Somite.ai, a biotech startup building foundation models for human stem cells, has landed a strategic investment from AMD Ventures. The deal follows Somite’s $47 million Series A raise in May, led by Khosla Ventures, and adds serious compute firepower to the company’s mission: using large-scale AI to transform the way cell therapies are discovered and developed.
The collaboration centers on Somite’s capsule-based data generation platform, which produces differentiation data at roughly one-thousandth the cost of traditional methods. That efficiency allows Somite to generate the dense, causal datasets required to train predictive models at a scale previously thought impossible in cell biology.
AI Meets Biology at Scale
Cell therapy development is notorious for long timelines and high costs. Somite’s approach mirrors what happened in language and vision AI: build massive foundation models trained on unprecedentedly rich datasets, then apply them broadly across therapeutic design.
“Biology is experiencing a computational revolution similar to language and vision,” said Sagi Paz, head of AMD Ventures. “Somite is clearly leading the way, and AMD Instinct GPUs are built for the demands of their ambitious models.”
AMD’s Instinct accelerators, known for high-performance AI workloads in research and enterprise environments, will provide the horsepower to train Somite’s models faster and at greater scale.
Beyond Hardware: A Co-Development Push
The collaboration won’t stop at compute cycles. Somite and AMD plan to co-develop software tools optimized for biological data and next-generation foundation models. The joint work could set new benchmarks for how AI handles messy, complex biological systems—an area still in its infancy compared to natural language or image generation.
Dr. Micha Breakstone, co-founder and CEO of Somite.ai, framed the partnership as a turning point: “We are on the cusp of a true breakthrough in data generation for cell-state transitions. AMD is uniquely positioned to help us deliver on our promise.”
Why It Matters
Foundation models are rapidly creeping into life sciences, from protein folding (DeepMind’s AlphaFold) to drug discovery platforms like Insilico Medicine. Somite’s bet is that stem cell biology—particularly the transitions that turn cells into therapies—will be the next big frontier. By marrying cheap, scalable data generation with enterprise-grade compute, Somite hopes to slash years off the path from concept to treatment.
If it works, millions of patients awaiting next-gen cell therapies could benefit—and AMD secures a foothold in one of the most promising intersections of biotech and AI.
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