Axiom Bio is a San Francisco company launched in late 2023 by Brandon White (CEO) and Alex Beatson (CTO), machine learning engineers with prior experience at Freenome, Spring Discovery, Genesis Therapeutics and Redesign Sciences. The company screens chemical compounds against live primary human hepatocytes at scale, captures hundreds of data points per cellular experiment via high-content imaging and multiplexed biochemical readouts, and uses the resulting dataset to train models that predict drug-induced liver injury (DILI). Its dataset covers more than 115,000 unique small molecules, over 1,200 targets and 50,000 scaffolds, including macrocycles, PROTACs and molecular glues, with 394 million-plus individually labeled cells, 9 billion-plus labeled mitochondria, over 5,200 DILI likelihood assessments and more than 38,000 liver enzyme elevation datapoints. Axiom operates two proprietary liver models: a 2D pooled-donor primary hepatocyte system with 48-hour dose-range exposures, and a 2D+ multi-cell hepatic system incorporating stromal and endothelial support cells that supports multi-dosing over two weeks and enables assessment of cholestasis and steatosis. The company reports its liver model identifies toxic compounds at roughly 70-75% sensitivity with about 90% accuracy on safe compounds, at $100-$450 per compound versus $3,000-$15,000 for physical experiments. The work was presented at the Society of Toxicology conference in March 2025. Pilot studies have been run with partners including six of the top twenty pharmaceutical companies, and the company plans to extend its models to brain, heart, kidney and immunogenicity endpoints. Its approach aligns with the FDA's April 2025 plan to phase out certain animal testing requirements.
Funding
Axiom Bio has raised $15 million in seed funding from Amplify Partners, Dimension Capital and Zetta Venture Partners, with angel participation including Jeff Dean, Laksh Aithani, Barry McCardel, Alec Nielsen, Ari Morcos, Stef van Grieken and Elliot Hershberg. Amplify led an initial $7 million seed in 2023 and invested again alongside Dimension Capital in an $8 million financing in late 2024; the combined $15 million was announced publicly in April 2025.