Our Investment in Manas AI: to Accelerate Drug Discovery

Manas AI seeks to accelerate the development of treatments for aggressive cancers, such as triple-negative breast cancer, prostate cancer, and lymphoma. By combining AI-driven molecular design with laboratory validation, the company aims to reduce the time and cost associated with traditional drug discovery. Their approach includes initiatives like Project Cosmos, which focuses on understanding drug-target interactions to streamline the identification of promising compounds. The founders are two of the world’s best in their fields.

Dr. Siddhartha Mukherjee is a renowned oncologist, cancer biologist, and author. He gained widespread recognition for his Pulitzer Prize-winning book, The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer. As an Associate Professor at Columbia University (currently on leave), Dr. Mukherjee has been instrumental in advancing cancer drug development.He has founded several biotech companies, including Vor Biopharma and Faeth Therapeutics, focusing on innovative treatments for cancer and other diseases. At Manas AI, he leads the scientific vision, leveraging AI to expedite the discovery of new therapeutics.

Reid Hoffman is a prominent entrepreneur and investor, best known as the co-founder of LinkedIn, Reid is an advisor and LP in Blitzscaling Ventures. He played a pivotal role at PayPal and has been a partner at Greylock Partners since 2009, investing in numerous successful tech startups.Hoffman also co-founded Inflection AI and serves on the boards of Microsoft and several nonprofit organizations. At Manas AI, he brings his expertise in scaling technology companies and a deep understanding of AI, aiming to transform the drug discovery process.

Manas' initial $25M seed round was led by General Catalyst, with participation by Greylock and Reid.  General Catalyst was selected for its extensive healthcare related resources that Manas can draw on.

Generally, we avoid life sciences investing.  It can be extremely lucrative, but the timelines are long and the science risk is difficult to assess for a team of non-biologists.  But we stepped outside our comfort zone with this investment because the founding team is so exceptional and well known to us, and AI (which we do know well) is at the core of their IP and differentiation.  Every venture fund invests off-thesis on occasion when presented with extraordinary opportunities.  This is one of those times.  

Manas has the potential to become one of the most valuable companies in decades. The goal is not to create a single drub, but to create a process for drug discovery and approval that vastly shortens time to market.  This includes more accurate initial targeting, faster trial phases, and ultimately more therapeutics to market sooner.  The enterprise value created could be unbounded.