Startup Q&A: Life sciences innovations for the next generation
This era is one of the most interesting times ever for innovation in the life sciences. Recent scientific advances have made real what was science fiction only a few years ago. This month, we’ll feature MATTER companies that are turning these novel scientific discoveries into compelling businesses, each with a mission to advance care and improve lives.
Mark Haupt, CMO of Ariel Precision Medicine
What is Ariel’s mission?
Our aim is to change healthcare outcomes for patients with chronic complex disorders. The approach is essentially like a virtual health hackathon, bringing together experts and technology from different disciplines to deliver a precision health decision support tool to clinicians for each patient for whom we provide clinical testing.
We are not a precision diagnostic company. We have created our own disease-specific, next-generation DNA sequencing panels combined with a data analytics platform that delivers deep insights. Ariel is not focused on big data alone, but rather the right data, in the right context for each patient for the duration of his or her healthcare journey.
How will Ariel improve healthcare?
Chronic conditions account for a disproportionate percentage of healthcare costs, estimated as high as 75-80%. A significant portion of these costs results from the difficulty of early diagnosis. To diagnose certain conditions, clinicians look for symptoms that appear later on in the disease process — when it’s too late for the clinician to intervene. Ariel is improving healthcare by unraveling the complexity of genetics and patient-centric data to permit the diagnoses of complex disorders earlier in the disease process. By providing insight into the underlying mechanism, we allow for the application of precision therapeutics and management, aiding in the shift from reactive to proactive healthcare.
What will the world look like if Ariel achieves everything you hope and dream?
Imagine a future you: Say you experience abdominal pain. You go to your doctor, give a cheek swab and link your symptoms to the Ariel Management tool. You discover you have the early symptoms of what could turn into a complex chronic condition that, left untreated, will lead to years of pain, hospitalizations, surgery, job loss, diabetes and possibly pancreatic cancer. Your doctor says, “Fortunately, we have the tools to prevent that outcome and treat your condition while the problem is small.”
The hope is that the world will be full of patients, each with a completely different health journey because of Ariel.
Yuan Zhang, Ph.D., MS, Co-founder, President and CEO of Seurat Therapeutics, Inc.
What is Seurat’s mission?
Seurat Therapeutics, Inc. is a biotech startup developing a new medication that stops migraines before they start. Our mission is to provide a lasting solution for people suffering from chronic migraines, giving them the freedom to go about their daily lives unburdened. Migraines are the most disabling neurological disorder and the fifth most prevalent illness in the world. Seurat is developing a new medication that uses a simple, nasal spray-like device to change that statistic.
How will Seurat improve healthcare?
Migraine patients spend approximately $17 billion on medical costs annually, for anything from medications to hospitalizations. Most patients are unable to function during their migraine attacks, which leads to an additional $20 billion in lost wages each year in the U.S. alone. For families with a person who experiences frequent migraines, healthcare costs are on average 70% higher than a non-migraine-affected family. Unfortunately, existing migraine medications are often used off-label (incorrectly prescribed or used) and merely reduce the severity of migraine symptoms rather than prevent the disease. Seurat is developing the first medication that can stop and prevent the underlying causes of migraines.
What will the world look like if Seurat achieves everything you hope and dream?
Migraines affect approximately 1 in 10 individuals — roughly 40% of whom would benefit from preventive therapies for migraines. Unlike current migraine medications, Seurat is developing a drug that stops migraines before they start. We believe that a weekly nasal spray of our drug can unburden the 14 million Americans who suffer from chronic migraines from the crippling anxiety of not knowing when the next migraine attack will occur.
Yang Zheng, Co-founder and COO of Oxalo Therapeutics
What is Oxalo’s mission?
Oxalo Therapeutics is committed to ending the epidemic of kidney stones and preserving renal health.
How will Oxalo improve healthcare?
Kidney stones and other oxalate pathologies are significant healthcare and economic burdens in the U.S. and globally. Oxalo Therapeutics’ microbiome-derived drug is a first-in-class therapy aimed at safely removing oxalate from the body. This drug may provide a much-needed solution for millions of desperate patients.
What will the world look like if Oxalo achieves everything you hope and dream?
Oxalo aims to preserve long-term renal health for the millions of patients suffering from calcium oxalate kidney stones and other oxalate pathologies. Kidney health remains a global initiative, as millions of patients suffer from chronic kidney disease and end-stage renal failure, ultimately requiring dialysis or kidney transplants. We hope to help prevent the progression to these severe kidney conditions and greatly improve quality of life.
David Katz, CEO and Founder of Sparrow Pharmaceuticals
What is Sparrow Pharma’s mission?
Sparrow Pharmaceuticals will develop safer corticosteroids.
Corticosteroids (e.g., prednisone) are the standard of care for millions of patients with autoimmune diseases and other health issues. But corticosteroid utility is limited by a range of serious side effects. Despite decades of pharmaceutical industry efforts to develop targeted therapies to supplant corticosteroids, patients still lack a treatment option that is effective, safe, cost-effective and convenient. Sparrow can provide that.
How will Sparrow Pharma improve healthcare?
We will combine today’s corticosteroids with a novel, patented drug that can block most corticosteroid side effects, yet is not expected to alter corticosteroid efficacy.
Those combinations will enable physicians to prescribe what is already the standard of care for their patients, with reduced concern about — and cost related to — side effects. The most advanced form is a tablet, which is ready to start Phase 2 clinical trials. Other forms (e.g., ocular, topical or inhaled) are 18 to 24 months from clinical trials.
What will the world look like if Sparrow Pharma achieves everything you hope and dream?
Corticosteroids have been prescribed since the 1950s to limit side effects, rather than to maximize efficacy. Our products will enable physicians to utilize higher corticosteroid doses, safely, for the benefit of their patients. We expect our products to achieve similar benefit-risk profiles as — and be priced at a fraction of the cost of — targeted therapies for autoimmune diseases that are today’s most costly drug class. We aim to shift substantial market share away from those products to effective, safe, cost-effective and convenient therapy.