Anthropic Opens Wet Lab in San Francisco Bay Area to Expand AI into Biotech Research

US AI company Anthropic has quietly set up a wet lab in the San Francisco Bay Area, extending its AI business into hands-on biological research and drug science. As public concerns about AI risks grow, Anthropic has begun conducting physical experiments to advance treatments for rare diseases.

Eric Kauderer-Abrams, Anthropic's head of life sciences, confirmed the lab's existence, saying biological research ultimately needs to be tested by real lab work. The lab is not specifically for drug discovery, but the company hopes to tackle diseases overlooked by the pharmaceutical industry and deliver results before employees and the public lose faith in AI's value.

Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei's father died from a disease that got a treatment just a few years later, adding personal meaning to the work. No drug development is guaranteed to succeed, and most candidate drugs ultimately fail clinical trials.