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Insilico Develops The World’s First Fully AI-Generated Drug
The Abu Dhabi-based company hopes to treat idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, and has 30 more drugs in the pipeline.
In a busy biotech hub in Abu Dhabi’s Masdar City, Insilico Medicine is pushing the frontiers of science. Under the watchful eye of Latvian-born CEO Dr Alex Zhavoronkov, the company has developed an AI-generated drug to treat idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) — a deadly disease of the lungs.
“This AI drug is a major milestone for us and the industry as a whole,” Dr. Zhavoronkov explains. “We can use AI to create lifesaving treatments for new diseases using approaches we haven’t yet considered and do so much more rapidly and efficiently”.
Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis is characterized by scarring of the lungs and has no known cure. Insilico’s AI drug aims to halt or even reverse the progression of IPF and is currently undergoing Phase 2 clinical trials in the US and China. The success of these trials will pave the way for more in-depth testing, bringing the drug closer to mass market approval.
Insilico’s groundbreaking research was recently published in Nature Biotechnology. It highlights how the company’s AI platform, Pharma.AI, is connecting the dots between fibrosis and aging to drive forward the discovery of a cure.
IPF treatment is just the beginning for Insilico. The company already has a roadmap consisting of over thirty AI-designed drugs, with seven already in clinical patient trials. These include treatments for inflammatory bowel disease, immuno-oncology targets, and even drugs developed using a method that targets a protein in cancers that can kill them without harming healthy cells.
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Dr Zhavoronkov’s ultimate goal is to leverage AI to unravel the complex processes involved in aging. “Our number one priority is to teach AI to understand the basic biology of aging, and I think we’ve succeeded in that process. Now, we need to demonstrate that we can utilize this understanding to cure diseases,” he says.
Insilico Medicine’s AI-driven drugs showcase the massive untapped potential of artificial intelligence in all aspects of healthcare. As the company continues to innovate, its work brings hope to patients around the world and demonstrates that the future of medicine is promising, thanks to the application of the latest technological breakthroughs.
News
Visa’s Return To Syria Starts With A Test And A Bank In Lebanon
Foreign visitors will be the first users to benefit, but whether Syria’s own banks and cardholders follow is still an open question.
Visa is returning to Syria. Its first live international card transaction in the country was a test rather than a launch, and the milestone event ran through a Lebanese bank.
The acquirer (the bank on the merchant’s side of a card payment) was Fransabank Lebanon, with Paymera as the other named partner. Nadim Moujaes, who heads a Fransabank Group subsidiary, describes the test as both the culmination of “longstanding efforts to link Syria back to international payment networks” and “the first step in a larger path”.
Syrian President Ahmed Al-Sharaa makes the first electronic payment in Syria using a @Visa card at a store in Damascus, following the lifting of US sanctions on Syria. pic.twitter.com/lpAN7nQ6Fc
— Tech Magazine (@TechMGZN) August 27, 2026
“We are excited to have successfully tested live transactions today as we plan to enable international visitors to use their Visa cards while in Syria,” says Leila Serhan, Visa’s senior vice president and group country manager for the North Africa, Levant and Pakistan region. Although a significant first step, that plan doesn’t come with a hard date for when a visitor’s card will work normally.
Mohammed Safwat Raslan, governor of the Central Bank of Syria, says the test paves the way for international card acceptance in Syria and that maintaining strong compliance, risk management and operational controls will remain essential. Serhan likewise stresses that Visa has worked within applicable legal, regulatory and compliance requirements. For a test transaction, it seems there was a great deal of attention paid to the rules, with the entire operation being carefully managed.
Also Read: Lebanon’s 5G Era Begins With 150 Stations And A $1M Budget
The test is the latest step in a sequence that began in December 2025, when Visa announced a strategic roadmap to support Syria’s integration into the global digital economy. In February 2026 it hosted its first industry gathering of banks, ecosystem partners and policymakers in Damascus and, the same month, signed an agreement with Syria’s Ministry of Communications and Information Technology in San Francisco.
Michel Kattouah, Paymera’s CEO, called the test “the return of international card acceptance,” but while that’s positive news, there’s no word yet on when a Syrian bank will issue a Visa card to a Syrian customer.
Visa’s Return To Syria Starts With A Test And A Bank In Lebanon
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