AI Tool to Slash Pharma Development Costs by Predicting Drug Trial Outcomes

Anew artificial intelligence (AI) platform is poised to radically change the way the pharmaceutical industry develops new drugs while dramatically cutting the cost of medical trials.

The technology, developed by GATC Health, can predict with 87 percent accuracy whether a new medication will be safe and effective in a clinical trial. The AI platform is so accurate that Medical and Commercial International Limited (MCI), a syndicate of the Lloyd's of London insurance marketplace, is partnering with GATC to offer funding and insurance coverage for trials of drugs that the technology predicts will be successful.

Drug companies spend an average of $1 billion and 10-15 years to develop one successful medication—not least because 90 percent of all drug candidates that make it to clinical trials fail, according to the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology.

The new AI platform is expected to radically cut the cost of developing new drugs and to dramatically increase how many of them succeed and make it to market, said William Vincent Padula, a professor of pharmaceutical and health economics at the University of Southern California.