Chinese AI drug discovery startup XtalPi has raised another $46 million this year, in an extension of its venture capital round, to finance expansion of its computerized pharmaceutical research platform.

The new investment was led by China Life Healthcare Fund, with participation from SIG and Yael Capital, and adds to the original $15 million series B round that closed in January. That round, which included support from Sequoia China, Google and Tencent, brings XtalPi’s total fundraising to over $66 million.

XtalPi was launched with the goal of integrating quantum physics and AI to create drug discovery and development applications that predict the properties of small molecules, and help researchers accelerate and de-risk new projects.

"For the next step, we want to open our base solution platform to support other developers of drug research and development algorithms," Shuhao Wen, XtalPi’s co-founder and chairman, said in a statement.

"Through this, we will help global pharmaceutical companies connect with a wide range of the latest AI research tools in an easily accessible way, and thereby further improve the efficiency of drug discovery and development," he added.

Founded in 2014 by a group of Massachusetts Institute of Technology physicists, the company has since grown to three locations, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Beijing and Shenzhen, China.

The new financing will support XtalPi's AI applications in drug R&D that expand the searchable chemical space for discovery work, as well as optimize later stages of development.

It also intends to upgrade the cloud-computing power and data security of its Intelligent Digital Drug Discovery and Development platform, known as ID4, to offer customized solutions to pharmaceutical companies.

In May, Pfizer announced an expansion of its collaboration with XtalPi to drug design and solid form selection; previously the two companies worked on crystal structure prediction and screening.

As part of project, a portion of the molecular mechanics parameters generated using public-domain compounds will be made available to the public, XtalPi said at the time.

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