SandboxAQ announced it has raised $300 million in a new funding round at a $5.6 billion valuation. The Alphabet spinoff previously raised $500 million in its initial funding round in February 2023.
The new funding will accelerate application development and adoption of SandboxAQ’s Large Quantitative Models (LQMs) and AI solutions, the company says.
SandboxAQ’s LQMs are trained on proprietary data generated using physics-based methods, a point of difference from general-purpose large language models trained on massive datasets. LQMs are being used in industries like biopharma to accelerate drug discovery and synthesis and in materials research for developing new manufacturing materials and compounds.
“Large Quantitative Models are the next wave of AI, as they provide a powerful ability to solve science and business problems for large industries including aerospace, biopharma, chemicals, defense, energy, finance, and more. The capital raise we are announcing today gives us additional resources to drive deep impact at scale,” said SandboxAQ CEO Jack D. Hidary, in a release. “LLMs and LQMs are complementary platforms that are both needed in the world of B2B applications. We are pleased to see the commitment of so many long-term investors in SandboxAQ.”
(Source: SandboxAQ)
SandboxAQ began as Alphabet’s AI quantum computing unit led by Hidary. It was spun out of Alphabet into an independent startup in March 2022, with Hidary as CEO and former Google CEO Eric Schmidt as chairman.
“Leading global enterprises are realizing that they must look beyond the capabilities and limitations of LLMs and embrace LQMs in order to maximize the ROI from their AI investments,” said Schmidt in a release. “Jack Hidary and his team at SandboxAQ have shown the ability to create significant customer value across key industries such as biopharma, chemicals, and financial services. Jack is a world-class, high-integrity CEO leading a deeply technical team. With this round, SandboxAQ can move even faster to its goals and impact.”
One of the more famous SandboxAQ investors is Yann LeCun, a leading AI scientist and one of three Turing Award winners for deep learning.
“I am investing in SandboxAQ because of their industry-leading approach to quantitative AI,” said LeCun, who is also the chief AI scientist at Meta. “While LLMs are very helpful tools for consumers, it is quantitative AI that will define work in large sectors of the economy including biopharma, chemicals and financial services. I am impressed by the technical depth of Jack and his team and am excited to support their work. SandboxAQ has emerged as a leader in novel applications of AI that solve the most pressing challenges in the world and their technical success is impressive.”
SandboxAQ is investing significant resources in AI-driven scientific innovation, particularly in the healthcare field. In 2024, SandboxAQ’s AQBioSim division advanced its AI-driven drug discovery efforts, forging partnerships with two top academic research institutions to accelerate therapeutic development for neurodegenerative diseases. The company also deepened collaborations with major biopharma firms, using its LQMs to uncover novel biomarkers and streamline clinical development for investigational drugs. It also launched IDOLPro, a generative AI tool designed to create drug molecules with tailored properties, speeding up research and development.
The company is even working on a medical device under its AQMed division called CardiAQ, a magnetocardiography (MCG) investigational device under development designed to capture and analyze magnetic signals from the heart for faster and more accurate cardio assessments. The company also announced a new clinical research study with The Mayo Clinic, supplementing its ongoing collaboration with Mount Sinai Medical Center and a successful feasibility study with the UCSF Medical Center.
The latest round was funded by Fred Alger Management, LLC, T. Rowe Price Associates, Inc., Mumtalakat, Parkway Venture Capital, Breyer Capital, Rizvi Traverse, S32, US Innovative Technology Fund, Ava Investments, Eric Schmidt, Marc Benioff, David Siegel, Yann LeCun, IQT, and other prominent investors.
“We see significant growth potential and opportunity for LQMs across a broad range of industries, which is why investing in SandboxAQ is an investment in AI’s future,” said Jim Breyer, Breyer Capital. “Through SandboxAQ, Breyer Capital has a front-row seat to a generation-defining company with some of the most inspiring uses of AI technology … uniting science and AI in bold and meaningful ways to address the world’s most pressing challenges.”
