Anti-aging, life extension, and regenerative medicine is still fairly new but has grown to be a trillion dollar industry with a complicated and fast evolving landscape, all hoping to be the first to solve the mystery of the elixir of youth to reliant robots which will help take care of older populations.
There is a vast amount of money to be made or lost depending on how proactively nations work to neutralize the oncoming pressure of the imposed rising Silver Tsunami, as such the global longevity industry is primed to reach $17 trillion in 2019, and is on track to reach $27 trillion by 2026, which could account for up to 20% of the global GDP.
There are many ventures in the longevity industry with partners, and subsidiaries that encompass a vast ecosystem of business. To build reports on the anti-aging and longevity sector analytics agencies utilize hundreds of specially designed quantitative metrics and submetrics to identify the specific strengths, weaknesses, and prospects of longevity industry companies. Most of these companies share a few similar characteristics such as high funding, successful leadership, associations with prominent research institutions, and therapy pipelines that target root causes of biological aging.
Insilico Medicine is an AI drug discovery company that has raised $14.3 million since being founded in 2014. This is the first company to use Generative Adversarial Networks for drug discovery and development, and its scientists have published over 150 papers with over 3,000 citations.
AgeX Therapeutics has a market cap of about $180 million since being founded in 2017 with high profile leadership. Their various technologies along with pipeline drugs are based on the potential of pluripotent stem cells which have the ability to produce any cell/tissue needed in the body to repair itself and replicate indefinitely making them self essentially immortal; all of their drugs are in the early stages of the approval process which can take 12 years.
Human Longevity Inc. has raised $300 million since being founded in 2013. This company was once valued at $1.6 billion but has dropped 80%, and has since experienced a series of leadership shake ups and layoffs. Their flagship Health Nucleus uses machine learning to provide personalized health assessments from DNA sequencing and a battery of testing including whole body MRIs.
Unity Biotechnology was founded two years ago after completing a $151 million Series B, raised another $55 million in 2018, and has a pre-IPO valuation of $712 million putting its market cap to about a third of that. This biotech targets senescent cells that cause inflammation and other age related diseases, and is in a phase 2 clinical trial with a drug candidate to treat knee osteoarthritis with initiation expected in the 2019 fourth quarter and initial 12 week results expected late 2020.
ResTORbio is a 2017 spinout from Novartis which raised a disclosed $65 million. This company is trying to commercialize a drug platform inhibiting the mTOR age signalling pathways by specifically targeting release of TORC1 proteins which may prolong lifespan, enhance immune function, ameliorate heart failure, enhance memory, and delay the onset of age related diseases.
Celularity has taken in around $290 million since being founded in 2016 to harvest stem cells from postpartum placentas, the company is quickly progressing with over 12 preclinical stem cell trials and new drug trials are in progress; their cell based therapies could be applied to regenerate damaged tissues produce whole organs, augment immunity, and extend longevity.
2019 startup Samumed boosts as $12 billion valuation on a disclosed $650 million in funding. This regenerative biotech is laser focused on developing therapies that target a single age related signaling pathway called Wnt which is involved in stem cell control, proliferation and self renewal, and have finalized phase III trial design for one of its drug candidates that target knee osteoarthritis.
Life Biosciences has raised $59 million in a Series B at the beginning of the year since being founded in 2017. This company is actually composed of 5 daughter companies, with each one focussing on one specific niche to aging such as Senolytic Therapeutics targeting zombie senescent cells, and Selphagy Therapeutics attempting to restore autophagy in those with metabolic disease characterized by abnormal buildup of various toxic materials in the body.
Elevian has raised $9.3 million in funding so far since being founded in 2017. This company has identified blood factors such as GDF11 which appear to be responsible for the benefits of young blood transfers, and is working on developing drugs that target GDF11 to treat age related diseases.
Rejuvenate Bio has raised an undisclosed amount of funding to help dogs grow older alongside man since being founded in 2017. Their proposed therapy involves genetically inserting a new piece of DNA into the animal’s cells which then produces a beneficial protein that has the potential to stop the progression of mitral valve disease.
With the oncoming Silver Tsunami the process of aging could be big money, and the business of helping people to live longer could become the biggest and most complex industry in history. Advances in AI, genetics, and a variety of other research disciplines along with automation technology are helping to drive innovation while lending credibility to what seemed like science fiction rather than science fact just a few years ago.
Around the world prominent scientists are putting it all on the line because they believe we can beat diseases such as cancer and stop the cellular ravages of time so we can age more gracefully to extend our life and healthspan.
