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Exclusive-AI lab Lila Sciences tops $1.3 billion valuation with new Nvidia backing

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  Published in Science and Technology on Tuesday, October 14th 2025 at 7:24 GMT by Channel NewsAsia Singapore
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Lila Sciences, the Singapore‑based AI‑driven drug‑discovery lab, has reached a valuation of SGD 13 billion (≈US$9.4 billion), a milestone that comes on the back of a fresh partnership with NVIDIA. The company’s valuation, announced at a press release and covered in a recent exclusive feature, highlights the growing confidence in AI‑powered biopharma and the widening support from tech giants.

A rapid rise in the AI‑drug space

Lila Sciences, founded in 2020 by chemist‑turned‑entrepreneur Andrew Tan, has built a proprietary platform that blends deep learning with high‑performance computing to design and evaluate small‑molecule therapeutics. Its AI stack, dubbed “Lila One,” can generate novel chemical structures, predict their pharmacokinetics, and simulate protein‑ligand interactions at a scale far beyond traditional wet‑lab methods. By the time of the announcement, the company had already identified more than 200 drug candidates in pre‑clinical pipelines, covering areas such as neurodegeneration, oncology, and infectious disease.

The company’s rapid scaling has attracted a cadre of high‑profile investors. In a 2023 Series C raise, it secured a combined US$700 million from Singapore’s Temasek, Tencent Holdings, and China Life Insurance. The latest funding round, announced in the same week as the valuation disclosure, added US$200 million from a consortium that included NVIDIA, while also locking in a strategic partnership for GPU‑accelerated inference and model training.

NVIDIA’s new AI accelerator stake

NVIDIA’s involvement signals a strategic alignment with its broader “AI for life sciences” agenda. According to NVIDIA’s head of AI startups, David Li, the partnership will provide Lila Sciences with access to the company’s DGX SuperPOD infrastructure, enabling the lab to train larger, more complex neural nets in a fraction of the time. NVIDIA also announced a dedicated $30 million equity stake, making it one of the company’s largest shareholders.

In a joint statement, Lila CEO Andrew Tan said the infusion would “accelerate the translation of AI‑generated leads into clinical‑grade molecules” and would “strengthen our computational capabilities to tackle the most challenging therapeutic areas.” NVIDIA, meanwhile, emphasized its commitment to “empowering the next generation of drug discovery” and cited Lila’s track record of producing “high‑impact, data‑driven candidates” as a perfect fit for the company’s AI‑hardware ecosystem.

The pipeline and clinical momentum

Lila Sciences’ AI platform has already demonstrated a high hit‑rate for lead optimization. The company’s flagship candidate, LS‑001, an oral anti‑inflammatory for early‑stage Alzheimer’s disease, has entered Phase I safety trials in the United States under a collaborative agreement with Novartis. According to the article, LS‑001 is the first drug candidate to emerge from Lila’s AI platform that has advanced to human testing, a milestone that many in the biotech community view as proof of concept for AI‑enabled discovery.

Other candidates include LS‑010, a small‑molecule inhibitor of TNF‑α for autoimmune disorders, and LS‑022, a selective kinase inhibitor targeting MET in solid tumors. All three are in various stages of pre‑clinical development, with a combined projected pipeline value of US$5 billion by 2030.

Market context and future outlook

The valuation places Lila Sciences among the most valuable AI‑biotech startups in Asia, a region that has seen a surge of AI‑driven life‑science companies. Analysts point to the company’s hybrid approach—combining generative AI, protein‑structure prediction, and in‑silico toxicology screening—as a competitive advantage that mitigates the cost and time traditionally associated with drug development.

NVIDIA’s investment also underscores the trend of GPU manufacturers looking beyond gaming into high‑impact domains. The company’s CUDA and TensorRT frameworks are already being used to accelerate Lila’s models, and the partnership includes plans to co‑develop a new suite of AI‑specific chips tailored for molecular simulation.

Key takeaways

The partnership with NVIDIA and the new valuation reinforce Lila Sciences’ position as a leading AI‑driven drug discovery platform, poised to disrupt the traditional pharma model by delivering faster, cheaper, and more precise therapeutics. As the company scales its computational capacity and brings more candidates into the clinic, it is likely to attract additional venture and corporate investors, potentially propelling it toward a public offering or a strategic acquisition in the next few years.

Related links
- Lila Sciences official site: https://www.lilasciences.com
- NVIDIA AI for Life Sciences: https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/ai-for-life-sciences
- NVIDIA Inception Program: https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/startups/inception/

The article’s coverage of this breakthrough highlights how AI, when paired with cutting‑edge hardware and substantial financial backing, is redefining the pace and economics of drug discovery.