Kvantify, a Danish quantum and high-performance computing business, has expanded to the UK with the appointment of an in-house drug-discovery team.
Founded in 2022, Kvantify enables institutions to harness the full potential of quantum and high-performance computing to solve businesses’ most difficult computational challenges.
Since 2022 when Kvantify was founded, they have scaled quickly, and have recently appointed four new UK-based team members – each previously at Benevolent AI – to make up their in-house drug discovery team. This news follows Kvantify’s recent prestigious EIC Accelerator Grant win and $5.7 million funding round earlier this year.
In May, London-based biopharma technology firm Benevolent AI announced a strategic reorganisation aimed at making cost savings of £45 million – including the laying off of 180 staff – while there has been a shake-up of its executive team.
Kvantify’s team in Denmark is made up of 50+ top-tier experts with backgrounds in physics, mathematics, chemistry, and computer science. The startup works across a variety of industries including transport and logistics, finance, and life sciences, delivering SaaS solutions based on cloud-native, quantum & high-performance computing.
The Kvantify UK team will focus on using physical simulations and machine learning methods to accelerate drug discovery. Up until this point, Kvantify has developed software tools to help organisations’ scientists accelerate their drug development projects.
A limitation for many companies is that they lack the competencies or the bandwidth to use computational tools. With the new UK team, Kvantify can reach a broader set of companies and offer the capability to conduct early drug discovery computationally on behalf of clients.
Kvantify’s new hires include Michael Carter, head of drug discovery; Giulio Mattedi, cheminformatics specialist; Daniela Dolciami, senior computational chemist; and Rob Z, computational chemistry specialist.
Other upcoming projects from the company include the development of its FAST-VQE quantum algorithm – currently in late-stage testing with supporting partner AWS – which is described as a major step towards moving chemical and pharma R&D away from the physical lab and towards computers.
Kvantify is also launching a collaboration with King’s College London’s Chemistry Department. Kvantify’s co-founder Professor Nikolaj Zinner, head of strategic alliances Nils Berglund, and head of drug discovery Dr Michael Carter will take on visiting positions at the department to help them adopt new quantum technologies and identify use cases.
Kvantify will additionally gain access to King’s talent pool and will sponsor a PhD student within the head of department Professor Martin Ulmschneider’s group to develop novel drug discovery methods suitable for quantum computing.
Hans Henrik Knudsen, co-founder and CEO at Kvantify, said: “We believe that London offers an ideal ecosystem for our software solutions to flourish. The city’s vibrant tech community and access to top talent align perfectly with our growth objectives.
“We have established ourselves as a serious player on the Danish market, and we are now ready to solidify our position in the European market.”