Based in Arizona, Airobes is working to make manufacturing of AI-designed proteins faster, cheaper, and more sustainable, helping unlock the next generation of biologics and therapeutics.
What Key Challenge Is Airobes Focused on Addressing?
AI is generating thousands of potential new therapeutics and treatments with a remarkably high success rate, but they still need to be made and tested. Airobes is working to make manufacturing of AI-designed proteins faster, cheaper, and more sustainable.
How Significant Is This Challenge?
AI has proven to be a powerful tool for the development of novel disease treatments and therapeutics, providing a newfound ability to target mechanisms and pathways that were previously “undruggable.” The bottleneck is no longer computational — companies are generating more protein sequences than can be manufactured. Traditional protein manufacturing in cells is reliant on
chromatography, a slow, complex, and failure-prone step. Airobes developed a new way of manufacturing proteins that maintains the high purities (>90%) needed for downstream R&D without the chromatography step, simplifying and speeding manufacturing.
How Is Airobes’ Approach Making a Meaningful Impact?
Airobes is currently manufacturing proteins directly for other businesses, academic labs, and individual customers. Their customers span numerous industries including biotechnology, food and beverage, and agriculture. They also collaborate with laboratories throughout the state and country to support custom protein manufacturing needs.
How Has Being Based in Arizona Supported Airobes’ Growth?
Arizona has provided the right blend of resources, space, expertise, and leadership that has accelerated Airobes’ growth and increased their capacity for innovation. AZBio was an early champion of Airobes, providing competitive funding to support their first intern, who eventually became their first full-time hire. The Connect Labs space at the 850 PBC and the surrounding bioscience community have been equally instrumental to their early success, providing the visibility, connections, equipment, and space needed to prove the technology and build early traction.
What Does the Future Look Like for Airobes?
Looking ahead, Airobes plans to rapidly expand their biomanufacturing capacity and continue working with existing partners and distributors to support larger custom protein projects. They are excited to grow their footprint in Arizona, enable faster and cheaper AI protein design campaigns, and help drive the development of novel biologics and therapeutics to better patient outcomes.
Responses attributed to Jarrett Eshima, PhD, CEO, Airobes LLC.
About the Author
Ava Woods is the Marketing & Communications Intern at AZBio, supporting digital communications, content creation, and member engagement initiatives. In her role, Ava assists with social media management, marketing campaigns, event promotion, and storytelling efforts that highlight Arizona’s growing bioscience community. Connect with Ava
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