TRILLIONS OF OPPORTUNITIES

Jessica richman’s testing kits help you monitor your health by analyzing the microorganisms that live inside your body.

What are microbiomes, and why do they matter?

They’re the trillions of microorganisms that live in us: bacteria, fungi, viruses. They affect our health, and now we can sequence microbiomes as we can DNA.

Because the sequencing costs are plummeting?

Yes. And my company, uBiome, was the first to commercialize microbiome sequencing for the public.

What products do you offer now?

One is an at-home testing kit that shows data regarding how your diet affects your health. The other two tests are ordered by doctors— one tests for issues like Crohn’s disease, the other looks for STDs.

That idea of “quantitative self” runs throughout your life. Even when you were a professional bodybuilder.

One of the great things about bodybuilding is that it’s very measurable. You know exactly how strong you are.

How did uBiome raise money?

We crowdfunded. In ten weeks we had $350,000.

Wasn’t crowdfunding risky in the sense that it would have appeared somewhat unserious in the very serious world of science?

Millions of people who aren’t scientists want to participate in science. I call it “citizen science” because science is a restrictive field.

restrictive how?

If you don’t have a Ph.D. or work in academia or research institutions, you’re not a “scientist.” That’s a silly idea. Millions of amateur scientists can do it if you let them have access to the data.

you’ve raised $22 million from traditional venturecapital firms, including Andreessen Horowitz. What do you think about Marc Andreessen’s prediction that we’ll have open-source healthcare—just like open-source software?

He’s right, although it’s more of a balancing act in healthcare because of data privacy.

do you think privacy concerns are generational? younger customers seem more willing to give up privacy in return for a good, low-cost product.

It’s partly generational. But some customers want to pay in Bitcoin to stay anonymous.

What’s next for uBiome?

There are interesting correlations between gut and gum microbiomes and overall health: conditions that are often difficult to treat, like Lyme disease and chronic fatigue. Even mental health.