Orakl Oncology Raises $34 Million to Predict Cancer Drug Response With AI

Paris-based Orakl Oncology has raised a $34 million Series A led by Norrsken VC and Singular, Tech Funding News reports. Verve Ventures, Speedinvest and HCVC also took part, bringing total funding to $50 million.

Orakl, a 2023 spin-out from cancer centre Gustave Roussy, grows real tumours in the lab and combines them with medical history and biological data to build groups of virtual patients, then uses AI to predict how they respond to drugs at scale. It aims at a stubborn problem: about 75% of oncology drug candidates fail in Phase 2 trials, according to BIO data.

Orakl says its platform predicts trial outcomes with 90% accuracy, but that figure comes from a preprint and has not yet been shown to improve drug success rates. Exclusive rights to four Sanofi oncology assets will serve as a real-world test. The company plans to expand from colorectal and pancreatic cancers into lung and gastric cancers and open teams in the US and UK.