Basecamp Research just raised a $140m Series C led by S32. It's teaching AI to read and write DNA, using huge amounts of genetic data it collects all over the world. It has been working with NVIDIA and Anthropic on its models, and both have now come in as investors too.
Oliver Vince is Co-Founder at Basecamp Research, which is using this AI to design new medicines for cancer, rare genetic diseases and infections. The next step is getting the first ones to patients, which he expects within the next couple of years.
The Scaling Europe show is presented by Deel. Check them out here: https://get.deel.com/ruynb7o4lfjk
Sponsors:
SurrealDB: https://surrealdb.com/
Airwallex: https://www.airwallex.com/uk
Lovable: https://lovable.dev/
Parloa: https://www.parloa.com/
Conveo: https://conveo.ai/
NatWest: https://www.natwest.com/
WWT: https://www.wwt.com/
Timestamps:
0:00 Introduction
0:21 What Basecamp Research does
1:17 The new $140m Series C
1:57 The Eden models and the Trillion Gene Atlas
4:13 Why NVIDIA and Anthropic invested
5:35 Why they want investors who are realistic and optimistic
7:56 Which diseases it could help first
10:10 How close they are to treating patients
14:03 Drug company or pharma partner
15:19 A different approach from other AI biology companies
19:46 What could make it fail
21:42 Scepticism from traditional pharma
