(Yicai) July 11 -- BioMap, a life sciences and artificial intelligence model firm established by Robin Li, founder and chief executive officer of Chinese tech giant Baidu, has completed a new financing round.

Yicai, who learned about BioMap's latest fundraiser, did not find who the investors were or how much funds the company secured.

However, the Hong Kong Investment Corporation and BioMap inked a strategic partnership agreement on June 24, with the latter announcing the establishment of its first-ever BioMap InnoHub in Hong Kong on the same day. The facility's first program is expected to support over 50 cutting-edge life sciences early-stage research and development projects over the next five years.

BioMap was set up in 2020, with Robin Li as its chairman and Liu Wei, former partner at Legend Star and CEO of Baidu Ventures, as its CEO. In 2021, it secured USD100 million in a Series A financing round.

BioMap has built the XTrimo, short for Cross-Modal Transformer Representation of Interactome and Multi-Omics, the first Life Science AI Foundation Model to hit over 100 billion parameters and is still the largest of its kind.

Last year, BioMap allied with leading French pharmaceutical company Sanofi, with the pair to jointly develop cutting-edge models for biotherapeutics discovery.

Li previously said he hoped AI technologies could shorten the time needed for the research and development of medicines, reduce drugs' side effects, ease the huge healthcare burdens of patients, and strive for more possibilities for every life.

Many tech tycoons, including Jensen Huang, founder of US chip giant Nvidia, Jack Ma, founder of Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding, Colin Huang, founder of e-commerce firm Pinduoduo, Zhang Yiming, founder of TikTok parent firm ByteDance, and Wang Xiaochuan, founder of search engine Sogou, have shown significant interests in life sciences.

These internet magnates' participation in life sciences has brought funds and support, boosting technological innovation and the sector's growth as well as leading life sciences into a new "golden age," according to analysts.

Editor: Martin Kadiev