Crypto investor and founder Will Harborne will lead a new enterprise aimed at funding and supporting groundbreaking longevity technologies.
From crypto to longevity
The burgeoning field of longevity biotech is about to have a new player. Like many recent enterprises, such as Brian Armstrong’s NewLimit, this one is driven by someone coming from the crypto field.
A team led by Will Harborne, a leading crypto investor and founder known for his work with Bitfinex, rhino.fi, and ZKV, has announced today the launch of LongGame, a new venture capital fund designed to invest in groundbreaking longevity biotech companies. The fund is actively fundraising, with the goal set at $40 million.
At the time when many venture capital funds are wary about “high risk, high reward” technologies that may take years and decades to mature, LongGame is going all in, as evident already from its name. The fund proudly touts its “radical focus” and promises that all its investments will “target therapies with the potential to increase human lifespan by 10+ years and ideally significantly more.”
The philosophy and the team
Despite this spirit of disruptive boldness, LongGame’s announced investment priorities are not necessarily revolutionary: stem cell therapies, gene editing, and senolytics. While the first two have a lot of untapped potential, many researchers think that the impact of senolytics on lifespan is more likely to be limited. It remains to be seen whether LongGame will venture into other radical territories such as organ and tissue replacement.
The fund also plans to leverage its crypto roots by “exploring potential crossovers between biotech and crypto in the newly emerging DeSci space.” Decentralized science (DeSci) is indeed an exciting new paradigm aimed at streamlining and democratizing research and development while also fixing some obvious flaws in the current system of incentives.
LongGame boasts an impressive team. Chloe Northcott, formerly at Geometry, will serve as Chief Operating Officer, while Dr. Manish Chamoli, hailing from the famed Buck Institute for Research on Aging, will assume the role of Chief Scientific Officer. Sebastian Brunemeier, General Partner at Healthspan Capital, will join as a special advisor. “The team at LongGame are truly mission-driven and laser-focused on Long-Bio, entering the sector at a time when the field is at a major inflection point,” he told Lifespan.io.
“Longevity is the next frontier of innovation, and just as we’ve seen crypto disrupt traditional finance, we believe that longevity biotech will do the same for health,” said Harborne, Founder and Managing Partner of LongGame. “Our goal is to fund therapies that do more than just extend life; we’re looking for solutions that radically expand the healthy human lifespan—by 30 years or more. We’re tackling the root causes of aging, not just the symptoms.”
Leading by example
Will leads by personal example: inspired by longevity pioneers like Bryan Johnson and his Blueprint program, he has transformed his own life in pursuit of life extension. He follows a precision health regimen that includes a supplement stack, exercise, and other practices to optimize physical and mental performance as well as a lot of testing beyond routine bloodwork. Will realizes, however, that lifestyle changes can only take him so far, and to go beyond this, major advancements in our understanding and manipulation of aging biology are required.
Will says that his commitment to longevity is not just a personal journey, but a scientific exploration into the future of human health. He also cares about future longevity therapies being widely available: “We want to ensure that these life-extending therapies are accessible to the masses, not just the wealthy. Longevity shouldn’t be just about helping the wealthy live longer but about helping the whole of society have significantly longer and healthier lives.”
We asked Will a few more questions in an exclusive blitz interview:
What is the new fund’s “secret formula” for success?
Secret formula is to combine our experience as founders in industries which are as highly uncertain as longevity biotech or potentially even more so (like crypto), with super high-quality scientific due diligence and a focus on commercialisability.
Many venture funds are cautious about the long-term and uncertain nature of investing in longevity biotech. However, LongGame seems to embrace it, even in its name. Are you really in this for the long haul?
We are committed to the long haul because solving aging is not a quick endeavor. Our LPs are motivated and fully aligned with this mission as well as with the potential for significant returns. This first fund serves as a precursor to a larger follow-up fund, where we aim to invest at later stages. However, our immediate priority is to demonstrate that early-stage longevity biotech can deliver returns that justify the inherent uncertainty and risk.
While investing in this space is undoubtedly challenging, it also presents immense opportunity. Many companies struggle to raise capital due to the long-term and uncertain nature of the field, with all longevity biotech ventures often painted with the same broad brush. However, not all companies are equal in their paths to commercialization. We see a unique opportunity to identify and support those with stronger short-term commercial prospects, helping them navigate uncertainty more efficiently.
What are your predictions for the near future of longevity biotech, particularly in light of recent setbacks like BioAge discontinuing its Phase II trial? Are we entering “the valley of death”?
We certainly don’t see this as the valley of death, and setbacks in all areas of biotech are common, particularly at clinical trials. Although this has not yet filtered through to clinical trial outcomes due to the long time frames involved, we see the next 10 years as a major engineering unlock (following research breakthroughs). Particularly when combined with progress in all areas of AI, and overlap to biotech, we see the potential for a longevity biotech golden era ahead, with successes leading to a positive feedback loop.
How do you intend to measure life extension outcomes (e.g., +10 years, +30 years)?
That’s very hard to do, and until we get the first approved aging interventions to market, any numbers will be predictions and likely wrong. Eventually, statistical evidence will emerge, and we are looking for life extension in healthy humans, not in obese or inactive populations.
View the article at lifespan.io
