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23andMe's Fall

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Re: 23andMe's Fall

#11

Post by helsinkiandrew »

> She’s sticking to her goal to transform 23andMe from a supplier of basic ancestry and health data into a comprehensive healthcare company that develops drugs, offers medical care and sells subscription health reports.

The company hasn't the funds (or time) to develop drugs and I'm not sure why any investors would invest in them rather than a company with a track record of doing so or a potential drug.

Selling their customers data to other companies (or partnering with) that can create drugs from it would seem the logical choice, along with "subscription health reports" and anything tacked onto the DNA/blood profiling/testing product to keep the data coming in.

Re: 23andMe's Fall

#13

Post by H8crilA »

htrp wrote: post #3

> Roelof Botha, a 23andMe board member and partner at Sequoia Capital, said the company’s big-spending strategy made sense when money was cheap. Now that it isn’t, “we’ve had to trim and focus on a smaller number of projects.” > Sequoia, which invested $145 million in 23andMe, still holds all its shares, he said. Today they are worth $18 million. Interesting that they weren't forced to liquidate/distribute the shares…

I don't know what specific deals they have with LPs, but why would it make a priori sense to force the fund to liquidate some specific shares and distribute the proceeds?

I would imagine that any fund is allowed to make losses on specific investments, least of all a hyper-aggressive VC fund which will create losses on many (most) positions, by design. And then once losses happen they should be treated for what they are - just another position where decisions should be made based on the outlook, and not based on the history.

Re: 23andMe's Fall

#14

Post by kibwen »

pkphilip wrote: post #9
incomingpain wrote: post #5

I had not heard they went IPO. They are a penny stock now? Looking at those financials... yikes. I am kind of shocked how poorly they are doing.

What happens when the company goes down? they will still have the DNA databases

Correction: the highest bidder will have the DNA databases.

Re: 23andMe's Fall

#15

Post by jeffreygoesto »

tokai wrote: post #8
crotchfire wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That would impede their plan to sell 23andMe, including its DNA database, to China (or Russia, or Antarctica, or the next Martians that happen along).

Why would russia or aliens ever pay for it, when they can just steal it?

Right. And they have enough of DNA themselves!

Re: 23andMe's Fall

#16

Post by logifail »

nirvael wrote: post #7

Seems like 23andMe is two businesses: consumer and a B2B data business. The consumer side is clearly struggling because of the problems mentioned in the article (they only need one test in their life, public perception is bad because their security has had breaches). So this needs a pivot where you can change the public's perception from a one-time test to continuous health monitoring through blood markers or somethi…

> needs a pivot where you can change the public's perception from a one-time test to continuous health monitoring through blood markers or something similar, expand to tests other than genetic and make it a repeatable, accurate test that gives you more information (and obviously stop leaking people's data).

"Stop leaking data"? Sounds like a step forward.

> But why not focus on the B2B side? Sell access to their databases.

So, it's actually: try to sell your customers' data instead of leaking it? :O

Sorry if that sounds snarky, but are we sure there are enough customers who want to pay to give their data to a company so that company can immediately sell their data on to other companies?

Re: 23andMe's Fall

#17

Post by samsk »

Omg, how can a company doing genetic test burn $1.4b ? Altought better question might be, how could it be worth $6b ? :-)

Re: 23andMe's Fall

#19

Post by pinkgolem »

logifail wrote: post #16
nirvael wrote: post #7

Seems like 23andMe is two businesses: consumer and a B2B data business. The consumer side is clearly struggling because of the problems mentioned in the article (they only need one test in their life, public perception is bad because their security has had breaches). So this needs a pivot where you can change the public's perception from a one-time test to continuous health monitoring through blood markers or somethi…

> needs a pivot where you can change the public's perception from a one-time test to continuous health monitoring through blood markers or something similar, expand to tests other than genetic and make it a repeatable, accurate test that gives you more information (and obviously stop leaking people's data). "Stop leaking data"? Sounds like a step forward. > But why not focus on the B2B side? Sell access to their data…

i mean, customers are angry if personal data leaks, but a lot of legit usecases can be done with agregate data.

Re: 23andMe's Fall

#20

Post by atemerev »

htrp wrote: post #10
egberts1 wrote: post #4

First of many mistakes that 23andMe took: fired the co-founder.

1 of the co-founders had access to an unlimited pool of personal capital (at least until personal issues curtailed that). The other had an idea. Make sure you are the co-founder with the sustainable advantage

Yeah, yeah, make sure you are born into a rich family and a right zip code.
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