What Verge Genomics does

Verge Labs (formerly Verge Genomics) is a San Francisco-based private AI company building all-in-human foundation models for neuroscience drug development. Its core platform, Converge, is trained on what the company describes as one of the largest proprietary multi-modal neuroscience patient datasets in the world — deep molecular profiling on 12,000+ brains across 6,000 patients with paired proteomic, genomic, and clinical data, plus a physical inventory of 900+ frozen brain tissue samples. On top of this data, the company has built the vBx foundation model, which generates a "virtual biopsy" of the brain from routine blood draws and predicts therapy response and side effects with claimed 3x greater accuracy than prior state-of-the-art models.

The company's go-to-market is enterprise B2B: it monetizes its dataset and models through direct strategic partnerships with top-20 pharmaceutical companies, including Eli Lilly, AstraZeneca, and Merck, supporting target discovery, target characterization, biomarker identification, and patient stratification. Verge also reports $1.6 billion in cumulative partnership value, 280+ surfaced novel drug targets, and an 83% preclinical validation rate. Originally a drug developer that took VRG50635 (an AI-designed ALS candidate) into the clinic, the company terminated that program in December 2025 after a Phase 1 efficacy miss and subsequently laid off approximately 90% of its workforce, rebranded as Verge Labs, and pivoted to providing AI-powered data services to drug developers rather than developing drugs internally. Total disclosed funding is approximately $130 million, including a $98 million Series B in 2021 led by BlackRock with Eli Lilly and Merck GHI, and a $32 million round in February 2025.

Name

Verge Genomics

Legal name

Verge Labs

Website

https://vergegenomics.com

Company type

Private

Founded year

2015

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

11–50 employees

Short description

Verge Labs (formerly Verge Genomics) builds AI foundation models for neuroscience drug development, trained on proprietary multi-modal brain tissue and clinical data from 12,000+ patients, and sells target discovery, biomarker, and patient stratification services to top-20 pharmaceutical companies.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

AI Drug Discovery Platform

NAICS

Research and Development in Biotechnology (except Nanobiotechnology) (541714), Scientific Research and Development Services (5417)

SIC

Services-Commercial Physical & Biological Research (8731), Services-Testing Laboratories (8734)

akta.pro primary industry

AI/ML Platforms for Drug Discovery & Experiment Optimization (HLAGAJAO)

akta.pro secondary industries

Drug Discovery (Target ID/Validation & Hit Discovery) (HLAIALAA), Foundation Model Developers (LLM/Multimodal Model Labs) (HDAAACAA)

Keywords

• AI drug discovery
• Precision neurology AI
• Neuroscience data platform
• Clinical trial optimization
• Genomics target identification

Headquarters

HQ city

San Francisco

HQ country

United States

HQ region

North America

Offices1 record

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Software

Cost components

Technology or R&D, Personnel, Operations, Infrastructure, Marketing or Sales

Revenue model

1. AI-Powered Data Services: Providing AI-powered data services to drug developers including identifying drug targets, finding patients, and predicting biomarkers. Business model centered on monetizing datasets and insights.
2. Partnership Agreements with Pharma: Strategic partnerships with pharmaceutical companies for drug discovery and development, including collaborations with top-20 pharma companies.

Go-to-market motion2 records

Distribution channels2 records

Marketing channels4 records

Core offering

Verge Labs provides AI-powered drug discovery and data services to pharmaceutical partners using its Converge machine learning platform and vBx multi-modal foundation model. The platform leverages a proprietary dataset of 12,000+ profiled brains and 900+ frozen tissue samples to deliver target discovery, target characterization, biomarker identification, and patient stratification. Customers access these capabilities through strategic collaboration agreements focused on neuroscience drug development.

Product overview

Verge Labs (formerly Verge Genomics) offers an AI-powered drug discovery platform centered on its Converge machine learning platform and vBx foundation model. The platform leverages one of the world's largest proprietary multi-modal neuroscience patient datasets (12,000+ brains across 6,000 patients) to build foundation models that reason about neurological disease at the patient level. The company provides AI-powered services to drug developers including target discovery, target characterization, biomarker identification, and patient stratification. After terminating its sole clinical candidate VRG50635 in late 2025 following Phase 1 trial failure, the company pivoted to focus on providing AI-powered data services to drug developers, monetizing datasets and insights rather than developing drugs independently.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• vBx Foundation Model Multi-modal foundation model for precision neurology that predicts brain activity, therapy response, and side effects in patients with up to 3x greater accuracy than previous state-of-the-art models. Generates a virtual biopsy of the brain from routine blood draws. Sold to drug developers and pharmaceutical partners for clinical trial optimization and patient stratification.
• Converge Platform Machine learning platform for drug discovery using proprietary multimodal patient brain data. Enables target discovery, target characterization, biomarker identification, and patient stratification for pharmaceutical and biotech partners.
• VRG201 Development Candidate AI-discovered drug development candidate in Verge's pipeline, representing one of two AI-discovered drugs that reached clinical candidate stage. Targeted at neurological disease indications.

Quantifiable outcome

• 43% reduction in required patient enrollment for clinical trials using vBx-1.0
• +3 more outcomes

Named customers3 records

Segments2 records

Ideal customer profiles2 records

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

AI capability5 records

Feature4 records

Partnerships

Two partnerships are on record, tiered major.

• Eli Lilly (Collaboration)majorStrategic or Co-development Partner · 20 November 2024Active collaboration with Lilly to discover and develop novel treatments for ALS using Verge's AI platform. Lilly is developing ALS therapeutics against targets identified through the Verge technology platform.
• Ferrer (Spanish pharma)majorStrategic or Co-development PartnerIn March 2024, Verge entered a licensing deal with Ferrer worth up to 112.5 million euros for ex-U.S. rights to VRG50635 ALS treatment. The deal is now in limbo following Verge's termination of the clinical asset.

Scale indicators8 records

Recent moves6 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Emerging players

• Owkin: AI platform for patient stratification and drug development with pharma partners; overlapping biomarker and trial-optimization use cases, focused on oncology as well as other indications.

Direct peers

• Recursion Pharmaceuticals: AI-driven drug discovery platform combining high-throughput biology with machine learning; most direct comparable in business model, target ID, and pharma partnerships.
• Insitro: Machine learning-driven drug discovery combining patient-derived data with ML; comparable platform play with pharma partnerships and disease-specific focus.
• Exscientia: AI-driven small molecule drug discovery with multiple pharma collaborations; directly comparable AI-bio platform and partnership economics.
• BenevolentAI: AI foundation model applied to drug discovery with pharma partnerships; comparable target ID and clinical development positioning.
• Atomwise: AI-based small molecule discovery with pharma partnerships; comparable B2B pharma services and foundation-model approach.

Broad incumbents

• Isomorphic Labs: Alphabet-owned AI drug discovery spinout building foundation models (AlphaFold) for pharma; broader scope and deeper capital base, but same fundamental play of applying large ML models to drug development.
• Schrödinger: Physics-based computational chemistry and ML platform serving pharma; broader portfolio of software, services, and internal pipeline, comparable as an incumbent informatics vendor.
• Tempus Labs: Multi-modal patient data and AI platform with strong pharma services business; competing for data-monetization budgets and biomarker workstreams at scale.

Others

• Relay Therapeutics: Precision medicine company combining computational methods with drug development; adjacent rather than directly competitive, but comparable in marrying computation with clinical pipeline ambition.

Market position

Strengths4 records

Weaknesses4 records

Competitive moat4 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights6 records

Customer concentration

• Xx.com/VergeGenomics
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/verge-genomics

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles10 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds6 records

Investors25 records

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Verge Genomics