DeepMind spinout Isomorphic Labs in talks to raise about $5B at a $50B valuation
What's the deal? Isomorphic Labs, the Google DeepMind spinout applying AI to drug discovery, is in talks to raise roughly $5 billion at a valuation of about $50 billion, Bloomberg reported late on 4 November, citing people familiar with the matter. The financing has not closed and details could change. It firms up Bloomberg's October report that Isomorphic was in early talks at a valuation of at least $40 billion, with one person saying it could reach $50 billion. The investors have not been named.
Why now? The talks come about five months after a $2.1 billion round closed in May, led by Thrive Capital with Alphabet and the UK Sovereign AI Fund taking part. That round did not disclose a valuation and brought Isomorphic's external funding to $2.7 billion. A $5 billion raise would more than double that in a single round.
What's the endgame? Founded in 2021 in London, Isomorphic develops medicines in-house and with partners including Eli Lilly, Novartis and Johnson & JohnsonDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →, focusing on cancer and immune disorders. It works through IsoDDE, a set of AI models that predict molecular structures to find and refine drug candidates. Chief executive Demis Hassabis, who shared the 2024 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for AlphaFold, has said his goal is to cut drug development from years to months.
By the numbers: Grand View Research estimates AI in drug discovery was a $2.3 billion market in 2025, growing to $13.8 billion by 2033, so a $50 billion price tag would value Isomorphic at more than three times that forecast for the whole sector. Rivals are priced far lower: Chai Discovery raised at a $3.8 billion valuation in July, and London's Basecamp Research at $800 million in September.
What could go wrong? Isomorphic has yet to test its own drug candidates in humans, Bloomberg noted, with first trials expected by the end of 2026. Few AI drug developers have reached the clinic, and none has brought a medicine to market.
The signal: A $5 billion round at $50 billion would be one of the largest private financings ever for a European company, and one of biotech's richest private valuations. Investors are paying frontier-AI prices for drug-discovery timelines that run in years, betting that AI can compress them.
Read more: Bloomberg (4 Nov), Bloomberg (8 Oct), Tech Funding News
Image credit: Isomorphic Labs
