The NGO Drugs for Neglected Diseases Initiative, which seeks treatments for neglected diseases, launched a partnership in April with BenevolentAI, a British company working to develop new molecules thanks to AI. BenevolentAI is not at its first attempt. She notably brought to light, during the pandemic, the role that a molecule, baricitinib, developed by the Eli Lilly laboratory for another disease, can play in the treatment of Covid-19 patients.
One would think that AI is now all the rage. But in the pharmaceutical sector, change is more than cosmetic. Beginning 2020Exscientia, a Scottish start-up, has developed with the Japanese pharmaceutical company Sumitomo Dainippon a first molecule “built” by AIentry into clinical trial.
“It’s not futuristic: artificial intelligence is a methodological approach to data processingwhich can be used in many stages of the drug industry’s development process”says Dr. Thomas Borel, director of scientific affairs for the federation of pharmaceutical companies (Leem).
