IBM shutters Watson AI tool for drug discovery
IBM Watson is cutting off sales of its artificial intelligence (AI) drug discovery tool after reporting lagging sales, per Becker’s Hospital Review.
For context, the drug discovery program was introduced in 2014 to help pharmaceutical companies develop drugs.
While IBM will still support current pharma clients using the software, Watson will no longer market the product and is instead doubling down on clinical development tools.
Here’s what it means: This is just the latest setback for IBM’s health play.
• Watson’s struggled to prove its efficacy to health systems.
Watson came under fire for producing erroneous treatment recommendations for hypothetical cancer patients according to internal documents cited by STAT.
Watson also struggled to retain major hospital clients in 2018, citing softening demand, according toStat.
The head of IBM Watson stepped down in October 2018 following tepid earnings and growing skepticism around Watson’s viability as a clinically useful platform.
Business Insider