Isomorphic Labs talks $40B valuation five months after $2.1B round
Bloomberg says Isomorphic Labs' early funding talks could value it as high as $50B, though terms could change.
By RuntimeWire Staff · Published
Primary source: Bloomberg Technology
Why it matters
The talks put a price on Isomorphic Labs' next test: turning AI-driven drug design into medicines that can advance through clinical development. The valuation is still under negotiation, and the financing has not closed.
Isomorphic Labs is in early talks to raise new funding at a valuation of at least $40 billion, five months after Isomorphic Labs raised $2.1 billion, Bloomberg reported. The talks are early, and the financing has not closed. One person familiar with the effort told Bloomberg the valuation could reach $50 billion; the report says the terms could change.
Demis Hassabis founded Isomorphic Labs to bring ideas from artificial intelligence into drug discovery. Before that, his work ranged from designing and programming the video game Theme Park at 17 to co-founding DeepMind. He later studied at Cambridge and earned a PhD in cognitive neuroscience at University College London, according to his company biography. Isomorphic Labs grew from DeepMind's AlphaFold work on predicting protein structures, a scientific advance Hassabis used as the starting point for a wider commercial bet.
In Isomorphic Labs' 2021 founding announcement, Hassabis argued that AI could change how researchers discover drugs, with a role beyond analyzing biological data. Isomorphic Labs' current ambition is to develop AI models and software, generate data, and advance potential medicines through development. That scope makes the proposed valuation a wager on a longer chain than protein-structure prediction alone.
A larger bet after a large round
Isomorphic Labs' May 2026 Series B brought in $2.1 billion. Isomorphic Labs said Thrive Capital led the round, with participation from existing backers Alphabet and GV and new investors MGX, Temasek, CapitalG, and the UK Sovereign AI Fund. Isomorphic Labs said the money would support its drug-design engine, global expansion, hiring, and the development of therapeutic programs toward clinical trials.
That followed a $600 million external round announced in March 2025, led by Thrive Capital, with GV and Alphabet also participating, according to Isomorphic Labs. Together, the two disclosed rounds total $2.7 billion, excluding any earlier support from Alphabet. Bloomberg's report does not identify investors in the new talks or say how much Isomorphic Labs is seeking to raise.
A $40 billion figure would be a proposed price in an unfinished financing. It would not represent a completed transaction or drug sales. The Bloomberg report gives no revenue or clinical-trial results to anchor that figure. The valuation reflects what investors may be willing to pay for the prospect that Isomorphic Labs can turn its AI capabilities into drug candidates and, ultimately, medicines.
The test moves beyond prediction
The technical case has advanced beyond Isomorphic Labs' original AlphaFold-inspired thesis, at least in Isomorphic Labs' own account. In a September 29th post, Isomorphic Labs described its approach as vertically integrated: it says it is building models, generating data, conducting drug-design work, and preparing to take potential medicines toward the clinic. The post also describes preclinical work and presents examples of computationally designed molecules tested in the lab. Those are company-reported results, not independent evidence that an AI-designed medicine will succeed in human trials.
Partnerships offer another way to test the platform. Isomorphic Labs announced collaborations with Eli Lilly and Novartis in 2024, which the company said could be worth nearly $3 billion in upfront and milestone payments, excluding royalties, according to its announcement. Isomorphic Labs later expanded its Novartis collaboration and announced a research partnership with Johnson & Johnson, according to the company's partnerships page. Such agreements can bring programs, scientific expertise, and potential payments. The milestone structure ties much of the stated value to future progress.
The key test is whether Isomorphic Labs' designs work outside the model and laboratory, through the much slower process of developing medicines for patients.