AI drug discovery company Owkin has signed a multi-year deal with pharmaceutical giant Sanofi to develop custom AI agents that can autonomously perform complex research tasks. The partnership extends their existing collaboration, which began in 2021 with a €90 million strategic agreement.
The new collaboration represents a shift toward what Owkin calls “embedded AI” – specialized AI systems that work directly within pharmaceutical companies’ existing workflows. These AI agents will be deployed through Owkin’s K Pro platform, which the company describes as an “AI scientist” for pharmaceutical research.
What makes these AI agents different
Unlike general-purpose AI tools, these agents are designed specifically for pharmaceutical work. They can handle tasks across the entire drug development process, from early discovery through clinical trials. The system combines patient data from multiple sources with specialized AI models trained on biological processes.
K Pro aims to help pharmaceutical companies make faster, more informed decisions by automating routine research tasks and providing competitive intelligence. The platform analyzes multimodal patient data – combining genetic information, medical imaging, clinical records, and other biological data.
Building on an existing partnership
Owkin and Sanofi have worked together since 2021, initially focusing on cancer research and patient classification. They later expanded their collaboration to include drug positioning for Sanofi’s immunology treatments. This new agreement represents the next phase of that partnership.
“Building on our collaboration with Sanofi, this marks a shift toward truly embedded AI,” said Thomas Clozel, CEO and co-founder of Owkin. “Sanofi can further harness agentic systems within their own workflows, unlocking the full value of their data to accelerate better decisions across drug development.”
Emmanuel Frenehard, Sanofi’s Chief Digital Officer, said the company is “continually investing in frontier AI solutions with the potential to accelerate and improve decision-making throughout the drug development lifecycle.”
The broader AI drug discovery trend
This partnership reflects a wider trend in pharmaceutical research, where companies are increasingly turning to AI to speed up drug discovery and reduce costs. Traditional drug development can take over a decade and cost billions of dollars, with high failure rates.
Owkin positions this work as part of its mission to achieve what it calls “Biological Artificial Superintelligence” – AI systems that can make therapeutic discoveries beyond what human researchers could achieve alone. The company believes this technology could help automate some of the most complex challenges in pharmaceutical research and development.