Think Gene - Latest Comments in 23andMe Is DTC Genomics and Nobody Should Be Surprised

Re: 23andMe Is DTC Genomics and Nobody Should Be Surprised

No One — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 10:56:12 -0000

23andMe is selling promises and hot air.

Re: 23andMe Is DTC Genomics and Nobody Should Be Surprised

Sunil Maulik — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 22:06:54 -0000

23andMe, NaviGenics, DecodeME are all toast. Why? What do you do with the information? Are you really going to become a vegetarian, start jogging 6+ miles a day, and lose 30 lbs because NOW you know you have the ApoE4 variant?

No one has shown how the data from the OTC genomix companies will integrate with MRI, HDL/LDL, blood-glucose and other data because no-one knows how.

A gimmick for the rich and foolish....
-sm-

Re: 23andMe Is DTC Genomics and Nobody Should Be Surprised

Jeff, PhD — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 15:06:26 -0000

I think you're right on. First if I was a customer, I'd be pissed about my $600. More importantly, I think they're destroying the value of the market (or accelerating the evolution of the market). But isn't the $1000 genome a selfish and naive argument made by academics and VCs? Focus focus focus on the customer. In the real world, the genome will be free and you'll be charged a subscription for value-add services - because this is the only thing a customer is willing to pay for. Which means this whole industry (just like in IT - think Dell) is in a race to commoditization and doesn't know it yet.

Being essentially backed by google - if 23andme is willing to use the nuclear option of basically giving it away, everyone else will soon fade away (because organic growth is unsustainable), unless they have deep pockets - but then what investor would work against google's deep pockets.

So in 3-5 years, this is what we have:
There are 1-3 big players left. Their business model is to offer lots of value added services. Their founders are replaced with real managers who don't make naive mistakes. 23andme stuggles as people become increasingly suspicious of google. No smart VC will get near this area including the vastly overvalued $1000 genome platform startups (b/c it's a race to commoditization). Everybody is still struggling to find customers - mostly because physicians resist the idea because they are (by law) disintermediated in the sale, and nobody offers clinically validated/FDA approvable services (it will take 10-15 years before we get there) and the physicians don't want to deal with that complexity/liability of genomic medicine anyways. Not to mention payors will refuse to play along.

So the business model evolves to a few flavors, such as (1) giving the service away, and $10-$20 per month subscription to hold your data and give updates banged into the system by chinese post-docs or grad students. (2) wiki style platform to which open source informatic widgets allow you to slice and dice your own data set (that is hosted for $10 per year by some patient advocacy nonprofit) and anonymized so that academics can do research on it for free and pharma pays a small use fee. (3) myspace etc. develops a service.

Re: 23andMe Is DTC Genomics and Nobody Should Be Surprised

Andrew Yates — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 12:33:44 -0000

Haha, Steve, it's not my fault you asked for a $600 dollar refund on a product you didn't even buy. I do think it's a bit silly that you love to lambaste 23andMe. Take them for what they are: how I described them here. You can bing them when they play Internet Doctors, but otherwise, lighten up. I don't see a picture of a doctor on their home page, and royalty can do whatever they want. Get used to it.

Re: 23andMe Is DTC Genomics and Nobody Should Be Surprised

Steven Murphy MD — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 08:06:15 -0000

Thanks for the insult.....
Good post...
-Steve
www.thegenesherpa.blogspot.com

Re: 23andMe Is DTC Genomics and Nobody Should Be Surprised

Dan Waldron — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 00:16:15 -0000

Hello. I was reading someone elses blog and saw you on their blogroll. Would you be interested in exchanging blog roll links? If so, feel free to email me.

Thanks.