Exclusive | Behind the billionaire-backed longevity business and the innovations that could help us live longer
Jeff Bezos, Sam Altman and Peter Thiel can buy whatever they want — even eternal youth?Tech billionaires are pouring massive amounts of their fortune into the bitter battle to be the best Benjamin Button, propelling the market for life-extending therapeutics into a $25 billion business.OpenAI CEO Altman, 39, and Amazon founder Bezos, 60, have shelled out millions in recent years to longevity labs Retro Biosciences and Altos Labs, respectively.PayPal cofounder Thiel, 57, forked over $1 million to the Methuselah Foundation, a biomedical charity that aims to make 90 the new 50 by 2030.But the road to reprogramming cells and manipulating genes is not paved with gold.
Anti-aging aficionados face regulatory hurdles, ethical questions and long-term funding concerns, among other challenges, in the race to keeping the Grim Reaper at bay.“We fail small and early and fast, and our goal is to get a return on our mission,” Methuselah co-founder and CEO David Gobel told The Post.“Our mission is lives saved as opposed to dollars made.” Gobel, a serial entrepreneur, began Methuselah in 2001 after asking himself one question as he neared 50 years old — “What’s the most important thing I can do, make more money or make more health?”The non-profit counts Thiel among its early champions.
More recently, records show that Vitalik Buterin — the 30-year-old Ethereum co-founder, who earned the title of world’s youngest crypto billionaire — contributed more than $13.6 million in 2021.“We haven’t actually solicited for donations since maybe 2013,” said Gobel, 72.“I hate begging, and I figured that we needed to earn our way forward by results.”Methuselah boasts nine companies in its portfolio.
One of them, Leucadia Therapeutics, developed a device to restore the flow of cerebrospinal fluid in the brain and drain toxins that may contribute to the development of Alzheimer’s disease.Another, X-Therma, is focused on using its subzero technology to preserve or...