Mati Gil, CEO of the Innovation Lab AION Labs Tells about the international project that is located in Israel and is attracting great interest and vigilance in the entire pharmaceutical world.
The project in question is the first alliance of its kind AstraZeneca, Merck, PfizerTeva, the Israeli Biotech Foundation and Amazon’s Internet services (AWS), powered by BioMed X With the support of the Israeli government, who joined together for a clear mission, to create and adopt new and ground-breaking artificial intelligence technologies that will change the process of drug discovery and development.
“Today, the development of a new drug takes about ten years and costs two billion dollars. Once the drug is proven, it has only a ten percent chance of succeeding in getting approved by the regulators,” says Gil, noting the main trend that the venture he heads is leading, to significantly shorten processes while using and exploiting advanced technologies . In this type of project, processes that take years in the development of a new drug will be shortened to a few weeks or even a few days.
“This is happening because there are capabilities in the field of artificial intelligence in Israel, this is happening because four pharmaceutical companies have chosen to team up and work together and not each in their own ivory tower, this is happening because the Israeli government has learned to invest in this field, because it recognizes the potential of this field to become the engine of growth of the future economy in Israel”.
The project grants one million dollars to each startup that sets out for the benefit of the first two years of its activity, and for this purpose it establishes its infrastructure in Israel. At the same time, each startup receives assistance in raising funds and resources for the continuation. “We set up 4-5 startups every year,” says Gil and adds: “This is a global venture located in Israel, but we turn to markets all over the world. We turn to the whole world and bring scientists to promote our startup, bring scientists back to Israel and provide development opportunities here in Israel So that they can continue to grow here as Israeli companies. We are fighting for global talent,” he says and thanks the Innovation Authority for supporting the entire project, noting that in the first year three of the first four startups come from abroad.