You ’ve belike get a line about Elizabeth Holmes by now , the eccentric chief executive officer of the offend aesculapian companyTheranos . Once a Venus flytrap for Silicon Valley investors and now the subject of an FBI criminal investigation , Theranos claimed to have developed rotatory rakehell - examination technology –claims that turned out to be full horseshit .
Holmes ' striking fall from grace has rocked the aesculapian community , provoke alarm about other similar troupe that have hoard incredible wealth and power , but keep their research under a veil of absolute secrecy . TakeModerna Therapeutics , for example , a six - twelvemonth - old biotech business firm ground in Cambridge , MA that was the recent subject ofa superb investigatory piece by Stat News . The company has attracted a staggering amount of investors ' money , brag a radical new agency to regale illness by manipulating human cubicle to struggle disease from within .
The engineering go promising , but like Theranos , Moderna ’s ultra - secretive policies prohibit them from publishing any substantial data to prove their work , nor do they disclose information to investors . The Stat piece also reveals eye - opening similarities between Holmes and Moderna ’s chief operating officer , Stéphane Bancel . The story is reallyworth a read , but here are some highlights that make me wonder if Moderna could be the next Theranos .
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The company keeps investors in the dark
Holmes accept money from investor but refused to let on any information about how Theranos ' technology actually worked . Moderna similarly keep an alarming level of privacy :
" The company has publish no datum stand its vaunted engineering … international venture capitalists said Moderna has so many investor clamour to get in that it can afford to turn away any who ask too many motion . Some small players have been given only a peek at Moderna ’s data before committing millions to the company . "
The CEO oversees Moderna’s scientific strategy, but isn’t a scientist
Holmes began her start - up at age 19 after dropping out of Stanford University . While Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel has his master ’s in chemical engineering and an MBA from Harvard , his qualification to make major scientific decisions at Moderna are also refutable :
" Bancel had no experience running a drug developing operation … he’d spent most of his vocation in sales and operations , not scientific discipline … He is list as a carbon monoxide gas - inventor on more than 100 of Moderna ’s early patent program , unusual for a CEO who is not a Ph.D. scientist . "
Like Holmes, he perpetuates a toxic work environment
" … Bancel built a civilisation of recrimination at Moderna , former employees said . fail experiments have been met with reprimand and even on - the - bit firing . They recalled abusive emails , dressings down at society meetings , exceedingly recollective hour , and unexplained terminations . "
High-level executives are quitting in droves
" At least a dozen highly placed executive director have quit in the retiring four years , including nous of finance , technology , manufacturing , and science . In just the retiring 12 months , respected leaders of Moderna ’s cancer and uncommon disease programs both resigned . "
Most noted among the resignations was the extremely well-thought-of and veteran chief scientific officer , Joseph Bolen , who had previously lead another Big Pharma society to FDA approval for a tremendously successful cancer drug . " ' No scientist in his correct judgement would leave that occupation unless there was something incorrect with the science or the personnel , ' sound out a person nigh to the company at the prison term . "
The mRNA treatments it’s trying to develop are potentially very dangerous
Moderna ’s research involves introducing synthetic mRNA into our cells . Theoretically , the radical treatment could target and reprogram specific cells , allowing our own bodies to cure themselves of disease with repeated STD over time . A phone number of Big Pharma companies have set about to spring up similar applied science , but abandoned them over concern that they get prohibitively dangerous patient side effects .
" speech – in reality mother RNA into cells – has long confuse the whole field . On their own , RNA particle have a surd time reaching their target area . They exploit well if they ’re enfold up in a delivery mechanics , such as nanoparticles made of lipids . But those nanoparticles can take to dangerous side result , specially if a patient has to take restate doses over months or years . "
It’s dialing back its original plans to focus on “less ambitious” projects…
" Lower - ranking employees , meanwhile , say they ’ve been disappointed and confused by Moderna ’s pin to less ambitious – and less transformative – intervention . Moderna has crusade off projects meant to upend the drug industry to focalize first on the less intimidating ( and most likely , far less remunerative ) field of vaccines – though it is years behind competitors in that area . "
… but is being unusually secretive about those, too
" Moderna just go its first two potential treatment – both vaccines – into human trials . In keeping with the refinement of secrecy , though , executives wo n’t say which diseases the vaccine place , and they have not listed the studies on the public federal registry , ClinicalTrials.gov . Listing is optional for Phase 1 trials … but most companies voluntarily disclose their workplace . "
Perhaps because it’s preparing to go public
" With a public listing make out required disclosures , and many are eager to see what Moderna ’s been keep under wraps all these age . Outsiders and competitors , looking only at Moderna ’s public argument , have noted a shift in strategy that might signal undisclosed setbacks . "
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