AI Protein Design Platform MoleculeMind Completed Over CNY 100 Mn Strategic Round Funding

Healthcare Author: Lingxi Peng Feb 20, 2023 11:01 AM (GMT+8)

Synthetic biology leader Cathay Biotech seeks a more efficient AI-driven manufacturing process

DNA

The AI protein design platform MoleculeMind (Chinese: 分子之心) announced that it had completed an over CNY 100 million Strategic Funding Round, which was led by Cathay Biotech (Chinese: 凯赛生物), followed by Lenovo Capital (Chinese: 联想创投). The leading investor in Angel Round Sequoia capital (Chinese: 红杉中国) continued to invest. Proceeds will be used to develop the AI protein optimization and design platform MoleculeOS, and explore the application in industries including biopharmaceutical or synthetic biology. This is the second funds that MoleculeMind raised within one year.

Cathay Biotech is the leading company in domestic synthetic biology engaged in the R&D, production and sales of new bio-based materials based on synthetic biology and other disciplines and utilizes bio-manufacturing technology. The company produces monomer raw materials that can be used in the production of bio-based polyamides, including a series of bio-manufactured long-chain diacids and bio-based pentamethylene diamine, as well as several bio-based polyamides and related products. The products are used in many fileds such as textiles, pharmaceuticals, perfumes and other fields.

MoleculeMind was  an AI protein design platform founded in 2022 by Jinbo Xu, a professor in Computational Institute at the University of Chicago, the founder of AI protein folding technology. The RaptorX-Contact technique he developed in 2016 was first proved that deep learning can dramatically increase the accuracy of protein structure prediction, and was learned by DeepMind. The company has two R&D centers based in China and the US. Through a data-driven deep learning algorithm to analyze the protein expression, stability, and developability, the AI protein optimization and design platform MoleculeOS assists experts in identifying suitable proteins or  developing the needed protein directly, which accelerates the industrial transformation of research fruits.

MoleculeMind's competitors include Helixon (Chinese: 华深智药), TianRang XLab (Chinese: 天壤XLab), and XtalPi (Chinese: 晶泰科技).