Altman: OpenAI may back firms using AI for drug discovery

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman indicated the company may consider investing in or subsidizing firms that use its AI for drug discovery, potentially taking royalties from successful discoveries.

Altman made the comments at Cisco’s AI conference in San Francisco, noting that OpenAI currently has no such partnerships.

He explained the company might cover the costs of using its AI models in collaboration with drug firms and benefit financially if breakthroughs occur.

Altman emphasized that this is not an active strategy but reflects the potential for AI to require significant capital for scientific research.

OpenAI and other tech firms like Google and Anthropic are increasingly exploring AI applications in healthcare and drug development.

Altman also clarified that the company would not take a cut from customers who simply use OpenAI’s APIs for research.

🔗 Source: Bloomberg

🧠 Food for thought

Implications, context, and why it matters.

Altmans royalty idea echoes a familiar biotech playbook

Sam Altman said OpenAI could take royalties on successful drug discoveries, which lines up with common biopharma deals that split upside.
Platform-style partnerships often include royalties tied to a drugs performance, plus other financial terms rather than only software fees 1.
Isomorphic Labs agreement with Eli Lilly includes royalties that can reach the low double digits, based on DealFormas summary 2.
OpenAI has raised a similar concept, since CFO Sarah Friar mentioned outcome-tied licensing and used drug discovery as an example 3.

This would shift from API access to outcome-linked, risk-sharing deals

These remarks sketch a path beyond selling access, toward outcome-linked risk sharing in capital-intensive areas like pharma. Altman said it is not an active strategy, OpenAI has no such partnerships, and the firm would not take a cut from customers who use OpenAIs application programming interfaces (APIs) for research.
Friar tied OpenAIs search for new business models to the need to pay for the compute 3.
Elsewhere, NVIDIA and Eli Lilly said they will invest up to $1 billion over five years in a co-innovation AI lab focused on speeding medicine development 4.
Drug discovery has long rewarded the finished asset more than the tools, so outcome-based terms can fit better than standard software licenses in some cases 1.