Lilly, a global leader in medicine, has launched the world’s largest AI factory fully owned and operated by a pharmaceutical company, built on NVIDIA DGX SuperPOD with DGX B300 systems. The facility, comprising 1,016 NVIDIA Blackwell Ultra GPUs, was unveiled at NVIDIA GTC Washington, D.C., and is designed to accelerate drug discovery, genomics research, personalized medicine, and molecular design at an industrial scale. This initiative allows Lilly to train large-scale biomedical foundation and frontier models while providing select AI tools through Lilly TuneLab, enabling biotech companies to access drug discovery models based on the company’s proprietary data.
TuneLab combines Lilly models with NVIDIA Clara open foundation models for healthcare, offering biotechs access to advanced AI while maintaining data privacy through federated learning powered by NVIDIA FLARE. This approach allows participating companies to benefit from increasingly robust models as more data is contributed without compromising proprietary information. Thomas Fuchs, chief AI officer at Lilly, emphasized that AI is helping chemists explore new atomic motifs and molecular configurations beyond the reach of traditional methods, accelerating the development of more personalized and targeted medicines.
The AI factory is supported by NVIDIA’s full-stack AI architecture, including accelerated computing, Spectrum-X Ethernet networking, and optimized AI software, providing a secure, scalable platform for the highly regulated life sciences sector. Mission Control software allows Lilly to manage DGX SuperPOD operations, monitor performance, and automate AI workloads across more than 1,000 GPUs. Using the AI factory, scientists can analyze complete genome sequences, predict patient outcomes, explore biochemical possibilities, and accelerate research in drug discovery, biomarker identification, and gene therapy design. Deep learning applied to imaging datasets through the open-source MONAI framework reduces processing time from months to days, supporting precision medicine initiatives.
Lilly is also leveraging AI for biomanufacturing, employing physical AI and digital twins via NVIDIA Omniverse and RTX PRO Servers to simulate and optimize production lines and supply chains. Robotics powered by NVIDIA Isaac Sim assists with quality inspection and transport within manufacturing, while AI agents built with NeMo software enhance laboratory workflows, molecule generation, and treatment testing. Diogo Rau, executive vice president at Lilly, noted that AI agents work continuously to generate insights and ideas that complement human expertise, supporting faster and more efficient development processes.
This AI factory positions Lilly as a leading AI-native pharmaceutical company, complementing its $50 billion investment in U.S. manufacturing and R&D, including new facilities and the proposed Lilly Medicine Foundry. With 1,016 Blackwell Ultra GPUs delivering over 9,000 petaflops of AI performance, the factory is capable of performing quintillions of calculations per second, enabling rapid experimentation and model training. The initiative is expected to create thousands of high-wage jobs while strengthening Lilly’s global leadership in AI-driven drug development and precision medicine.
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