On April 22 in San Francisco, 550+ practitioners working at the intersection of AI and life sciences gathered for UNLOCK 2026. The premise: cut the hype, focus on what's actually working.

• 341 unique companies.

• 284 attendees at the VP, head, or partner level or above. 

• 33 speakers across 14 sessions. 

THREE highlighted moments:

Michelle Lee, Founder/CEO, Medra

We are building the data engine that we believe is necessary to make science autonomous. Our number one priority is to work with our customers to help with their science. Instead of opening a lab, we thought to ourselves, why couldn't we open the largest autonomous lab. Medra Lab 001 is going to be the largest fully autonomous lab in the United States.

Jorge Reis-Filho, Chief of AI for Science Innovation, AstraZeneca

Our core thesis at AstraZeneca is that AI is going to change absolutely every single step in what we do in terms of drug discovery and clinical development. My team is primarily focused on transforming clinical development first and foremost. Our core strategy is to utilize domain specific frontier models to derive new biological and clinical insights utilizing our key differentiator, our data from clinical trials.

Aviv Regev, EVP, Research and Early Development, Genentech

Lab in the loop, clinic in the loop, foundation models, autonomous agents, drug discovery and development. All of those things only work when all the components are tied together. They rely on anyone, everyone, and everything working together. The lab, the clinic, the data, and the AI. But when they do work together, they have the chance to potentially go after very big problems with very big numbers.

The thread running through the day: real progress in AI for the life sciences depends on tight loops between the wet lab and the dry lab. The teams getting somewhere are the ones who can own the full stack and generate the right data, not just the AI layer.

Missed UNLOCK this year?

• Check out the recap here.

• Every session from UNLOCK here.

What's next

UNLOCK 2026 sold out with a 100-person waitlist, and the room was over capacity on the day. 

UNLOCK 2027 is in planning. Don’t want to miss out next year? Follow our LinkedIn and X to be the first to know when announcements drop.