Protai

Protai is a drug discovery company in Israel that leverages AI and proteomics to develop novel therapeutics for complex diseases. The company’s drug discovery approach involves the mapping of diseases based on their protein-level data and interactions, to observe cellular functions. It uses its proteome database—reportedly the largest in the world—with over 50,000 clinical samples gathered by harmonizing large sets of data from 6,000 research papers. It is also building machine learning models to identify more than one million proteo-forms including protein-protein interactions, and post-translational modifications of proteins. 

Protai’s platform leverages Google subsidiary DeepMind’s AlphaFold, an AI-powered protein model predicting platform, to improve the prediction of protein-protein interactions and drug-target interactions.

The company has not disclosed its drug pipeline; however, in a proof-of-concept, it reported that its platform has identified several high-value targets for lung cancer, which are currently being researched. 

Founded in 2021, Protai emerged from stealth in January 2022, raising USD 8 million in seed funding. It has earmarked the funds to further develop its AI platform, advance its drug programs, and enhance its partnerships with pharmaceutical companies.