Astellas partners with AI Proteins on $400M computational drug discovery deal

Astellas Pharma of Japan has entered a partnership with Boston based AI Proteins to apply its computational design platform to drug discovery.

AI Proteins builds miniproteins from scratch using artificial intelligence, saying the molecules can achieve binding activity beyond what traditional biologics derived from nature can provide.

The deal includes an undisclosed upfront fee and milestone payments that could lift the total value to more than $400 million, while Astellas will be responsible for development, regulatory work and eventual commercialization of any resulting assets.

The collaboration marks another step in Astellas' long-term push to embed AI tools into its research pipeline, an effort that started about ten years ago.