Manas AI has officially launched for transforming new cancer medicines discovery.
Subscribe to our email newsletter
Utilising its collaboration with Microsoft and a team of multidisciplinary scientists, the company is poised to disrupt the conventional therapeutic discovery model.
The company was co-founded by Dr Siddhartha Mukherjee, an oncologist, author, and researcher alongside Reid Hoffman, an investor and entrepreneur.
It incorporates technologies such as molecular docking, generative computational chemistry, and biology to establish a comprehensive therapeutic development pipeline, covering everything from target detection to clinical trials.
Leveraging Microsoft Azure and Microsoft’s deep AI expertise, the company plans to develop new treatments.
Through its partnership with Microsoft, Manas AI will leverage the infrastructure of Azure’s cloud computing allowing molecular docking at speeds up to 100 times faster than conventional systems.
In addition, the company is pursuing an initiative that is AI-powered, to map the core drug binding ‘rules’, which will speed up the detection of new chemical entities.
Manas AI is initially concentrating its efforts on oncology, developing treatments for aggressive malignancies including prostate cancer, lymphoma, and triple-negative breast cancer.
Manas AI co-founder Dr Siddhartha Mukherjee said: “Through the power of AI and our world-class team, we believe we can drastically reduce the time and cost it takes to bring game-changing new treatments to patients.
“I am particularly excited about the novel models for generative chemistry that Manas is developing. If these generative models work, we aspire to replace conventional experimental methods to create medicines.”
To propel its AI-driven drug discovery programmes, the company has secured $24.6m in funding.
General Catalyst led the funding round, which saw additional participation from Greylock and other investors from the life sciences and technology sectors.
These funds will be directed toward scaling its AI platform, progressing its drug candidate pipeline, and global expansion of its clinical programmes.