ByteDance is spinning off its AI-powered drug discovery business, valuing the new entity at around $1 billion. The standalone company, which will be based in Shanghai, is seeking roughly $200 million in its first funding round. ByteDance will retain a controlling stake after the split, and the core team, algorithms, platforms, and early-stage drug pipeline will all move to the new company.
The team started as ByteDance's in-house AI pharma unit in 2021, led by former Volcano Capital managing director Liu Kai. Liu and his 50-person team are spread across Shanghai, Singapore, and San Jose. To match the rhythms of biotech R&D, the new company has lined up a scientific advisory board that reads like a who's who of the industry: former Innovent Biologics president Liu Yongjun, former Amgen chief scientist Ji Ma, and others covering everything from target validation to clinical development.
On the tech side, the team released molecular structure prediction models Protenix and Seedfold in 2025, upgraded to Protenix-v1/v2 in 2026, and launched a protein binder design tool called PXDesign. For drug pipeline validation, they built the Anew Labs AI drug platform. At the American Association of Immunologists annual meeting in April 2026, they presented an IL-17 small molecule program that claims to be the first in the world to block all three IL-17 dimers (AA, AF, FF) with a small molecule.
Going independent gives the unit more flexibility to attract top talent and follow biotech-appropriate development timelines. The new company will continue to get underlying compute power from Volcano Engine, ByteDance's cloud arm. The first-round investors haven't been finalized yet, but several existing ByteDance shareholders and top dollar funds in China are already in talks.