Exscientia Enters $70M Collaboration to Develop Antiviral Therapeutics Against Coronavirus and Other Viruses With Pandemic Potential
8.9.2021 13:00:00 EEST | Business Wire | Press release
Exscientia, an AI-driven pharmatech company with a mission to radically improve how drugs are discovered, today announced a four-year collaboration with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, a non-profit focused on fighting global poverty, disease, and inequity, to develop small molecule therapeutics that tackle the current coronavirus pandemic and help prepare for future pandemics. The collaboration will initially focus on developing broad-spectrum coronavirus agents (e.g., SARS-CoV-2 and its variants, MERS), including accelerating Exscientia’s lead programme, which targets the main protease (Mpro) of SARS-CoV-2, the virus responsible for COVID-19. Subsequently, the collaboration will expand to develop therapeutics for influenza and Paramyxoviridae (e.g., Nipah), with the potential to develop additional programmes as identified by the joint team.
Exscientia’s AI-driven platform enables scientific concepts to be rapidly translated into precision-designed therapeutic candidates, with a goal of increasing probability of success and an accelerated path to the patient.
“The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic underscores the urgency to develop safe and effective broad-spectrum drugs to expand our armoury against viruses and their variants. We need to fight today’s pandemic but also ensure we are prepared with new drugs to combat viruses with future pandemic potential. We are honoured to work alongside the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to advance this mission by ensuring accessibility and affordability of these therapeutics globally,” commented Andrew Hopkins, Chief Executive Officer of Exscientia. “We believe that our AI-driven platform can accelerate the creation of better, more effective therapeutics that can address some of the world’s most critical and emerging health risks.”
"Small molecule therapeutics could provide a superior approach to guard global health," said Denise Barrault, Director of Portfolio Management at Exscientia. "Certain targets are prevalent across families of viruses, meaning that potent therapeutics could be broadly effective across multiple virus families. Further, this collaboration will focus on evaluating protein targets that are evolutionarily conserved and are less likely to develop resistance.”
The Gates Foundation’s programme-related investment in Exscientia was made through its Strategic Investment Fund (SIF), a team that uses a suite of financial tools to address market failures and incentivise private enterprise to develop affordable and accessible products and services for low-income populations. SIF investments are intended to further the Gates Foundation’s programmatic goals, not to generate financial returns. If any profit is generated by an investment, it will be used solely for charitable purposes through Gates Foundation philanthropic programmes.
Under the terms of the agreement, Exscientia will receive a $35 million equity investment from the SIF, with the potential for additional grant funding to help advance development candidates through commercialisation. The Gates Foundation’s programme-related investment is subject to certain closing conditions being satisfied. As a global leader in pandemic preparedness, the Gates Foundation will also contribute its extensive expertise in funding the design, development, and distribution of antiviral drugs. Exscientia will lead the initial antiviral projects and apply its platform technology to research, discover, and develop up to five Phase 1-ready small molecule therapeutics for future pandemic preparedness. Exscientia will provide $35 million in matching contributions, through operations and funding for third party activities. Exscientia maintains worldwide rights to all developed products with a commitment to make the antiviral products affordable and accessible to people in developing countries.
In July, Exscientia received a grant from the Gates Foundation to expedite the optimisation of a new class of COVID-19 therapeutics created using its AI drug design platform, focused on a novel class of inhibitors targeting the SARS-CoV-2’s main protease enzyme, Mpro, the causative agent of COVID-19. This work will continue under the collaboration announced today. Additionally, in 2020, the foundation awarded a $4.2 million grant to Exscientia to identify new innovative treatments for malaria and tuberculosis – two of the world’s leading infectious disease killers – as well as new medicines for non-hormonal contraception.
About Exscientia
Exscientia is an AI-driven pharmatech company committed to discovering, designing, and developing the best possible drugs in the fastest and most effective manner. Exscientia is the first company to progress AI-designed small molecules into the clinical setting and repeatedly demonstrate the ability of AI to transform how drug candidates are created. Exscientia’s AI platform has now designed three drugs that are in Phase 1 human clinical trials.
Drug design is precision engineering at the molecular scale. Exscientia has built dedicated AI systems that efficiently learn from the widest range of data and consistently reapply enhanced knowledge through iterations of design. Because Exscientia’s AI platform learns more effectively and rapidly than human-led efforts alone, candidate molecules satisfying complex therapeutic requirements are created with revolutionary efficiency. Exscientia believes that designing better drugs, faster, will allow the best ideas of science to rapidly become the best medicines for patients.
Exscientia has offices in Oxford, Vienna, Dundee, Miami and Osaka. For more information visit us at https://www.exscientia.ai or follow us on Twitter @exscientiaAI.
To view this piece of content from cts.businesswire.com, please give your consent at the top of this page.
View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210908005481/en/
Contact information
Exscientia Enquiries:
Edelman PR (UK)
Nathan Field
P: +44 (0)7866 411198
Nathan.Field@edelman.com
Edelman PR (US)
Amanda Lazaro
Amanda.Lazaro@edelman.com
Exscientia
Amanda Galgay
contact@exscientia.ai
About Business Wire
For more than 50 years, Business Wire has been the global leader in press release distribution and regulatory disclosure.
Subscribe to releases from Business Wire
Subscribe to all the latest releases from Business Wire by registering your e-mail address below. You can unsubscribe at any time.
Latest releases from Business Wire
Beerenberg Prevails in Patent Case Against Aspen Aerogels29.6.2026 08:00:00 EEST | Press release
The Korean Patent Court has invalidated three of Aspen Aerogels’ patents related to improved hydrophobic aerogel material. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260628192007/en/ Beerenberg delivers high-end insulation solutions built for performance, reliability, and long-term value. (Photo: Beerenberg) The ruling confirms the conclusion of the Intellectual Property Trial and Appeal Board (IPTAB) that the patents did not meet the necessary requirements for patentability. Beerenberg, which specializes in high-end insulation products, welcomes the court’s decision. “We are pleased that the case has now been concluded and that any uncertainty regarding the infringement claims has been removed,” says CEO Arild Apelthun. About Beerenberg Beerenberg has delivered cost-efficient solutions to a wide range of industrial enterprises for 49 years. The company is one of the leading suppliers of maintenance and modification serv
Seiden Law LLP States: Cambodian Businessman Leak Yim, Wrongfully Accused in Thailand, Seeks Redress in U.S. Court29.6.2026 07:00:00 EEST | Press release
Seiden Law LLP (“Seiden Law”), legal counsel for Mr. Leak Yim, a Cambodia national, and his family, announces the filing of an application in U.S. federal district court in Washington D.C., seeking court-ordered discovery to uncover the false and misleading information that may have led to mistaken prosecution in Thailand of Mr. Yim as well as his unwarranted identification to Congress as being associated with scam centers in Asia. 28 U.S.C. § 1782 (“1782”) provides powerful evidence-gathering remedies, permitting an applicant to obtain evidence in the United States to assist international proceedings. Seiden Law, a U.S. law firm with significant experience in 1782 cases, has filed this application to compel production of documents and sworn testimony from persons in the U.S. that will shed light on the circumstances surrounding recent actions against Mr. Yim. “Mr. Yim and his young family are the apparent victims of guilt by association and political persecution,” said Robert Seiden,
Sultan Bin Ahmed Attends Media Master's Graduation in Spain28.6.2026 19:40:00 EEST | Press release
His Highness Sheikh Sultan bin Ahmed bin Sultan Al Qasimi, Deputy Ruler of Sharjah and President of the University of Sharjah (UOS), attended on Friday, at the University of Barcelona, the graduation ceremony of the first cohort of the Master of Science in Media Entrepreneurship and Digital Innovation programme, first of its kind, offered by the University of Sharjah's College of Communication in partnership with the University of Barcelona and with strategic support from Sharjah Media City (Shams). This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260628429537/en/ Sultan Bin Ahmed attends Media Master's Graduation in Spain (Photo: AETOSWire) His Highness expressed his pride in their achievements and praised the strong partnership between the two universities, which share a commitment to knowledge, excellence and global understanding. His Highness stressed that graduation marks the beginning of a new journey rather than its con
VerSprite Launches Fork and Knife: AI-Driven Threat Modeling and Adversarial Testing Built for the Speed of Modern Software27.6.2026 00:28:00 EEST | Press release
VerSprite, a global leader in risk-based threat modeling and the firm behind the PASTA (Process for Attack Simulation and Threat Analysis) methodology, today announced the general availability of Fork (www.forktm.com), a continuous application threat modeling platform, alongside Knife, an AI-led, human-on-the-loop adversarial testing platform for web applications and web API endpoints. Together, the two products operationalize a new model for product security—one where applications are securely designed, continuously modeled, and actively tested as part of the build process itself. The launch addresses a problem every security leader knows but few tools have solved: threat modeling is essential, never more so than in an AI-driven era, yet it has remained slow, manual, and anchored to frameworks designed for a different threat landscape. The problem: threat modeling matters more than ever—and most tools are stuck in 2005 For two decades, application threat modeling has leaned heavily on
Venture Global Announces Closing of $1.5 Billion Senior Secured Vessel Financing Facility26.6.2026 23:30:00 EEST | Press release
Venture Global, Inc. (NYSE: VG) announced today that its wholly-owned subsidiary, Venture Global Shipping Holdings, LLC (“VGSH”), has entered into a Credit and Guaranty Agreement providing for a senior secured term loan facility (the “Facility”) in an aggregate principal amount of up to $1,500,000,000. The Facility will mature on June 26, 2032. Deutsche Bank and ING acted as coordinating lead arrangers for the Facility. ING also serves as facility agent and security trustee. VGSH intends to use the net proceeds from the Facility for general corporate purposes, including to reimburse Venture Global LNG, Inc. for payments previously made by it or its affiliates in connection with the acquisition of nine LNG carriers, funding certain reserve accounts, and paying transaction fees and expenses. About Venture Global Venture Global is an American producer and exporter of low-cost U.S. liquefied natural gas (“LNG”) with over 100 MTPA of capacity in production, construction, or development. Ven
In our pressroom you can read all our latest releases, find our press contacts, images, documents and other relevant information about us.
Visit our pressroom