DURHAM – POLARISqb has raised more than $2 million in a seed round led by investors who poured in capital via OurCrowd and were joined by Infinity Medical.
The Durham-based company is located in the American Underground.
Co-founded in 2020 by CEO Shahar Keinan and CTO Bill Shipman, POLARISqb said in a statement that the funding will be allocated to grow the company’s employee base, scale its platform, and develop assets faster.
POLARISqb logo from company website
Keinan and Shipman developed what they say is the world’s first drug discovery software specifically built for quantum computers.
“POLARISqb is using the most advanced technology to create drugs to fight diseases that have plagued humans for millennia, Keinan says. “We are uniting the three sciences: Physics (Quantum Computing), Biology (Genetics) and Chemistry (Molecular drugs), to create our designs, build a unique IP portfolio and change the way new drugs are developed.”
The company was named a notable biotech startup in December 2020 by BioPharmaTrend.com for its promising technology that the publication said could reduce drug development time.
“POLARISqb uses the latest innovations in cloud, quantum computing, artificial intelligence, and machine learning to operate 10,000 times faster than any alternative solutions in the market,” marketing material from the company reads. The company stated it could produce “up to 100 assets each year,” adding that this process can be done on a scale that is based on months rather than on years.
“We will compress the lead time for preclinical drug candidates from 5 years to 4 months,” the company website says.
