Merck inks two strategic AI collaborations

Germany’s Merck KGaA (MRK: DE) today announced two new strategic drug discovery collaborations aimed at harnessing powerful artificial intelligence (AI)-driven design and discovery capabilities, further advancing the company’s research efforts.

The partnerships, with BenevolentAI (Euronext Amsterdam: BAI) and Exscientia (Nasdaq: EXAI), both UK headquartered, are expected to generate several novel clinical development drug candidates with first-in-class and best-in-class potential in key therapeutic areas of oncology, neurology and immunology.

As per the terms of the accord, three potential first-in-class and best-in-class targets have been selected to initiate each partnership with the possibility of identifying and nominating additional targets in the future. The collaborative efforts are focused on advancing small molecule development candidates which Merck will select for further pre-clinical and clinical development.