Quild #16: Entos

This is the Quild daily, highlighting one early-stage startup that has statistically significant signals of becoming a unicorn.

Entos combines machine learning and automated chemistry to revolutionize small-molecule therapeutics design. Traditional therapeutic discovery is highly complex and entails prolonged timelines, vast training data needs and sub-optimal accuracy. Entos is eradicating these challenges with its cutting-edge OrbNet platform, an AI-driven drug-development process that creates a thousand-fold acceleration in molecular properties prediction with 100x less training data required.

Founders: Thomas Miller (CEO), Fred Manby (CTO), Tim Cernak (CSO), Sarah Trice (COO), Matthew Welborn (Director)

Signals:

1. Top company alumni

   1. Tim was a principal scientist at Merck for ~9 years

   2. Sarah was a scientist and led innovation & business units at Merck for 15 years

2. Top university alumni, academics, and scientists

   1. Thomas is a professor of Chemistry at CalTech. He graduated with a PhD in Theoretical Chemistry from University of Oxford, a MPhil in Theoretical Chemistry from UCL, a BS in Chemistry & Mathematics from Texas A&M, and was a postdoctoral fellow at UC Berkeley

   2. Fred is a professor of Theoretical Chemistry at University of Bristol

   3. Tim is an assistant professor at University of Michigan. He graduated with a PhD in Organic Chemistry from McGill University and was a postdoctoral fellow of Chemical Synthesis at Columbia University

   4. Sarah graduated with an MBA from MIT and a PhD in Organic Chemistry from University of Pennsylvania

   5. Matthew graduated with a PhD in Physical Chemistry from MIT and a BS in Chemistry from UT Austin. He was also a scientist at CalTech

3. Fast team growth

   1. Grew 2x YoY from 21 to 43 employees

4. Midas list investors

   1. Coatue co-led series A

   2. Sequoia participated in series A

Till tomorrow, Kenn