Paris, France and London, UK — December 10, 2024 — AQEMIA, a pioneering techbio that teaches atomic scale physics to a generative AI to invent innovative medicines, announces two major milestones: $100 million in cumulative funding and the beginning of a global expansion starting with London (United Kingdom).
The new $38 million funding round, led by new investor Cathay Innovation, brings total funds raised since inception to over $100 million. This round, coming less than a year after the previous one, follows the successful validation of AQEMIA’s drug discovery platform through outstanding results in internal preclinical programs and pharmaceutical partnerships, particularly in oncology. The funding will support AQEMIA’s development goals, including preparations for clinical trials.
“This is a transformative moment for AQEMIA,” said Maximilien Levesque, PhD, CEO and co-founder of AQEMIA. “Less than a year after our last round, this successful fundraising and the opening of our new London office mark significant strides toward our ambition to accelerate the discovery of new medicines on a global scale. Partnering with Cathay Innovation brings international expertise, particularly in the US and Asia, reinforcing our vision and mission. With this momentum, we are poised to advance to clinical trials, bringing us closer to delivering life-changing treatments to patients in need.”
This new round is led by Cathay Innovation, followed by historical investors Wendel, Bpifrance Large Venture, Eurazeo, and Elaia.
“AQEMIA embodies the future of drug discovery, uniquely combining the power of AI and quantum mechanics to address theoretical questions around efficacy and bring potentially life-changing new drugs to market faster,” says Jacky Abitbol, Partner at Cathay Innovation. “We are long-term supporters of entrepreneurs harnessing the transformative potential of AI to reshape healthcare and are fully aligned with Maximilien and Emmanuelle’s vision to profoundly transform the world of molecule research and the larger pharma industry. Our partnership goes beyond capital support—we look forward to unlocking new opportunities with our healthcare and pharma ecosystem and bringing deep expertise in scaling AI-driven companies around the world as AQEMIA accelerates its path to the clinic and expands its global impact.”
In addition to reaching the $100 million funding milestone, AQEMIA announces the opening of its London office, scheduled for January 2025 in the King’s Cross area. This expansion strengthens AQEMIA’s presence in the UK’s dynamic tech and biotech sectors. The new location will provide access to the UK’s rich talent pool, especially in life sciences and techbio, as the company continues its global recruitment efforts across all levels.
AQEMIA will also use the proceeds to continue to advance its technology platform—teaching quantum-inspired, atomic-scale physics to generative AI—to transform drug discovery, designing innovative and safe small-molecule drugs with high efficiency. By teaching theoretical physics to the generative AI, AQEMIA does not need experimental data to train on, unlocking truly innovative molecular designs, further away from existing molecules—a key challenge for genAI today. The drug discovery platform is now proven to work, as demonstrated by AQEMIA’s recent preclinical successes: (i) in their most advanced oncology programs with in vivo results, which continue to progress toward clinical trials, and (ii) through AQEMIA’s $140 million collaboration with Sanofi, announced in December 2023, which already underscored the platform’s potential and strong industry recognition.
About Aqemia
AQEMIA is a next-gen Techbio company building one of the world’s fastest-growing drug discovery pipelines. Our mission is to rapidly design innovative drug candidates for critical diseases. What sets us apart is our unique use of physics and statistical mechanics algorithms to power generative AI, enabling the design of novel drug candidates without relying on experimental data. We have already achieved several drug discovery successes within our internal pipeline and through collaborations with leading pharmaceutical companies, with our most advanced programs currently undergoing in vivo optimization.
For more information, visit AQEMIA.com and our LinkedIn
About Cathay Innovation
Cathay Innovation is a multistage venture capital firm, affiliated to Cathay Capital, investing in founders building transformative businesses across Europe, North America, Asia, Latin America and Africa. Its platform connects founders with investors and its ecosystem of leading Fortune500 corporations to help startups scale and transform industries with consumer to enterprise and AI solutions in commerce, fintech, digital health and mobility/energy’
Founded in Paris in 2015, Cathay Innovation now manages over $2.5B AUM with additional offices in San Francisco, Berlin, Shanghai and Singapore and has invested in over 100 startups including Chime, Pinduoduo (NASDAQ: PDD), Glovo, Wallbox (NYSE: WBX), Owkin, Getaround, Ledger, ZenBusiness, Alma, Descartes Underwriting and more.
To learn more, visit us at www.cathayinnovation.com or follow us on LinkedIn or Twitter @cathayinnov