Ampersand Biomedicines raises $65 million

Ampersand Biomedicines today announced it has secured $65 million in Series B funding from investors including Ampersand’s founder, the bioplatform company builder Flagship Pioneering, as well as pharma major Eli Lilly (NYSE: LLY) and several additional new investors.

Ampersand is part of a growing number of start-ups applying artificial intelligence and machine learning to drug research. The company is trying to solve what chief executive Jason Gardner says is one of the biggest problems in pharmaceuticals: medicines that hit their targets but cause side effects because those targets are also found on healthy tissue.

Ampersand’s Series B funding will fuel the continued development of its computationally powered Address, Navigate, Determine (AND) Platform to program AND-Body Therapeutics, a new category of smarter biologic medicines. AND-Body Therapeutics are designed to localize to their intended target and conditionally actuate biology to treat disease, enabling improved target engagement while limiting on-target, off-tissue side effects. The versatility of the AND Platform allows Ampersand to take aim at a broad range of diseases simultaneously. The funding will also drive the acceleration of Ampersand’s initial pipeline of impactful programs, including one in immuno-inflammation and another in immuno-oncology, both of which are planned to enter investigational new drug (IND)-enabling studies in 2025.