#9 The longevity VC landscape

Deep dive into where and how capital is being deployed

Aug 21, 2022

The Agenda 👇

News bulletin 📰
The longevity VC landscape
Recent funding in longevity 💰
Upcoming events 📅
Jobs in longevity 🧑‍💼

1/ News bulletin 📰

📈 Longevity.Technology’s launches dedicated platform for longevity investors - now approved for USA, UK and other qualifying investing countries

🧑‍🦲 Rapamycin-loaded microneedles reverse hair loss in mice - rapamycin and epigallocatechin gallate (EGCG) an active ingredient in green tea

🧬 New nuclear genes that affect the mitochondria identified - may have a significant effect on lifespan

🧠 Longeveron announces Q2 results - and phase 2a trial of Lomecel-B for patients with mild Alzheimer’s Disease proceeding on schedule, currently at 50% enrollment

🐁 Dietary restrictions do not help cognitive function in mice - neither caloric restriction nor intermittent fasting improve late-life cognition

2/ The longevity VC landscape

2021 was a hot year for healthtech and biotech venture markets but was especially so in the field of longevity. Leveraging datasets available from Longevity.Technology’s investment platform, I’ve evaluated where capital has been deployed, and how this nascent market is shaping together. As part of this analysis, 48 longevity companies have been identified and can broadly be organised into 4 major types:

Prevention
These are companies that are trying to prevent the genomic and tissue damage that contributes to the ageing process. Most of these companies consist of supplements and healthspan interventions ventures.
Diagnostics
This group is actively developing biomarkers that signal the degree of age-related damage and can measure the extent to which an individual has aged. Examples include ageing clocks, biomarker panels and microbiome testing.
Therapeutics
Therapeutics companies are those that are developing interventions to treat age-related damage that has already occurred. This is the broadest group of companies and includes firms working on senotherapeutics, drug discovery and development and neurotech.
Rejuvenation
Rejuvenation firms are distinct from the therapeutics group in that they are developing interventions reverse the biological age of a cell type, tissue or organ. Examples include cellular and mitochondrial rejuvenation and xenotransplantation.

The vast majority of longevity companies raising capital in 2021 were Therapeutics firms focused on treating age-related diseases. Almost double the number of therapeutics companies raised funds than the next closest group, Rejuvenation.

*Number of companies raising capital in 2021*

Nonetheless, the size of those tickets was not uniform, and almost $1 billion was raised by Therapeutics and Rejuvenation companies, compared to just the $452 million raised by Diagnostic firms and comparatively meagre $34 million raised by Prevention firms.

The Rejuvenation group capital raise was disproportionately skewed by the single $500m raised by Calico Labs, which is developing of rejuvenation therapies. The lack of capital raised by Prevention companies reflects the limited evidence behind supplement-based distributors, and the challenge of building a scalable business model around prevention.

Diagnostic companies raised $65m on average, but even this group was disproportionately weighted by the >$255m by Insilico, the AI drug discovery company that has since gone on to raise a further $95 million in their Series C. On average, Therapeutics companies raised $40m a piece and Prevention companies only $8m.

The distribution of fundraises across the stages is shown below. 73% of pre-seed raises in longevity were for Rejuvenation therapies, late-stage capital was more evenly distributed across the categories.

Distribution of companies across funding stages

While 2022 has seen a collapse in biotech investing across the board, it is promising to that longevity market is starting to attract large ticket sizes. As the market starts to shape up with distinct segmentation, we’re already starting to see a focus on Therapeutics and Rejuvenation as opposed to Diagnostics and Prevention. Nonetheless, it’s not possible to measure treatment efficacy (rejuvenation or otherwise) without novel measures to determine age, so I would expect to see this category increase its share of the funding market.

4/ Upcoming events 📅

🇩🇰 The 9th annual Aging Research and Drug Discovery Meeting is taking place this year in Copenhagen, Denmark between 29th August - 2nd September. This non-profit gathering will include global thought-leaders sharing their insights into ageing and the future of drug discovery in the field.

🌐 Featuring intramural speakers such as Dr. Amutha Boominathan, Group Lead of MitoSENS, and Dr. Jean Hebert of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Ending Aging Forum 2022 will be focusing on SENS' in-house research as well as student presentations and SENS-funded research projects. This event will be hosted through the Meetaverse virtual reality experience and will feature a conference hall, individual project rooms, and an expo room on September 2 - 3, 2022. Registration is free.

🇬🇧 The Nutrition and the Biology of Ageing conference is being hosted by the Biochemical Society and the British Society for Research on Ageing, and will feature Brian Kennedy of the National University of Singapore. Conference will take place at University of Kent Canterbury, UK on September 12-14.