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Fresh from a colossal IPO, AI-assisted pharmacology pioneer InSilico Medicine (3696.HK) is making headlines again, with an international partnership to speed the discovery of new cancer drugs. The Chinese biotech announced last week thatit had entered into a multi-year research and development deal worth up to $888 million with Servier, an independent pharmaceutical group based in France. The news came within weeks of InSilico scoring Hong Kong’s biggest IPO of 2025, raising HK$2.28 billion ($290 million) to pursue its mission of using artificial intelligence to accelerate the delivery of novel drugs.
Under the agreement, InSilico’s proprietary AI platform will be used along with Servier’s oncology expertise to come up with new candidate drugs and turn them into marketable products. In so doing, the collaborators will share the risks and the profits, with InSilico getting up to $32 million in upfront and near-term payments for its AI input, while Servier will co-fund R&D activities. The French partner will take the lead in testing, registering and launching any promising drug formulations that emerge from the relationship.