Microsoft, 1910 Genetics partner for AI-powered drug discovery revolution

Imagine a world where new drugs can be designed and developed faster, cheaper, and more effectively than ever before. A world where AI can help scientists discover novel treatments for diseases that have no cure. A world where drug discovery is not limited by human intuition, but enhanced by AI innovation.

This is the vision that Microsoft and 1910 Genetics share, and the reason why they have formed a multi-year partnership to create a next-generation AI-powered drug discovery platform. This platform will combine the best of both worlds: 1910 Genetics’ cutting-edge AI engines for designing small and large molecule therapeutics, and Microsoft’s Azure Quantum Elements platform for providing advanced AI models, powerful computing resources, and future access to quantum computing.

1910 Genetics is a biotech pioneer that leverages AI, lab automation, and its own massive datasets to design both small molecule and large molecule therapeutics. This approach has already shown promise in speeding up lead molecule discovery.

Microsoft’s Azure Quantum Elements platform is a cloud-based service that provides advanced AI models, powerful computing clusters, and future access to quantum computing tailored to accelerate chemistry and materials science breakthroughs.

Together, they aim to build the foundational infrastructure for AI-driven drug discovery and development. The platform will be available to pharmaceutical companies, biotechnology firms, and research institutions globally in various models (co-discovery, co-engineering, Platform-as-a-Service).

Key Highlights of the partnership:

• Microsoft and 1910 Genetics will expand their pilot collaboration into a five-year commercial agreement and go-to-market collaboration that combines the company’s massive computational and wet lab biological data, robotics-driven laboratory automation, and multimodal AI models for drug discovery with Microsoft Azure Quantum Elements.
• 1910 Genetics will build the infrastructure layer on which pharmaceutical and R&D teams across the world begin, accelerate and realize their transition to AI-driven drug discovery today and drug development, commercialization, post-marketing surveillance, and real world evidence tomorrow.

“We are thrilled to be collaborating with 1910 Genetics to bring their pioneering AI drug discovery engines to Azure Quantum Elements. This groundbreaking technology holds immense promise for accelerating the design of small and large molecule therapeutics. Our collaboration with 1910 Genetics demonstrates our shared commitment to innovation and our aspiration to solve some of the most challenging problems the world faces in drug discovery. We look forward to what our shared efforts will empower drug researchers to accomplish,” said Jason Zander, Executive Vice President of Strategic Missions and Technologies at Microsoft.