Two biotechs say they're using AI to conjure drugs from scratch. Their documents suggest otherwise

Abstraction: Biotech firms' AI drug-design claims scrutinized against actual evidence

Key points:

• Absci CEO Sean McClain claimed at J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference 2023 to be "first and only company to design and validate new antibodies with zero-shot generative AI"
• McClain stated the approach "completely eliminates all the biological discovery technologies that currently exist"
• STAT News investigation suggests the documentary evidence from Absci and Generate Biomedicines does not fully support their bold AI-from-scratch drug design claims
• The article reflects broader concerns about AI hype in biotech coinciding with ChatGPT's early popularity in early 2023
• Absci was founded in 2011 and had a market cap near $2B at time of the presentation

Connections: Absci · Generate Biomedicines · Drug Discovery · AI For Science · Generative AI

Source: https://www.statnews.com/2025/02/10/ai-drug-development-claims-by-biotech-companies-absci-generate-biomedicines-questioned/