Zealand pens up to $1.2B deal with Generate for AI-designed obesity, metabolic drugs

Danish biopharma Zealand Pharma has signed a deal worth up to $1.2 billion with Generate:Biomedicines, a Massachusetts-based company that designs drugs with generative AI. The aim is to develop new treatments for obesity and other metabolic conditions.

In return for its investment, Zealand gets access to Generate's generative AI platform, which it will use to design new protein therapeutics. The article describes the targets as new multispecific drug candidates for weight loss and metabolic disease. The $1.2 billion figure is the most the deal could reach, not a guaranteed amount.

The article describes Generate as having one of the most mature pipelines among drugmakers using generative AI, and as being at the leading edge of a growing group of companies that design drugs this way. Generate went public in February with $425 million, money intended to support Phase 3 development of its anti-TSLP therapy GB-0895 for severe asthma. GB-0895 is also in early-stage studies for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). The company designed it with its own generative AI platform.

For Zealand, which the article describes as obesity-focused, the deal is a way to bring AI-driven protein design into its work on weight loss and metabolic drugs. It also shows a Danish drugmaker partnering with one of the more advanced AI drug design companies.