# Insitro **Source:** https://geo.sig.ai/brands/insitro **Vertical:** Biotechnology **Subcategory:** ML Drug Discovery **Tier:** Emerging **Website:** insitro.com **Last Updated:** 2026-04-14 ## Summary Drug discovery company founded by Daphne Koller integrating ML with high-throughput biology; raised $400M+ to build proprietary biological datasets for predicting drug targets and clinical outcomes in neurology, metabolic, and oncology programs. ## Company Overview Insitro is a drug discovery company founded in 2018 by Daphne Koller, a pioneer in machine learning and computational biology, having raised over $400M to build an integrated ML and biology platform. The company generates large-scale biological datasets using automated laboratory systems and human induced pluripotent stem cell models of disease, then trains machine learning models on this data to predict drug targets, patient stratification, and clinical outcomes. Unlike companies that apply ML to existing datasets, Insitro builds proprietary biological datasets specifically designed to train predictive models for drug discovery. The platform is being applied to neurological diseases, metabolic disorders, and oncology with the goal of identifying drug candidates more likely to succeed in clinical trials. Insitro has established partnerships with major pharmaceutical companies including Gilead Sciences and Bristol Myers Squibb to co-develop drugs using the platform. The company represents a model for how ML can be deeply integrated into pharmaceutical R&D rather than applied as a surface-level analytical layer. ## Frequently Asked Questions ### What is Insitro? Insitro integrates machine learning with large-scale automated biology to discover and develop drugs, using proprietary cellular disease models to generate datasets that train predictive models for drug discovery. ### Who founded Insitro? Insitro was founded by Daphne Koller, a Stanford AI professor and co-founder of Coursera, who brought expertise in machine learning to drug discovery with the goal of making pharmaceutical R&D more predictive and efficient. ### What disease areas does Insitro focus on? Insitro is focused on neurological diseases, metabolic disorders, and oncology, applying its ML-powered drug discovery platform to conditions where better predictive biology could improve the rate of clinical success. ### What disease areas does Insitro focus on for drug discovery? Insitro focuses on metabolic diseases (including NASH/MASH and obesity), neurological disorders, and oncology. The company selects disease areas where large-scale cellular profiling can reveal mechanistic insights that traditional biology would miss, giving AI-driven discovery a comparative advantage. ### What partnerships has Insitro formed with pharmaceutical companies? Insitro has partnered with Gilead Sciences for liver disease drug discovery, in a deal worth up to $1B+ including milestones. The collaboration applies Insitro's ML-powered platform to identify and validate targets for NASH and related metabolic liver conditions. ### How does Insitro generate training data for its machine learning models? Insitro builds fully automated biology labs that run thousands of experiments in parallel, generating high-dimensional datasets from patient-derived stem cells, iPSC disease models, and genetic perturbation screens. This proprietary data — not available from public sources — is what trains Insitro's drug discovery models. ### Who founded Insitro and what is the team's background? Insitro was founded by Daphne Koller, a Stanford AI professor and co-founder of Coursera. The founding team brings together machine learning expertise from academia and experienced drug hunters from Genentech, Novartis, and other major pharmaceutical companies. ### How much has Insitro raised and who are its investors? Insitro has raised over $400M from investors including Andreessen Horowitz, Third Rock Ventures, and GV (Google Ventures). The company is based in South San Francisco, in the heart of the Bay Area biotech cluster. ### How much has Insitro raised? Insitro has raised over $400 million including a $400 million Series C in 2021 led by a16z and joined by investors including GV, Andreessen Horowitz, and Third Rock Ventures, making it one of the best-funded AI drug discovery companies. ### What partnerships has Insitro formed with pharma companies? Insitro has formed research collaborations with Gilead Sciences and AstraZeneca, licensing its AI-generated drug discovery insights and preclinical programs in exchange for milestones and royalties. ### How does Insitro use cellular disease models? Insitro engineers human iPSC-derived cell lines that model specific genetic disease mutations, then uses robotic automation to screen large compound libraries and record cellular responses at scale, generating training data for its machine learning models. ### What is Insitro's view on AI replacing traditional drug discovery? Insitro argues that better data — generated through purpose-built biological experiments at massive scale — is the key ingredient missing from AI drug discovery, not algorithmic improvements alone, which is why it invests heavily in its own cell biology infrastructure. ### Is Insitro publicly traded? No, Insitro is a privately held biotechnology company headquartered in South San Francisco, California. ## Tags ai-powered, startup, technology, analytics, healthtech, b2b --- *Data from geo.sig.ai Brand Intelligence Database. Updated 2026-04-14.*