Ataraxis AI has raised $20.4 million in Series A funding to further develop its AI precision medicine platform for cancer care, with a focus on its first offering, Ataraxis Breast.
The financing round was led by AIX Ventures with participation from Floating Point, Thiel Bio, Founders Fund, Bertelsmann Investments, and existing investors Giant Ventures and Obvious Ventures. Healthcare pioneers also participated as angel investors, including Mario Schlosser, co-founder and former CEO of Oscar Health, Ryan Fukushima, COO of Tempus, alongside researchers from OpenAI and DeepMind.
Founded by Jan Witowski, MD, PhD, and Krzysztof Geras, PhD, Ataraxis AI has developed a frontier AI foundation model called Kestrel. The company’s first offering, Ataraxis Breast, is described as the world’s first AI-native prognostic/predictive platform for breast cancer. According to the company, the platform has been clinically validated to be 30 percent more accurate than the current standard of care for breast cancer.
“This investment is a testament to the groundbreaking work our team is accomplishing and the immense potential of AI in precision medicine. It also reflects our progress, securing funding just a few months after receiving clinical validation,” said Jan Witowski, MD, PhD, co-founder and CEO, Ataraxis AI. “With this capital, we are on track to further accelerate our mission to change how cancer is treated and ultimately impact at least 50 percent of new cancer cases by 2030.”
The company plans to launch Ataraxis Breast for clinical use later this year for oncologists across the United States. The new funding will support expanding treatment selection capabilities within and beyond breast cancer, as well as the development of next-generation AI foundation models.
Ataraxis AI reports that its Kestrel model outperforms existing approaches by uncovering complex, previously undetectable patterns linked to patient outcomes across all disease types, while requiring less data and computational power. The model is the first of Ataraxis’ foundation models, which will power the development of treatment selection tools for all cancer types.
The company has also announced its Clinical Advisory Board, which includes medical oncology key opinion leaders from top health systems: Dr. Francisco Esteva (Northwell Lenox Hill), Dr. Lajos Pusztai (Yale Cancer Center), Dr. Adam Brufsky (UPMC Hillman Cancer Center), and Dr. Freya Schnabel (NYU). Yann LeCun, PhD, Chief AI Scientist at Meta and Turing Award Laureate, serves as the company’s AI advisor.
“In the next five years, the world’s leading oncology centers won’t just have top physicians—they’ll have AI copilots revolutionizing diagnosis and treatment. Ataraxis AI is at the forefront of this transformation, and its breakthrough platform, Kestrel, is setting a new standard for precision oncology,” said Krish Ramadurai, Partner at AIX Ventures. “Jan and his team aren’t just building another AI tool—they’re redefining how cancer is detected and treated, with the potential to improve millions of lives. We couldn’t be more excited to back them on this journey.”
