Breyer Capital is a premier global venture capital and private equity investor focused on catalyzing high-impact entrepreneurs in the United States and China. Founded by Jim Breyer in 2006, Breyer Capital makes long-term, idea-driven strategic investments in its chosen core areas: social media, entertainment/media, digital health, and financial technologies.  Breyer Capital actively partners with a diverse set of companies including early-stage startups building breakthrough technologies, fast growing companies, and established worldwide leading corporations. Its team enjoys helping to frame strategic investments anchored by the passion of founders and owner/operator teams, the insights of its network of world-class investors, and a conviction that artificial intelligence, machine learning, and virtual reality will transform technology and investment opportunities globally.

Breyer Capital

Healthcare & Life Sciences Investment Firm

Healthcare Venture Partners

Goldman Sachs Merchant Banking Division is a private equity and venture capital firm that provides equity and credit investment. It is a subsidiary of Goldman Sachs Group, Investment Banking and Securities Investments. It is focused on providing private equity, mezzanine debt, senior secured loans and distressed debt securities. It manages private capital globally and offers expertise to companies, investors, entrepreneurs, and financial intermediaries around the globe. It also invests in equity and credit across corporate, real estate and infrastructure strategies. Goldman Sachs Merchant Banking Division began operation in 1869, with its headquarters in New York.

Goldman Sachs Merchant Banking Division

Kohlberg Kravis Roberts is an investment firm that manages multiple alternative asset classes, including private equity, energy, infrastructure, real estate, credit, and, through its strategic partners, hedge funds. The company generates investment returns for its fund investors through a patient and disciplined investment approach, employing people, and driving growth and value creation.

Kohlberg Kravis Roberts

Casdin Capital is a fundamental research investment firm focused on the life sciences and healthcare industry. It manages a long-short equity fund and makes investments in early-stage to late-stage private investments.  Casdin was launched in 2012 by founder and CIO Eli Casdin and as of October 2020 has approximately $2.2 billion in assets under management.

Casdin Capital

Johnson & Johnson Innovation accelerates early-stage innovation through strategic collaboration. It connects potential collaborators to resources with the goal of assisting them in advancing transformation science and technology across the pharmaceutical, medical device, and consumer healthcare spectrums.

Johnson & Johnson Innovation – JJDC

Catalio Capital Management is a venture capital firm that invests in breakthrough biomedical technology companies. It was created by George Petrocheilos and Dr. Jacob Vogelstein in 2020.

Catalio Capital Management

Paige

Paige was founded in 2017 by Thomas Fuchs, Dr.Sc., and colleagues from Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. The Company builds computational pathology products designed so patients and their care teams can make effective, more informed treatment decisions. With this new class of diagnostic devices positioned to drive the future of pathology, Paige created a platform to deliver this novel technology to pathologists to transform their workflow and increase diagnostic confidence and productivity.  Paige’s lightweight platform was purpose-built with pathologists to offer an intuitive user experience, and minimize IT burden and costs while ensuring patient safety and data privacy. Paige’s products deliver insights to pathologists so they can arrive efficiently at more precise diagnoses for patients. Paige is the first company to receive FDA breakthrough designation for computational pathology products.

<div>Paige offers an AI-powered pathology computational platform for detecting cancer subtypes, enabling pathologists to make accurate digital diagnoses. The company claims its deep-learning algorithms have detected prostate cancer, skin cancer, and breast cancer accurately.&nbsp;</div>

Artificial intelligence is identifying and testing new therapies faster than ever.

AI Drug Discovery

PAIGE

Gestalt and Paige Partner to Enhance Digital Pathology Workflows with Integration of Advanced AI Algorithms

Microsoft

Paige and Microsoft are collaborating to develop the world's largest image-based AI models for cancer diagnosis and patient care, aiming to revolutionize oncology and pathology.

SaaS (Software-as-a-Service) companies providing their ML platform to other pharma companies to identify biomarkers (measurable biological signs used to determine disease progression) and predict drug response. 

To apply the power of artificial intelligence (AI) to digital pathology images to develop and deliver a new generation of clinical applications and computational biomarkers to transform cancer diagnosis and patient care

Quest Diagnostics

To enhance cancer diagnosis and care using digital pathology diagnostic data.

Leveraging personal data for custom-fit diagnosis and treatment

Precision Medicine

Secure cloud-based platforms and data sharing networks that collect, index, store, and analyze large amounts of health data and patient population data sets from sources including genomic, clinical, wearables, imaging, and population data.

PHC Holdings

To expand the global reach of Paige's AI-based digital pathology solutions, Epredia has been appointed as a commercial distribution partner, including exclusive rights in Japan.

Companies that develop an in-vitro medical device or imaging tools and tests that identify genetic mutations for both diagnostic (nature of the disease) and prognostic (likely course of the disease) purposes, allowing providers to match a patient to a specific drug or therapy.

<div>
 
 Paige offers an AI-powered pathology computational platform for detecting cancer subtypes, enabling pathologists to make accurate digital diagnoses. The company claims its deep-learning algorithms have detected prostate cancer, skin cancer, and breast cancer accurately.&nbsp;
 
 
 Paige's platform can be used to access proprietary data to generate and test digital biomarker hypotheses and also for SaaS-based deployment of digital biomarkers to identify patients for therapies and clinical trials, as well as cancer detection. Paige is the first company to receive FDA&rsquo;s breakthrough designation in 2019 for one of its pathology products, a prostate module. In 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/23180">
 October 2023
 </a>
 , it received another breakthrough device designation from the FDA for its breast cancer detection tool, Paige Lymph Node.
 
 
 Key customers and partnerships
 
 
 The company started commercializing its Paige Prostate from 2019, which is a first-to-market prostate cancer detection solution. Its AI solutions are vendor-agnostic, which allows Paige to cater to a broad range of customers.&nbsp;
 
 
 The company collaborated with several companies, including 
 <a href="https://invicro.com/invicro-and-paige-partner-to-offer-comprehensive-tissue-biomarker-profiling-services/">
 Invicro LLC 
 </a>
 (January 2020), 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/11137">
 Janssen
 </a>
 (June 2022), 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/13275">
 OptraSCAN
 </a>
 (September 2022), 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/17043">
 Leica Biosystem
 </a>
 s (March 2023), 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/21127">
 Ohio State University&rsquo;s Wexner Medical Center 
 </a>
 (August 2023), and 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/21665">
 Microsoft
 </a>
 (September 2023). 
 Funding and financials
 
 
 The company closed a USD 220 million 
 <a href="https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210309005546/en/Paige-Secures-Financing-from-KKR-for-Total-Series-C-Funding-Round-of-Over-125-Million">
 Series C
 </a>
 funding in March&nbsp; 2021, co-led by Casdin Capital, Johnson and Johnson Innovation (JJDC) and Kolberg KravisRoberts, with plans to expand geographically and grow further develop clinical applications, biomarkers, and AI-based diagnostics.
 
</div>

<div>
 
 HiberCell is a biotechnology company that develops novel therapies focused on oncology. It entered the AI drug discovery space when it acquired AI genomics analysis company Genuity Science (and its subsidiaries in Iceland and Ireland) in August 2021.&nbsp;
 
 
 Genuity Science&rsquo;s solutions include end-to-end therapeutic discovery and development services such as building custom disease datasets, discovering and prioritizing targets, identifying biomarkers, and optimizing clinical trials. Genuity Science leverages its AI-powered platform to manage, process, and analyze genomic data. HiberCell intends to use Genuity Science&rsquo;s AI/ML capabilities to advance its oncology pipeline of five programs, of which one has reached the Phase 2 clinical trial stage.
 
 
 As of March 2024, the company&rsquo;s pipeline included three drug candidates, namely: 1) HC-7366, targeting the general control nonderepressible 2 (GCN2) kinase as part of the integrated stress response (ISR) signaling pathway; 2) HC-5404, aimed at inhibiting the PKR-like endoplasmic reticulum kinase (PERK) involved in the unfolded protein response (UPR) signaling pathway; and 3) odetiglucan, a therapy targeting tumor-immune interactions within the tumor microenvironment​.&nbsp;
 
 
 Key customers and partnerships
 
 
 In December 2023, HiberCell and Merck &amp; Co partnered to conduct a Phase Ib trial to evaluate the combination therapy of belzutifan and HC-7366 for treating clear cell renal cell carcinoma. Further, in January 2021, the company partnered with Biodesix to develop an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay as a companion diagnostic test.
 
 
 Funding and financials
 
 
 In 
 <a href="https://hibercell.com/news/hibercell-closes-67-4-million-series-b-financing-and-secures-30-million-debt-facility-from-hercules-capital/">
 May 2021
 </a>
 , HiberCell completed a Series B financing round, raising USD 67.4 million, and secured an additional USD 30 million in debt financing from Hercules Capital. The funds were expected to be used for clinical advancement of its novel therapeutic candidates. 
 
</div>

HiberCell

<div>
 
 Arbor Biotechnologies specializes in gene editing to develop novel therapeutics for a variety of indications, starting with liver-related diseases. It operates an AI-powered biodiscovery platform to discover novel CRISPR enzymes, which are sequences of repeating genetic code. To do this, its platform deploys computational search techniques, genome sequencing, gene synthesis, and high-throughput screening. This can eventually be turned into drugs or even applied to agriculture and other industrial uses. In 2018, the company announced the discovery of Cas13d, a new type of gene editing enzyme that helps to alter RNA to treat genetic diseases.&nbsp;
 
 
 As of February 2024, the company had five internal drug discovery programs, of which one was in the IND-enabling stage. It also has multiple collaborative programs under development focused on oncology and various other therapeutic areas.
 
 
 Key customers and partnerships
 
 
 The company has a long-standing partnership with Vertex Pharmaceuticals since
 <a href="https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20190103005194/en/Vertex-and-Arbor-Biotechnologies-Establish-Collaboration-to-Discover-Novel-Proteins-to-Advance-Discovery-of-Gene-Editing-Therapies">
 January 2019
 </a>
 , which focused on developing gene-editing treatments for cystic fibrosis and four other diseases. The alliance was further extended in 
 <a href="https://www.biospace.com/article/vertex-and-arbor-strike-a-1-2-billion-deal-for-gene-editing-programs/">
 August 2021
 </a>
 and 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/15741">
 January 2023
 </a>
 .&nbsp;
 
 
 Other partnerships included a collaboration with 
 <a href="https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/arbor-biotechnologies-announces-collaboration-with-ginkgo-bioworks-to-advance-the-discovery-and-development-of-precision-gene-editors-302011991.html">
 Ginkgo Bioworks
 </a>
 (December 2023) to leverage Ginkgo's R&amp;D services to further optimize Arbor's novel precision editors, a non-exclusive licensing agreement with 
 <a href="https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2022/02/08/2380680/0/en/EdiGene-and-Arbor-Biotechnologies-Announce-Worldwide-Non-exclusive-License-Agreement-to-Advance-Ex-Vivo-Engineered-Cell-Therapy-Programs.html">
 EdiGene
 </a>
 (February 2022) to leverage Arbor&rsquo;s platform for ex vivo oncology therapies, a strategic research and non-exclusive licensing agreement with 
 <a href="https://investors.tcr2.com/news-releases/news-release-details/tcr2-therapeutics-and-arbor-biotechnologies-establish">
 TCR2 Therapeutics
 </a>
 (January 2022) to develop allogeneic TRuC T-cell therapies using Arbor&rsquo;s CRISPR technology, and a license agreement with 
 <a href="https://www.lonza.com/news/2020-12-23-14-00">
 Lonza
 </a>
 (December 2020) to use Arbor&rsquo;s gene-editing technology for Lonza&rsquo;s bioproduction products and services.
 
 
 Funding and financials
 
 
 In its latest Series B funding round in November 2021, which was led by Ally Bridge Group, TCG Crossover, and Temasek, Arbor Biotechnologies raised USD 215 million. The proceeds of the round were earmarked to fuel the company&rsquo;s clinical development pipeline.
 
</div>

Arbor Biotechnologies

Based in the UK, Arctoris provides an automated drug discovery platform, offering fully validated research and development (R&amp;D) processes under an Experiments-as-a-Service model. The company works with biotechnology companies, AI drug discovery companies, pharma and academic institutions enabling these institutions to run experiments in Arctoris’s platform and provides on-demand access to a broad scale of datasets for AI drug discovery companies to train their algorithms.

Arctoris

<div>
 
 Frontier Medicines leverages AI/ML technologies to develop treatments for cancer-causing proteins that are dismissed by traditional pharma companies as undruggable.&nbsp;
 
 
 The company has a proprietary chemoproteomic platform which entails an approach based on the interaction of small-molecule compounds and proteins to screen a large number of targets and combine them with a protein database that contains more than 150,000 novel binding pockets (hotspots). This enables it to access 90% of the human proteome that were not previously targeted due to lack of hotspots. The platform&rsquo;s AI/ML engine incorporates a library of diverse compounds, a hotspot map that serves as the starting point for understanding the druggability of a potential therapeutic target, and lead design and generation.&nbsp;
 
 
 The company focuses on oncology and immunology target and, as of February 2024, it had five wholly-owned therapeutic programs and three AbbVie-partnered programs in its pipeline. All programs were in their discovery stage, except the company&rsquo;s lead candidate, FMC-376 (activated and inactivated forms), focused on treating different cancer types, including non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), colorectal carcinoma (CRC), and pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC), which is in the IND-enabling stage.
 
 
 Key customers and partnerships
 
 
 The company entered a USD 100 million partnership with 
 <a href="https://news.abbvie.com/2020-12-02-AbbVie-and-Frontier-Medicines-Establish-Global-Partnership-to-Discover-and-Develop-Novel-Therapies-and-E3-Degraders-Against-Difficult-to-Drug-Targets">
 AbbVie
 </a>
 In December 2020 to develop small-molecule therapeutics against hard-to-drug protein targets including around 600 E3 ligases (the enzymes that drive the ubiquitination and degradation of proteins.&nbsp;
 
 
 Funding and financials
 
 
 In July 2021, the company raised USD 88.5 million in a 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/4347">
 Series B
 </a>
 funding round co-led by Woodline Partners LP and RA Capital Management, with equal participation from Deerfield Management Company. The proceeds were earmarked for advancing the company&rsquo;s drug pipeline and expanding operations in Boston, where its new facility was to complement the company&rsquo;s headquarters in California. 
 
</div>

Frontier Medicines

<div>
 
 Verge Genomics is a biotechnology company engaged in developing therapeutics for neurological diseases using human genomics and AI to accelerate drug discovery. The main target areas are Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), Parkinson&rsquo;s Disease (PD), and Frontotemporal Dementia (FTD).&nbsp;
 
 
 It has built a proprietary all-human platform (unlike standard clinical trials that rely on animal data), called CONVERGE, that uses data sets from brain tissue samples of deceased patients with ALS and PD. While most drugs target only one gene at a time, the company claims its technology can identify hundreds of genes that cause disease and develop drugs that target all the genes at the same time. The company uses AI technology to optimize the drug discovery process as a whole.
 
 
 As of March 2024, Verge had one drug candidate in the clinical stage (Phase I) and 10 drug candidates in the discovery stage.&nbsp;
 
 
 Key customers and partnerships
 
 
 The company has partnerships with various tissue banks (such as Harvard University and University of Miami Miller School of Medicine) and several educational institutes and foundations (such as Target ALS, Answer ALS) that enabled its drug discovery platform.&nbsp;
 
 
 In addition, the company&rsquo;s customers include several pharmaceutical companies, such as 1) 
 <a href="https://www.vergegenomics.com/news-blog/verge-genomics-announces-research-collaboration-with-the-sheffield-institute-for-translational-neuroscience">
 Sheffield Institute for Translational Neuroscience (SITraN)
 </a>
 to accelerate the validation of novel drug targets and screening of drug compounds for Parkinson's disease (February 2021), 2) 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/4146">
 Eli Lilly
 </a>
 to research and develop novel therapies to treat ALS (July 2021), 3) 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/21707">
 Alexion
 </a>
 to identify novel drug targets for rare neurodegenerative and neuromuscular diseases (September 2023), and 4) 
 <a href="https://www.vergegenomics.com/news-blog/verge-genomics-and-the-pritzker-neuropsychiatric-disorders-research-consortium-form-cutting-edge-schizophrenia-research-collaboration">
 Pritzker Neuropsychiatric Disorders Research Consortium
 </a>
 to analyze data from schizophrenic patient&rsquo;s brain tissue with Verge&rsquo;s technology (October 2023).
 
 
 Funding and financials
 
 
 In December 2021, Verge raised USD 98 million in an oversubscribed 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/7426">
 Series A
 </a>
 funding round led by BlackRock. The funds were used to scale up its pre-clinical and clinical candidate programs in the pipeline and enhance its lead therapeutics through clinical testing. 
 
</div>

Verge Genomics

SaaS (Software-as-a-Service) companies providing their ML platform to other pharma companies for drug discovery services such as target selection, validation and lead optimization.

SaaS (Software-as-a-Service) companies providing their ML platform to other pharma companies to design and run preclinical experiments.

SaaS (Software-as-a-Service) companies aggregating and analyzing biomedical data with the help of AI to generate insights across the drug development pipeline.

Biotechnology companies that have integrated AI as a core component of their in-house drug development process. They typically have a few in-house drug development programs, and also collaborate with pharma companies to develop certain drugs.

Companies leverage GenAI to support drug discovery through accelerated drug designing

Companies offer AI/ML-based SaaS products to accelerate the discovery and development of novel therapeutics

Offers AI/ML-based solutions to accelerate drug discovery and development

DISRUPTOR_PRESENT

<div>
 <ul>
 <li>New York-based AI biotechnology company Paige has received breakthrough device designation from the FDA for its breast cancer detection tool Paige Lymph Node.</li>
 <li>Paige Lymph Node is an in-vitro diagnostic medical device software based on a deep learning model trained using over 32,000 digitized hematoxylin and eosin lymph node slides. It is capable of detecting breast cancer metastases in lymph node tissue including the detection of suspicious areas of potential breast cancer metastasis, identification of breast cancer micro-metastases and isolated tumor cells in lymph node tissue, and enhanced diagnostic accuracy and confidence.</li>
 </ul>
</div>

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