BRIEF—BenevolentAI cashes in with two milestone payments

British AI company BenevolentAI and pharma major AstraZeneca have moved forward their 2019-initiated drug discovery collaboration, with the latter adding two novel targets to its drug portfolio.

BenevolentAI will collect two milestone payments in relation to the candidates, which target chronic kidney disease (CKD) and idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF).

The firm’s platform employs a disease-agnostic approach, with five novel targets thus far having been delivered to AstraZeneca’s portfolio, two for CKD and three for IPF.

In 2022 the collaboration was expanded for a further three years into two new disease areas, heart failure and systemic lupus erythematosus.