Global competition of longevity for $ 101 million for semi -finalists – this is their ideas to prolong the life of 10 years or more
Competitors in a race to extend life are on their second round.
In a global competition of seven years, the teams rush to discover new therapies and interventions that can prolong human life a decade and help people age well.
In 2023, Peter Diamandis, a self -proclaimed entrepreneur, futuristic and founder and executive president of the Xprize Foundation, launched the Healthspan competition of $ 101 million. Since then, more than 600 teams from 58 countries have put their ideas in the ring, including medical devices, lifestyle interventions and biological therapies. Today, the competition has each awarded the best 40 teams of $ 250,000 to help them test their assumptions in clinical trials.
“We are really pushing on a global scale so that people accelerate the process, so that we can get real solutions in the hands of people who need it,” said Jamie Justice, PHD, executive director of Xprize Healthspan, explains Fortune.
Teams from the world, made up of students, university researchers, and even a winner of the Nobel Prize, are in competition for the coveted prize, which will amount to $ 81 million.
A team of Malaysia high school students presented a community solution which includes the facilitation of battery circles with the elderly. Another team is testing the potential advantages of diabetes life and popular weight loss drugs, GLP-1. Another still examines if medication metformin can help prevent cognitive decline. By 2030, the winner will have shown that his therapy can restore muscle, cognitive and immune function in a clinical trial of one year older adults.
“The next breakthrough in aging could come from scientists and entrepreneurs, anywhere. With this price, we ignite a global health revolution, and these semi-finalists lead the charge,” said Diamandis, in a press release. “This competition does not only accelerate progress, it calls into question the beliefs of our society in terms of aging.”
The judges composed of leading researchers and scientists on the ground assessed the teams according to their illustration “of really solid innovation [on a] Potential breakthrough that could affect all the processes underlying the way we get older, “said the judge. The teams had to show a preparation for clinical trials with solid evidence of an intervention which can be put on the wider population.
While people live longer, there is still a difference of a decade, on average, between the way people live and the way they live in good health. This competition hopes to reduce the gap and extend the duration of healthy people.
“We examine solutions that can be proactive and can be generalized to a larger population, so that we can start to fill this gap at the level of the population,” explains the judge.
The teams will submit data from their clinical trials by April of next year, ahead of Xprize selecting the first ten finalists in July 2026, followed by the winner of the Grand Prix selected in 2030.
This story was initially presented on Fortune.com
