from Hacker News

Is SaaS a good business model for drug‑discovery companies?

by Protostome on 4/22/25, 7:58 AM with 4 comments

• by fnands on 4/22/25, 3:00 PM

  > yet it crashed spectacularly in Phase III clinical trials.

  I don't think this necessarily means the approach is flawed: my understanding is that the value these companies/models try to deliver is that it brings down the search space of molecules you test in your funnel by several order of magnitude.

  Some will still fail, but as long as you do better than how things used to be done before, you bring value.

  Maybe it will just take one blockbuster success for Pharma companies to decide this approach is worthwhile.

• by fnands on 4/22/25, 2:56 PM

  I wonder if this also applies to the new wave of materials science companies that have a somewhat similar model, i.e. come up with some material that has useful properties. See e.g. CuspAI and Dunia. CuspAI seems to be getting their data from partners, while Dunia is building their own lab.