AstraZeneca signs $1.5 billion AI drug-discovery deal

AstraZeneca locked in $40 million upfront and up to about $1.46 billion in milestones with insitro on Thursday, Oct. 15, 2026. The Cambridge, England drugmaker and the San Francisco AI biotech will use insitro's Virtual Human platform—lab-grown cell models plus machine learning—on metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis (MASH) and cardiomyopathies. AstraZeneca holds exclusive worldwide rights to advance selected programs; insitro may also earn single-digit royalties on future global sales. Shares rose 2.1% to 12,559.47 pence around noon in London. Sharon Barr told Reuters that choosing new targets for the discovery pipeline is one of the hardest tasks across R&D. By the time a new pathway or target appears in major scientific journals, she said, it is no longer novel and the company is already a few steps too late—but identifying unique connections early and testing them in cellular systems puts them ahead of the game. In deal remarks she said disease biology is incredibly complex, target selection is critical, and the partnership will use advanced AI to find biological drivers and speed high-quality novel targets to patients. Insitro already partners with Bristol Myers Squibb on ALS targets and Eli Lilly on AI models that predict small-molecule properties. CONTESTED: No sources dispute the parties, payment structure, disease focus, or rights terms.