Longevity/Biotechnology

"Longevity" is sometimes used as a synonym for "life expectancy" or “typical length of life.” However, today’s developments in medical science may allow us to add a further definition of “longevity” as “life with improved health, and without chronic illnesses and age-related diseases.” We think that the current longevity trend is leading to the greatest investment opportunity of all time.

Several recent research reports have this startling message: we are about to experience an exponential rise in life expectancy over the next 10 years. Not only will we live much longer, but we will also feel younger while living longer. Eye-opening facts and predictions from these reports include:

So far, we have not found a reasonable investment with an attractive risk/reward ratio in rejuvenation therapies. However, we are keeping on our radar companies that save human life and improve quality of life by creating drugs to fight chronic diseases. Today, we are making a few focused bets on biotechnology companies in the genome therapy field.

Genome therapy has transformative potential across the entire spectrum of decease categories (viruses, cancer, neurology, ophthalmology, liver disorders, etc.). It represents a total addressable market (TAM) of USD 4.8 trillion as well as disruption of the USD 1 trillion in annual sales of the biopharmaceutical industry (source: Goldman Sachs Research).

We see a significant market opportunity for genome medicines that will disrupt existing biopharma markets. Today, most chronic disorders require lifelong treatment. For example, severe hemophiliacs require 50+ infusions a year. In contrast, gene and cell therapies targeting diseases at the genetic level have the potential to be “one shot cures” or at the very least less-frequent treatments. At the moment, they are being tested (and proven effective) as treatments of “last resort”. However, the next step for these therapies could be to move into earlier stages of disease progression, which would disrupt existing therapeutic markets.

The global cumulative TAM for genome medicine across all disease areas based on the current generation of technology platforms (gene therapy, editing and cell therapy) could reach USD 4.8 trillion. This total is largely driven by oncology (> USD 1 trillion), neurology (> USD 1.5 trillion) and eye disorders (> USD 0.5 trillion). By comparison, annual global prescription sales are projected to be USD 1.01 trillion in 2022 (source: EvaluatePharma).

We see two drivers of commercial opportunity. The first is the creation of new profit pools, e.g., orphan disorders. The second is the disruption to current therapies/markets, e.g., cancer, heart, neurology, and viral infections. We note that a significant proportion (USD 3.6 trillion) of our estimated revenue pool is derived from prevalent patients. These are patients who already have the condition. Once they are treated, they are essentially “cured”. Therefore, in the long term, the primary driver of recurring sales will be disease incidence, i.e., the number of new patients born with or developing the disease with oncology (USD 1.2 trillion) as the largest source. In addition, this scenario is also contingent on the continued optimization of gene therapy efficacy/safety, movement to earlier stages in cancer, and standardization and successful scaling of manufacturing of viral vectors to meet commercial demand.

In our view, the current generation of genome medicine is the “first wave“. We anticipate that a new generation of optimized therapies will emerge in the coming years with better efficacy, safety, targeting, and specificity. We believe these improvements will expand the range of addressable diseases to include solid tumors, multigenic disorders, and others. We see about USD 3.5 trillion in upside from new TAMs of diseases with no existing treatments, but which become treatable by next-generation genome medicines.

We have made the following investments in genome therapy segment :