An AI drug deal that prices patient data per record

Pathos AI announced multi-year collaborations with Bristol Myers Squibb and Tempus AI on 23 October, starting with Alzheimer’s disease and other neurological conditions, as PharmExec reported. Bristol Myers Squibb also led Pathos’s $237m Series E, which values the company at about $3bn. Tempus disclosed the data terms in a filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission.

• Tempus will aim to deliver 500,000 de-identified records of patients with Alzheimer’s or other specified neurological conditions over five years, about 100,000 a year, at $100 per delivered record. With updates, the order is worth up to $55m.
• Pathos analyses the data with its Foundry platform and a licensed Tempus tool. Bristol Myers Squibb gets three-year exclusive rights to use Foundry in neuroscience and access across its wider portfolio.
• For a set period, Tempus will not license the same records to anyone outside the three companies. Because Tempus and Pathos share executives and shareholders, a committee of independent Tempus directors approved the order.

Most AI announcements in pharma lead with the model. This contract prices the input, one patient record at a time, and protects it with exclusivity, which suggests where a large drug developer expects the advantage to sit. For companies in pharma and consumer health that hold well-documented patient or consumer data, the deal raises the question of what a single record would be worth to a partner, and on which terms to share it. (PharmExec)