In a landmark collaboration set to reshape the pharmaceutical industry, AI and accelerated computing leader NVIDIA has partnered with global medicine company Eli Lilly and Company to launch a first-of-its-kind AI co-innovation lab. The two U.S.-based giants will jointly invest up to $1 billion over five years to tackle some of the most persistent challenges in drug discovery.
The new facility, based in the San Francisco Bay Area, aims to create a new blueprint for developing medicines by combining Lilly’s deep expertise in biology and medicine with NVIDIA’s dominance in AI and computational power.
“AI is transforming every industry, and its most profound impact will be in life sciences,” said Jensen Huang, founder and CEO of NVIDIA. “NVIDIA and Lilly are bringing together the best of our industries to invent a new blueprint for drug discovery — one where scientists can explore vast biological and chemical spaces in silico before a single molecule is made.”
A Fusion of AI and Pharmaceutical Expertise
The collaboration will leverage NVIDIA’s powerful BioNeMo platform and its next-generation Vera Rubin architecture to build sophisticated AI models. The goal is to create a continuous learning system that tightly integrates Lilly’s “wet labs” (physical biological experiments) with computational “dry labs,” enabling around-the-clock AI-assisted experimentation.
This scientist-in-the-loop framework will allow experiments, data generation, and AI model development to continuously inform and improve one another, drastically speeding up the process of identifying, optimizing, and validating new molecules.
“Combining our volumes of data and scientific knowledge with NVIDIA’s computational power and model-building expertise could reinvent drug discovery as we know it,” said David A. Ricks, chair and CEO of Lilly. “By bringing together world-class talent in a startup environment, we’re creating the conditions for breakthroughs that neither company could achieve alone.”
Beyond Discovery to Manufacturing and Supply Chain
The partnership’s scope extends beyond initial drug discovery. NVIDIA and Lilly will also explore applying AI to optimize clinical development, manufacturing, and supply chain logistics.
By using technologies like NVIDIA Omniverse™ libraries, Lilly can create digital twins of its manufacturing lines. This will allow the company to model, stress-test, and refine entire supply chains in a virtual environment before implementing physical changes, enhancing its capacity to produce high-demand medications and improve reliability.
What This Means for MENA’s Tech and Health Sectors
While this partnership is based in the U.S., its implications resonate strongly with the MENA region’s strategic ambitions in technology and healthcare. Nations like the UAE and Saudi Arabia have made significant investments in AI and are actively fostering HealthTech and BioTech ecosystems as part of their economic diversification plans.
This collaboration serves as a powerful model for how MENA’s established industries can partner with its burgeoning tech sector. Regional pharmaceutical companies, research institutions, and sovereign wealth funds can draw inspiration from this billion-dollar initiative, highlighting the immense value of applying cutting-edge AI to solve complex, real-world problems. For MENA startups in the AI and HealthTech space, this news reinforces the massive market potential and signals a growing global trend toward deep-tech, cross-industry innovation.
About NVIDIA
NVIDIA is the world leader in AI and accelerated computing. Its pioneering work in the field has catalyzed the growth of modern AI, the metaverse, and high-performance computing, transforming industries from gaming and professional visualization to transportation and healthcare.
About Eli Lilly and Company
Lilly is a medicine company turning science into healing to make life better for people around the world. Pioneering life-changing discoveries for nearly 150 years, Lilly’s medicines today help tens of millions of people across the globe, with a focus on diabetes care, obesity, Alzheimer’s disease, immune system disorders, and oncology.
Source: NVIDIA Newsroom
