According to TrackingBeat monitoring, Alex Zavalov, Founder and CEO of Engsilicon Intelligence, delivered a keynote speech at the 2026 World Artificial Intelligence Conference, systematically elaborating on the transformative role of AI in new drug development. Traditional new drug development usually takes 4 to 5 years from target identification to lead compound, with China's domestic research architecture and talent accumulation alone being about 2 years faster than the global average. With the additional AI capability, this process can be further shortened to 9 to 12 months—this is the "miracle that AI combined with the Chinese architecture can achieve."

Alex reviewed that his team first demonstrated in a 2019 paper published in Nature that reinforcement learning and AI could generate new molecules and successfully validate them in the laboratory within 46 days. The subsequent popularization of generative AI has completely changed the R&D process, and open models such as DeepSeek have enabled scientists worldwide to use AI in the fields of public health and new drug development.
Alex disclosed that the company has drugs in Phase III clinical trials in China, covering targeted therapies for complex diseases and candidate drugs targeting both disease and aging, with research results published in several Nature series papers. He specifically mentioned the establishment of a robot-driven drug development factory in Jinqiao, Pudong, Shanghai, which was built from concept to facility in 18 months, setting multiple records. Currently, the company is exporting this "ultra-intelligent pharmaceutical" capability to other pharmaceutical companies to help them improve quality and efficiency in over 1200 tasks required for new drug development.

At the end of his speech, Alex called for the establishment of an academic community to allow AI to benefit the world in an open manner, especially in public health and extending human healthspan.

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