Isomorphic Labs, an AI drug discovery startup spun out of Google DeepMind under Alphabet, is in preliminary talks for a new funding round targeting a valuation of at least $40 billion, according to people familiar with the matter.

One of the people said the round could value the company at as much as $50 billion. The fundraising is not yet complete and terms could still change, the people said.

Isomorphic Labs did not respond to a request for comment.

Bloomberg News previously reported that just five months ago, Isomorphic Labs completed a $2.1 billion Series B funding round.

At the time, CEO Demis Hassabis, who also serves as chairman of DeepMind, said Alphabet (GOOG) provided "a very large portion" of the funding but declined to disclose Alphabet's stake or the company's valuation.

Hassabis, who previously led DeepMind, announced in August that he would move to the role of chairman and become Alphabet's chief scientist while continuing as CEO of Isomorphic Labs.

London-based Isomorphic Labs was spun out of DeepMind in 2021 with the goal of commercializing the breakthrough AlphaFold protein folding model.

The company competes with a range of firms attempting to apply frontier AI technology to medicine, including OpenAI, which released a life sciences research model this year.