Venomics AI, a Bengaluru biotech company spun out of the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), raised $2.7m in a pre-seed round announced on 5 November 2026.
Speciale Invest and South Park Commons co-led the round, and Operators Studio also invested. It is the company's first institutional funding. Venomics AI did not disclose a valuation.
The company plans to use the money to grow its database of venom molecules, strengthen its AI and laboratory screening, hire staff and test its most promising drug candidates.
“Animal venoms represent one of nature's richest yet least explored sources of potential medicines”Kartik Sunagar, Founder and Director, Venomics AI
What Venomics AI does
Animal venoms contain molecules that evolved over millions of years to act on specific targets in the body, which makes them a source of leads for medicines. Two approved drugs show the idea: captopril was inspired by snake venom peptides, and ziconotide comes from a cone snail venom peptide.
Venomics AI sequences venoms to build what it calls the Venom Atlas, a molecular dataset. AI models then rank the molecules most likely to become drugs, and the company tests those predictions in its own lab. The test results are fed back to improve the next round of predictions and molecular design.
The company said it has set up the first version of its platform and joined Nvidia's Inception programme. It was also named one of five finalists for the 2026 Indo-Boston Biotech Bridge Award. It has not named specific disease targets or drug programmes.
The founders
Kartik Sunagar, the founder and director, is an associate professor at IISc's Centre for Ecological Sciences, where he leads the Evolutionary Venomics Lab. His research covers how venoms evolve and how antivenoms are made. Indian Startup News reported that his lab worked with Scripps Research on a synthetic antibody against neurotoxins from several snake species, and with the Technical University of Denmark on a nanobody-based antivenom tested in mice.
Co-founder Vinay Prabhu is the chief technology officer. He holds a PhD from Carnegie Mellon University and works on machine learning and large AI systems; he was previously chief scientist at UnifyID. According to Entrackr, the two set up the company in May 2026.
"Animal venoms represent one of nature's richest yet least explored sources of potential medicines," Sunagar said in the company's announcement. He said the aim was to build a drug discovery platform in India that draws on the country's biodiversity and scientific talent.
Why the investors backed it
Arjun Rao, a general partner at Speciale Invest, said few people combine Sunagar's knowledge of venoms with access to study them, and that pairing it with Prabhu's AI experience was rare. Speciale estimates that about 20 million venom peptides exist and that fewer than 0.1% have been studied, according to Indian Startup News.
Prateek Mehta, a general partner at South Park Commons who leads its India office, described venom as one of nature's oldest targeting systems. He said AI makes it possible to search many molecules at once instead of one at a time, and that India's biodiversity gives the company an advantage.
What the money is for
The company said the round will pay to expand the Venom Atlas, add AI and lab screening capacity, and build a team across venom biology, computational science and drug discovery. It will also fund work to validate and optimise the strongest candidate molecules.
Other Indian startups are working on venom-derived compounds. Entrackr pointed to Snaayu Lifesciences, incubated at C-CAMP, which studies pain-relieving compounds from cone snail venom. Speciale Invest also co-led a Rs 70 crore (about $7.4m) Series A for Bengaluru AI drug discovery company Peptris Technologies in February 2026, according to Entrackr.
Company website: venomics.ai