Watson shifts from drug discovery to the clinic

Responding to reports that it will no longer sell its Watson artificial intelligence system for use in drug discovery, IBM says it is “not discontinuing our Watson for Drug Discovery offering” and that it will continue to support current users. At the same time, IBM says, “We are focusing our resources within Watson Health to double down on the adjacent field of clinical development.” The initial report of changes at IBM was published in the life sciences newsletter Stat and attributed to “a person familiar with the company’s internal decision-making.” IBM has struggled to adapt its Watson computing system to drug discovery. It had to halt a marquee installation of Watson for Oncology at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in 2016. Both MD Anderson and IBM said they scrapped the project because of procurement improprieties. AI has made only small advances in drug discovery generally, and industry