The Gates Foundation committed up to $35 million to Profound Therapeutics to accelerate biomarker and drug target discovery for preeclampsia and eclampsia. The investment includes an initial $20 million and additional funding tied to experimental milestones, with Profound applying its ProFoundry platform and agentic AI capabilities. Profound said it will use placental tissue and serum samples from affected patients to identify proteins linked to these pregnancy disorders—leveraging the so-called “expanded proteome,” or proteins outside canonical genome coding regions. The company’s goal is to produce biomarkers, drug targets, and candidate therapeutics, supported by AI-based prioritization and downstream validation. The grant also highlights Gates’ focus on underinvested women’s health indications, where limited therapeutic options remain and diagnostic and mechanistic gaps persist.