Amazon's AWS launches AI drug discovery platform
Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios
Amazon's AWS launched a new application that it says will help scientists design and test novel drugs more quickly and precisely.
Why it matters: Amazon is entering the crowded AI drug discovery race, intensifying competition to achieve faster, cheaper drug development.
Zoom in: Dubbed Amazon Bio Discovery, the agentic AI application provides an AI model library that generates and evaluates potential drug molecules for new antibody therapies.
- Users can train models on their own prior experimental data to make and test drug candidates. Once a drug candidate is identified, users can send them to Amazon lab partners, including Twist Bioscience and Ginkgo Bioworks.
- Bio Discovery clients so far include Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, Bayer and Voyager Therapeutics, and Amazon said 19 of the top 20 global pharma companies already use AWS.
The big picture: Amazon's ambitions threaten a growing crop of drug discovery startups that have already raised millions from investors.
- Some startups are focused on external partnerships, while others are building their own drug portfolios.
- Novo Nordisk and OpenAI also announced a drug discovery partnership Tuesday focused on boosting Novo's efficiency across manufacturing, distribution, supply chains and corporate capabilities.
Case in point: AI drug discovery company Iambic, which has raised more than $300 million, struck a collaboration with Takeda worth about $1.7 billion in February to advance small-molecule programs in oncology, gastrointestinal and inflammation therapeutic areas.
- But Iambic also has several drug candidates in its pipeline, including a Phase 1 tyrosine kinase inhibitor for HER2-driven solid tumors.
Driving the news: Amazon revealed Bio Discovery at its life sciences symposium today in New York.
Between the lines: Amazon won't be taking a cut of milestone or royalty payments on any medicines developed with its platform, unlike other drug discovery arrangements.
- "This is an AWS product that will be priced on a usage basis, similar to all other AWS products," AWS general manager of health care and life sciences Dan Sheeran told Axios Pro.
Catch up quick: Earlier this month, AWS announced a collaboration to accelerate drug discovery with Flagship Pioneering, a biotech incubator and investor, which already has a host of drug discovery companies in its portfolio.
- AWS will be the "preferred" cloud provider for Flagship portfolio companies under the agreement.
- "We certainly hope that the companies that they create in the future will be taking advantage of Amazon Bio Discovery," Sheeran says.
Zoom out: Amazon's move follows Nvidia's January announcement of a $1 billion drug development partnership with Eli Lilly.
The bottom line: Using AI in drug discovery is going mainstream, giving Big Pharma more options.
