The UCSF School of Pharmacy has built a reputation for blending basic research with translational science to produce breakthroughs that bring therapies closer to patients. School faculty members have founded more than 40 startups to create a hub of scientific innovation, advancing technologies that bridge academic discovery with real-world applications.

“UCSF has a rich history of entrepreneurship, with seminal biotech companies like Genentech and Chiron founded by UCSF faculty members in the ’70s and ’80s,” said Adam Renslo, PhD, associate dean of entrepreneurship and industry relations. “In the current era, our investigators are approaching biological problems from so many different angles and fields of training.  From making new discoveries to inventing new technologies to writing new code, what unites us is advancing our shared understanding of biology and disease, which naturally brings with it an interest in entrepreneurship."

Overcoming the “the valley of death”

Translating basic research into therapeutics that reach patients requires successfully navigating what scientists in drug development call “the valley of death” — the difficult gap between a fundamental discovery in an academic lab and identifying a drug optimized for clinical trials or that can attract capital investment.  

Yet faculty members have found a way to carve that path, fueled by the school’s consistent ranking as a top recipient of funding from the National Institutes of Health among pharmacy schools nationwide.  

This steady support has fueled the pursuit of big, risky questions about biology that have helped faculty launch start-ups. Among them, three major areas are bringing more precise therapeutics to patients worldwide:

1. Computational drug discovery

The school has long been a leader in combining AI, molecular modeling, and large-scale virtual screening to accelerate the design of new medicines. Faculty-led startups in this area have included:

• Foundational work by emeritus professors like Irwin "Tack" Kuntz, PhD, a pioneer of the computational pharmacology approach known as molecular docking, and Matt Jacobson, PhD, whose lab employed physics-based energy models for predictive protein modeling. Several biotechnology companies resulted, including Global Blood Therapeutics, which focuses on sickle cell disease and was purchased by Pfizer for $5.4 billion, and Circle Pharma, which harnesses the power of macrocycles to transform the treatement of cancer and other serious illnesses.
• Computational approaches toward designing proteins with new functions, including as novel therapies, by Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry Professor William DeGrado, PhD. He has co-founded several successful biotech companies, including Pliant Therapeutics, which went public in 2020 and is advancing a pipeline of therapies for fibrosis and related diseases.  
• Advancement of predictive methods for understanding how molecules bind to proteins by Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry Chair Brian Shoichet, PhD, who was mentored by Kuntz. His long-running collaboration with Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry Adjunct Professor John Irwin, PhD, included the co-founding of Deep Apple Therapeutics, which combines screening of ultra-large drug molecule libraries to identify and optimize drug targets in a fraction of the industry standard time. 

2. Unlocking the Potential of GPCRs

Deep Apple's discovery engine is currently advancing multiple programs focused on modulating G protein–coupled receptors (GPCRs), a proven class of drug targets tied to metabolic disorders, inflammation, immunology, and endocrine diseases.  

Together with Shoichet’s lab, Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry Associate Professor Aashish Manglik, MD, PhD, focuses on the structural biology of GPCRs, and helped identify a molecule that activates opioid receptors — also GPCRs — without causing the side effects typical of most opioid medications.  

As collaborators, Shoichet and Manglik were among the founders of Epiodyne, a company that further developed this emerging area, applying new understanding of receptor biology to produce safer and more effective pain medications.

Manglik’s experimental insights into GPCR function also helped start Septerna, a company that combines structural biology with high-throughput discovery to advance novel GPCR-targeted therapies.

3. A new way to target proteins with small molecules

The school also specializes in protein engineering and small-molecule approaches to protein-protein interactions, which gives scientists powerful ways to discover new medicines, whether by reshaping how proteins behave or by creating compounds that can precisely target disease pathways.

Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry Professor Jim Wells, PhD, renowned for developing original approaches to the design and manipulation of proteins, left Genentech in 1998 to launch Sunesis Pharmaceuticals, which introduced small molecule "tethering” technology, to target otherwise inaccessible sites on proteins with small molecules. Wells brought this unique technology to UCSF in 2005 and co-founded the Small Molecule Discovery Center (SMDC) with Renslo.  

Wells started several companies, including Epibologics, which focuses on extracellular protein degradation. His more recent research focuses on proteins on the surface of cells, for example shedding light on how oxygen deprivation alters proteins on the surface of cancer cells, potentially translating into better diagnostic tools and creating new therapeutical targets for diseases like pancreatic cancer.

Having helped develop the tethering technology while an early scientist at Sunesis, Professor and Vice Dean of Research Technology and Entrepreneurship Michelle Arkin, PhD, has widely applied the technology at UCSF to target protein–protein interactions once thought to be “undruggable.” She currently serves as executive director of the SMDC, where tethering is made available to investigators across campus and beyond.

Arkin is also a co-founder of Ambagon Therapeutics, a pioneer of molecular “glues” that stabilize molecular interactions between proteins. Together, Renslo and Arkin co-founded Elgia Therapeutics to advance their discovery of therapeutic leads for inflammatory and neurodegenerative disease, molecules that originated from a tethering screen.