Chai Discovery raises $400M for AI drug discovery as big pharma bets on machine learning over blockchain

Chai Discovery, an AI-driven drug discovery startup barely two years old, is in discussions to raise $400 million at a $3.4 billion valuation.

The company’s backers include OpenAI, Thrive Capital, Menlo Ventures, General Catalyst, and Oak HC/FT on the tech side, and Pfizer and Eli Lilly on the pharma side.

From zero to $3.4 billion in two years

Founded in 2024 by Joshua Meier, Jack Dent, Matthew McPartlon, and Jacques Boitreaud, Chai Discovery raised roughly $30 million in seed funding in 2024, followed by a $70 million Series A in August 2025. The $130 million Series B in December 2025 valued the company at $1.3 billion. The current $400 million round would nearly triple that valuation to $3.4 billion.

Chai Discovery’s flagship Chai-2 model can design novel antibodies from scratch, a process known as de novo antibody design, with hit rates of approximately 20%. Prior computational methods achieved hit rates of roughly 0.1%, making the company’s AI roughly 200 times more effective at finding viable drug candidates.

Former Pfizer Chief Scientific Officer Mikael Dolsten joined Chai Discovery’s board.

What this means for DeSci and crypto-native drug discovery

Chai Discovery’s trajectory suggests that the most consequential activity in drug discovery is happening within traditional venture capital and corporate partnership structures. No tokens. No DAOs. No on-chain governance. When a two-year-old company can attract $400 million from Pfizer, Eli Lilly, and OpenAI without touching a blockchain, it raises a pointed question: what specific problem does decentralization solve in drug discovery that isn’t already being addressed by AI plus traditional capital?

The broader AI vs. crypto capital competition

OpenAI’s presence on Chai Discovery’s cap table is particularly notable. The company is directly investing in vertical AI applications, suggesting that AI infrastructure players see drug discovery as a natural extension of their technology stack rather than something requiring new financial primitives like tokens or smart contracts.

VitaDAO’s treasury operates on a fundamentally different scale than the hundreds of millions flowing into companies like Chai Discovery. If Chai Discovery’s 20% hit rate continues to hold up in clinical validation, the argument for blockchain-based alternatives becomes harder to make to institutional capital allocators.

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