Warp Sciences exits stealth with $215M to bring robotics to drug discovery

Warp Sciences emerged from stealth last week with $215 million in funding to build chemistry infrastructure for sovereign biotech. The South San Francisco startup is creating a U.S.-based contract research organization that combines chemists, robotics and AI to make and test molecules for research teams.

The company says its goal is to generate experimental data that can train better AI models, which in turn could enable more capable labs and let scientists test more ideas. Warp is not developing its own drug pipeline; instead, it is designing automated labs that can run experiments, learn from them and improve with each cycle.

Co-founder and CEO Kevin Weil said AI has accelerated software engineering and mathematics but has not yet had the same impact in the physical sciences. Chemistry and biology advance, he said, when researchers make something, test it and learn from the result. Weil added that generating real-world data at scale is necessary to build more capable AI for science, and that Warp is starting by making research compounds drug discovery needs today while building labs and automation to speed the cycle from hypothesis to experiment to answer.

Warp emphasized sovereign biotechnology as a central rationale. Reuters reported that a 2024 Biotechnology Innovation Organization survey found 74% of respondents had contracts with Chinese companies for preclinical and clinical services. The BIOSECURE Act, signed into law in December 2025, established a framework for restrictions on federal procurement and funding involving designated biotechnology companies of concern.

In response, Warp says it is building a U.S.-based chemistry partner that scientists can rely on for speed, quality and close collaboration. Its goal is to shorten the path from molecular design to testing while giving customers more control over where sensitive research takes place.

The initial service will focus on lead optimization analog synthesis—making variations of molecules that scientists can compare as they search for a drug candidate. Experienced chemists will guide experiments as the lab becomes increasingly automated by robotics and AI, with models trained on data from physical experiments. Warp plans to help customers discover drugs more efficiently and keep that discovery in the U.S.

Warp Sciences says its founding team’s experience spans AI, data infrastructure, healthcare and drug discovery. Weil most recently served as chief product officer and vice president of science at OpenAI. Chief Scientific Officer Solomon “Sol” Reisberg held medicinal chemistry leadership roles at Terremoto Biosciences.

Reisberg said he has worked with overseas chemistry partners that delivered speed and value, but he still worried about protecting the intellectual property behind drug programs. He said Warp aims to give drug hunters the same caliber of chemistry services in the U.S., with IP protection at the center of the relationship and without the price premium that U.S. boutique CROs currently demand.

Chief Technology Officer Manohar “Mano” Paluri was a vice president at Meta Superintelligence Labs and a founding member of FAIR. DJ Patil was a founding executive at Devoted Health and the first U.S. chief data scientist for the White House.

Paluri said every experiment should make the next one smarter. He said AI needs a closer connection to the physical work of chemistry, and that closing the loop between designing experiments, executing them and learning from their outcomes builds increasingly capable systems for deciding what to make and how to make it. Warp is building software, AI and robotics alongside the lab so each part is shaped by what chemists need, he added.

Early hires have added robotics experience from Genesis, Skild AI and 1X Technologies, as well as scientific expertise from Genentech and Lawrence Livermore National Labs. Patil said Warp’s services bolster customer-led discovery programs: biotech and pharma customers determine which molecules to pursue and retain control of their drug programs. Warp is not developing drugs of its own, he said; it is building infrastructure for the people who do.

Lightspeed led the funding, with participation from Premji Invest, Mayfield, IVP, Lux, Conviction, Menlo Ventures, 01 Advisors, Standard, Lowercarbon Capital, Gigascale Capital, Angular Ventures, Scribble Ventures, Uncork Capital, Innovation Endeavors, Matter VP, Zero Shot Fund, SignalFire and Moxxie Ventures.

Angel investors included Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong, Anthropic Labs co-lead and Instagram co-founder Mike Krieger, former Tesla Robotics vice president Milan Kovac, Databricks co-founder Ion Stoica, former OpenAI AGI Deployment CEO Fidji Simo, Mercor CEO Brendan Foody, OpenAI chief research officer Mark Chen and OpenAI chief financial officer Sarah Friar.

Other angels were former OpenAI and Coinbase chief marketing officer Kate Rouch, Rostra CEO Lulu Meservey, Skild AI CEO Deepak Pathak, Figma CEO Dylan Field and Physical Intelligence co-founder and COO Lachy Groom.