Novo Nordisk partners with Orbis Medicines in $1.4B AI drug discovery deal

Novo Nordisk has entered into a partnership with Orbis Medicines to develop oral macrocycle drugs for cardiometabolic diseases. Under the agreement, Novo Nordisk will pay Orbis up to 1.4 billion dollars in upfront and milestone payments, plus sales royalties. Orbis uses an artificial intelligence platform called nGen to create synthetic macrocycles, which are cyclic peptides designed to last longer in the body and resist degradation better than linear peptides.

In separate developments, the Scottish-based start-up Chemify has received 21.6 million dollars in grants from Scottish Enterprise and 8.1 million dollars from the UK government. This funding will help the company expand its automated artificial intelligence synthesis platform, Chemify Genesis, at its facility known as Chemifarm. The expansion aims to establish Chemify as a chemistry hyperscaler and increase its capacity to produce small molecules and materials.

Additionally, Cabot has received a significant Department of Energy grant originally issued during the Joe Biden administration to support domestic electric vehicle supply chains. Cabot is now redirecting its focus toward growing energy storage demands driven by artificial intelligence. The company's related projects in Texas and Louisiana are scheduled to begin operating in 2028.