entered a collaboration with Bayer AG that aims to accelerate the discovery of small molecule drugs focused on cardiovascular disease and oncology.

Under terms of the agreement, Exscientia will initially work on three projects with targets agreed between both parties. Exscientia may be eligible to receive up to €240 Million, including upfront and research payments, near term and clinical milestones. As part of the agreement, Exscientia may also receive sales royalties.

Professor Andrew Hopkins, CEO of Exscientia, commented: “We’re delighted to collaborate with Bayer, a globally recognised pharmaceutical company. Since our pioneering Nature papers demonstrating the automated design of small-molecules, we have enhanced our platform and exemplified it commercially, by accelerating the discovery of future drug molecules with partners.”

Dr. Joerg Moeller, Member of the Executive Committee of Bayer AG's Pharmaceuticals Division and Head of Research and Development added, “We are driving forward digital transformation in R&D as we believe that digital technologies such as AI can simplify and speed up the discovery and development of new drugs for patients. The collaboration with Exscientia is expected to help us to achieve project milestones earlier and at the same time accelerate timelines by enabling more precise identification of suitable drug targets and lead structures.”

As part of this collaboration, Exscientia will apply its Centaur Chemist™ Artificial Intelligence (AI) drug discovery platform to go beyond conventional human endeavour by using its evolutionary computing and deep learning algorithms to discover and optimise novel drug candidates at unprecedented productivity.

About Exscientia

Exscientia is at the forefront of Artificial Intelligence (AI)-driven drug discovery and design. By fusing the power of AI with the discovery experience of seasoned drug hunters, Exscientia is the first company to automate drug design, surpassing conventional approaches.

Exscientia’s innovative Centaur Chemist™ platform enables breakthrough productivity gains as well as new approaches to improve drug efficacy. Novel compounds are automatically designed and prioritised for synthesis by its AI systems, which rapidly evolve compounds towards the desired candidate criteria for clinical development.

Exscientia systems learn from both existing data resources and experimental data from each design cycle. The principle is similar to how a human would learn, but the AI process is far more effective at identifying and assimilating multiple subtle and complex trends to balance potency, selectivity and pharmacokinetic criteria.

As a result, the AI-driven process is more likely to achieve the end goal and to do this more rapidly and efficiently than traditional human endeavour.

Exscientia is collaborating with several leading pharmaceutical and life sciences companies, has its headquarters in Oxford, UK with further offices in the UK, USA and Japan. For more information visit us on www.exscientia.ai or follow us on Twitter @exscientialtd