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Calico (company)

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(Redirected from Calico Life Sciences)

Calico Life Sciences LLC
TypeSubsidiary
Industry
FoundedSeptember 18, 2013; 13 years ago (2013-09-18)
FounderBill Maris
Headquarters
South San Francisco, California
,
United States
Area served
Worldwide
Key peopleArthur D. Levinson (CEO)
Number of employees
375 (2025[1])
ParentGoogle (2013–2015)
Alphabet Inc. (2015–present)
Websitecalicolabs.com

Calico Life Sciences LLC is an American biotechnology company with a focus on the biology of aging, attempting to devise interventions that may enable people to lead longer and healthier lives. It is a subsidiary of Alphabet Inc.

History

[edit]

Calico, short for the California Life Company,[2][3] was announced on September 18, 2013, prior to Google's restructuring and was founded by former GV CEO Bill Maris.[2][4][5] In Google's 2013 Founders Letter, Larry Page described Calico as a company focused on "health, well-being, and longevity."[6] It was incorporated into Alphabet with Google's other sister divisions in 2015.[7][8]

The Calico team has included a number of pioneering researchers in the field of aging research, including members of the National Academy of Sciences, Cynthia Kenyon and Daniel E. Gottschling.[9] Some of the company’s earliest employees included the geneticist David Botstein, and cancer drug developer Robert L. Cohen,[10] Eric Verdin, CEO of the Buck Institute for Research on Aging, served as a consultant to the Calico team.[11]

At the end of 2017 and the beginning of 2018, Calico lost two top scientists; in December 2017 Hal Barron, its head of R&D, left for GlaxoSmithKline, and in March 2018 chief computing officer Daphne Koller, who was leading their computational biology efforts, left to pursue a venture in applying machine learning techniques to drug design.[12][13][14]

Partnerships

[edit]

In September 2014, Calico and AbbVie announced an R&D collaboration focused on aging and age-related diseases such as neurodegeneration and cancer.[15] The partnership was extended in 2021.[16]AbbVie terminated the collaboration in November 2025, a few months after the companies announced the failure of fosigotifator in a Phase II/III trial for ALS.[17][18] By that time Abbvie had invested around $1.75 billion dollars, and two compounds arising from the collaboration were still in development by Calico: ABBV-CLS-484, a PTPN2/N1 phosphatase inhibitor and a potential cancer drug, and ABBV-CLS-628, a monoclonal antibody against pappalysin-1 that was in Phase II testing for autosomal dominant polycystic kidney disease.[19][20]

In 2015, the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard announced a partnership with Calico to "advance research on age-related diseases and therapeutics",[21] a further partnership also was announced with the Buck Institute for Research on Aging.[22] Also in 2015, Calico announced a partnership with QB3 based on researching the biology of aging and identifying potential therapeutics for age-related diseases[23] and one with AncestryDNA based on conducting research into the genetics of human lifespan.[24]

Reception

[edit]

When Calico was formed, Google did not disclose many details, such as whether the company would focus on biology or information technology.[25] The company issued press releases about research partnerships, but not details regarding the results of its research or the specifics of what it was working on.[3][26] This led to frustration by researchers regarding Calico's secrecy[26] and questions as to whether Calico had produced any useful scientific advancements.[27] Calico said the business's purpose was to focus on long-term science not expected to garner results for 10 or more years, leaving nothing to report on in its first five years.[27]

See also

[edit]

References

[edit]
  1. ↑ "Calico Life Sciences Employee Directory". LeadIQ. 2025. Retrieved March 21, 2025.
  2. 1 2 Pollack, Andrew; Miller, Claire Cain (September 18, 2013). "Tech Titans Form Biotechnology Company". The New York Times. Retrieved January 18, 2015.
  3. 1 2 Molteni, Megan (November 6, 2018). "The Key to a Long Life Has Little to Do With 'Good Genes'". Wired. Retrieved January 18, 2024.
  4. ↑ "The brains behind Calico? Bill Maris of Google Ventures". VentureBeat. October 9, 2013. Retrieved February 16, 2018.
  5. ↑ "News announcements: Google announces Calico, a new company focused on health and well-being". News announcements. September 18, 2013. Retrieved July 11, 2022.
  6. ↑ Page, Larry. "2013 Founders' Letter". Archived from the original on July 7, 2014.
  7. ↑ "Google Rises After Creating Holding Company Called Alphabet". Bloomberg.com. August 10, 2015. Retrieved July 11, 2022.
  8. ↑ Dougherty, Conor (August 10, 2015). "Google to Reorganize as Alphabet to Keep Its Lead as an Innovator". The New York Times.
  9. ↑ "National Academy of Sciences Member Directory".
  10. ↑ Leuty, Ron. "Art Levinson's Calico taps former Genentech execs, other top scientists as first 4 hires". San Francisco Business Times. Retrieved November 19, 2013.
  11. ↑ "Dr. Eric Verdin—The Effect of Food on Longevity". blog.insidetracker.com. Retrieved November 21, 2023.
  12. ↑ Al Idrus, Amirah (March 2, 2018). "Calico loses its second executive in 4 months as Daphne Koller quits". FierceBiotech.
  13. ↑ Bergen, Mark (March 1, 2018). "Alphabet Loses Top AI Researcher at Anti-Aging Unit Calico". Bloomberg News.
  14. ↑ Koller, Daphne (May 1, 2018). "insitro: Rethinking drug discovery using machine learning".
  15. ↑ Huet, Ellen. "Google's Calico Joins AbbVie In 'Pivotal' Partnership To Develop Anti-Aging Drugs". Forbes. Retrieved September 10, 2020.
  16. ↑ "AbbVie and Calico extend partnership on drugs for age-related diseases". Pharmaceutical Technology. July 28, 2021. Retrieved July 28, 2021.
  17. ↑ "Fosigotifator". alzforum.org. November 21, 2025. Retrieved November 24, 2025.
  18. ↑ Masson, Gabrielle (November 13, 2025). "AbbVie to end Calico collab, lays off researchers: Stat". www.fiercebiotech.com. Retrieved November 24, 2025.
  19. ↑ Garde, Damian (November 12, 2025). "AbbVie cuts ties with Google-backed longevity company, lays off scientists". STAT. Retrieved May 22, 2026.
  20. ↑ "AbbVie Terminates $3.5 Billion Calico Partnership After 11 Years, Cuts 100 Jobs". MedPath. November 13, 2025. Retrieved May 22, 2026.
  21. ↑ "Broad Institute and Calico announce an extensive collaboration focused on the biology of aging and therapeutic approaches to diseases of aging". Broad Institute. March 17, 2015. Archived from the original on August 25, 2017.
  22. ↑ Carroll, John (April 28, 2015). "Google's Calico continues its partnering romp on aging R&D with Buck collaboration". FierceBiotechResearch.com. Archived from the original on May 1, 2015.
  23. ↑ "Calico and QB3 announce partnership to conduct research into the biology of aging and to identify potential therapeutics for age-related diseases". March 24, 2015. Archived from the original on May 9, 2017. Retrieved June 6, 2015.
  24. ↑ Brodwin, Erin. "A collaboration between Google's secretive life-extension spinoff and popular genetics company Ancestry has quietly ended". Business Insider. Retrieved April 22, 2020.
  25. ↑ Regalado, Antonio (September 18, 2013). "Google to Try to Solve Death, LOL". MIT Technology Review. Retrieved January 18, 2024.
  26. 1 2 Belluz, Julia (April 27, 2017). "Google is super secretive about its anti-aging research. No one knows why". Vox. Retrieved January 18, 2024.
  27. 1 2 Langley, Hugh; Dodge, Blake (January 22, 2021). "Alphabet's age-fighting bet Calico has been quiet for years, but it's hiring. Here are all the jobs open at the secretive biotech firm". Business Insider. Retrieved January 18, 2024.
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