By Hannah Green
A 10-year-old AI drug discovery company is moving its headquarters from New York to Massachusetts.
Insilico Medicine has leased space at 1000 Massachusetts Ave. in Cambridge. The company was previously based out of an office at Cure, a New York City healthcare innovation campus, where it plans to keep a presence as it expands in Cambridge. The company also has a presence in Greater China, Canada, and the Middle East.
“If you are not in Boston, you are not in biotech, in my opinion, at least not seriously,” Insilico founder and CEO Alex Zhavoronkov told the Business Journal.
Zhavoronkov brought Insilico to life back in 2014 at the Emerging Technology Centers at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. After Insilico raised a $225 million Series C round in June 2021, the company moved to NYC to Cure, a space developed by its investor Deerfield Management.
Now, Zhavoronkov said Insilico is coming to Cambridge to establish an office “where all the magic happens.”
“There are very few epicenters globally that lead in biomedical innovation and can make bold bets, and number one is Boston,” Zhavoronkov said.
The chief executive said the company came to Cambridge to consolidate around where partners and talent are located. Around 15 people will make up the Insilico U.S. team as they move into their new space, Zhavoronkov said.
Zhavoronkov said the Cambridge team will focus on “business development, corporate development to ensure it’s basically the brain of the operation.” The CEO said this U.S. team will help set the market direction for the company. Zhavoronkov said Insilico made more than $51 million in revenue last year, and that comes from sales of AI-generated drugs.
“It’s very substantial revenue growth year-over-year. And I think if you want to grow, if you want to transform the industry you need to be in Cambridge and you need to be super transparent and show people how you do it,” Zhavoronkov said.
Insilico’s Cambridge space will also include a showroom to demonstrate its pipeline of drugs — the company has seven clinical-stage drugs — and its AI-driven technology. Zhavoronkov said 10 out of the top 20 pharmaceutical companies are using Insilico’s software.
Insilico plans to occupy its new headquarters on May 1 and hold an official opening in June.