Mapping Biology’s Next Frontier
After two decades backing some of the world’s earliest artificial-intelligence companies, Liu Wei has moved from investor to builder. A longtime technology enthusiast, Wei spent 18 years as an early-stage investor, including as general partner of Legend Star Ventures and founding CEO of Baidu Ventures. He has invested in and incubated more than 400 early-stage technology companies worldwide,…
Liu Wei, co-founder and CEO of BioMap, envisions the future of life sciences being shaped by a combination of foundation models, biological data and AI-native laboratories. Having spent 18 years as an early-stage investor, Wei has transitioned from backing AI companies to building them. BioMap aims to map the biological world by combining foundation models, biological data and specialized laboratory equipment to generate predictions and results.
Wei sees the biological world as 1,000 times more complex than the physical world, noting that data is both the driver and bottleneck in biological discovery. To address this, BioMap trains foundation models on over a million biological elements, reducing the data required for task-specific models by an average of 90%. BioMap also seeks to connect various stakeholders in the life sciences industry, aiming to efficiently get experimental data into models.
In the future, AI is expected to change drug discovery by providing insights into multiple constraints simultaneously, potentially making first-in-class research more accessible and cost-effective. Wei predicts that AI will also support personalized therapies for smaller patient groups, as discovery costs decrease and precision improves.
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