Bioptimus raises $41m for its GenAI model for biology

Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) player Bioptimus has swelled its coffers with another financing round, raising $41 million less than a year after emerging onto the scene with $36 million in seed funding.

The Paris, France-based start-up – formed by scientists formerly working at Google DeepMind and Owkin – launched the first version of its AI-powered universal 'foundation model' for pathology last summer and said the latest cash injection will help it develop a new version that will be available later this year and simulate biological processes "at unprecedented scale."

A foundation model is a machine learning framework that is trained on very broad and diverse data sources – bringing together genomics, transcriptomics, and proteomics data, along with other sources like biological studies, clinical trials, and medical imaging results, for example. They can be used for a host of applications, such as enhancing the understanding of disease processes and guiding new drug design.

Bioptimus claims its initial H-Optimus-0 model is already the world's largest foundation model for pathology, outperforming rival platforms developed at Harvard Medical School in the US and Leeds University in the UK on applications like predicting gene expression from morphology and subtyping ovarian cancer.

"What we are building is not just a technological breakthrough; it's a transformative tool for understanding biology in its full complexity," said Jean-Philippe Vert, co-founder and chief executive of Bioptimus, who was previously a research lead at Google Brain and chief R&D officer at Owkin.

"By learning how biology works directly from raw data across scales, from molecules to whole organisms, our model will empower researchers in the pharmaceutical industry to simulate complex biology, predict disease outcomes and response to treatment, and design therapies with unprecedented precision," he added.

"Beyond pharmaceuticals, this model will unlock limitless possibilities across many other industries, driving biological discoveries in ways we are only beginning to imagine. Essentially, it's like the GPT of biology - but instead of generating text, we're simulating biology."

The new fundraising was led by Cathay Innovation, with participation from Sofinnova Partners, Bpifrance through its Large Venture Fund, Andera Partners, Hitachi Ventures, Boom Capital Ventures, Pomifer Capital, Sunrise, and angel entrepreneurs Emmanuel Cassimatis and Thomas Wolf.

Bioptimus said it will allow it to "enhance its multi-modal AI platform by integrating even more diverse data sources and therapeutic areas, forge strategic partnerships with pharmaceutical and biotech companies, and expand critical datasets to further refine and validate its models."