Softbank leads $225m series-D round for Exscientia

Eliza Punshi
28 April 2021

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UK-based, AI-led pharmaceuticals company Exscientia has raised $225m in a series-D funding round led by SoftBank, via its Softbank Vision Fund 2i.

SoftBank is providing an additional $300m equity commitment that can be drawn at the company's discretion. Including this, and the latest funding, Exscientia has so far raised $626m over four funding rounds.

Also joining the round were Novo Holdings, Blackrock, Mubadala Investment Company, Farallon Capital, Casdin Capital, GT Healthcare Capital, Marshall Wace, Pivotal bioVenture Partners, Laurion Capital, Hongkou and Bristol Myers Squibb.

The funding will allow the company, which uses artificial intelligence to design patient-based drugs, to continue scaling its pipeline through clinical testing and continue expanding its technology platform.

Previous funding
Exscientia raised $15m in funding from drug discovery specialist Evotec in September 2017.

Two years later, GT Healthcare Capital Partners backed the company in a $26m round in January 2019. New investor Celgene Corporation and previous backer Evotec also took part in the round.

In May last year, Novo Holdings led a $60m series-C funding round for Exscientia, with Evotec, Bristol Myers Squibb and GT Healthcare Capital also taking part.

Company
Founded in 2012 and based in Oxford, Exscientia is a clinical-stage pharmaceutical company that uses AI across its platform to engineer new medicines. The company has advanced the first two fully-AI-designed drugs into clinical trials and now has more than 20 active programmes in its pipeline.

The company has 130 staff, according to its LinkedIn page.

People
Exscientia – Andrew Hopkins (CEO).
SoftBank – Eric Chen (managing partner, SoftBank Investment Advisers).