Harvard geneticist George Church poses for a portrait inside his lab at Harvard Medical School. Jessica Rinaldi | Reuters

Genome-sequencing company Veritas Genetics offered the first $1,000 whole genome sequence to consumers and physicians in 2016. Now the company is ready to again push competition in the growing personal genetics industry, cutting its test pricing by 40% and closing the gap on popular genetic-testing companies 23andMe and AncestryDNA. The Veritas whole genome sequencing product "myGenome" will go down in price from $999 to $599, a new price point that the company, a 2019 CNBC Disruptor 50, thinks will lead millions of more consumers to access the company's services. "We know that all genetic tests lead to the genome," Veritas chief marketing and design officer Rodrigo Martinez said. "There is no more comprehensive genetic test than your whole genome. So this is a clear signal that the whole genome is basically going to replace all other genetic tests. And this [price drop] gets it closer and closer and closer." Research into genomics, the branch of biology concerning genetics, has progressed rapidly over the past few decades. When the first whole genome was sequenced in 2003, the process required 15 years of work, 20 different labs and more than $3 billion, according to Martinez. Veritas is now using advances in AI and machine learning to automate more of this process, making it much more affordable.

'This is the inflection point'

Veritas already tested the influence of pricing on its whole genome sequencing product once, when the company dropped the price of the service from $999 to $199 briefly last November for the first 1,000 kits ordered. That experiment — which matched the pricing on the popular consumer genetics kits offered by 23andMe and Ancestry — sold out in less than six hours and cost the company only $458 in marketing spend, according to Martinez. "This is the inflection point," Martinez said. "This is the point where the curve turns upward. You reach a critical mass when you are able to provide a product that gives value at a specific price point. This is the beginning of that. That's why it's seismic."

Consumers have been slow to make the transition from ancestry-based genetic tests to whole genome sequences, which offer far more medical data and insight, and it is not clear the $599 price will be enough. While the MIT Technology Review reported that more than 26 million people have taken at-home ancestry tests, Veritas has only fully sequenced about 5,000 genomes so far, according to the company. A major part of getting consumers to pay the premium is successfully explaining the difference between whole genome sequencing and genotyping, the service offered by companies like 23andMe. Whole genome sequencing looks at all 6.4 billion letters of the human genome; genotyping looks at less than half of 1% of that number, according to Martinez. This difference is the reason whole genome sequencing offers much more comprehensive health-care data, leading the Mayo Clinic to begin using Veritas' tests in their executive health programs. "It's like comparing a tricycle with a sports car," Martinez said of the difference. According to 23andMe, its genotyping technology includes 600,000 variants, looking at points in the human genome that it knows — based on published scientific research — to convey information about genetic predispositions. That more focused approach is distinct from the full human genome. The genetic variants it studies are based on FDA requirements for support to be found in the published scientific research, and the 23andMe genetic-testing kit (priced at $199) is the only one approved by the FDA to report health conditions directly to the consumer without a medical professional needing to be involved in the process. It offers 130 total reports based on specific genetic variants and has sold 10 million kits. More from Disruptor 50:

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Why some of the world's top cybersecurity hackers are paid millions to use their powers for good An AncestryDNA spokeswoman stressed that its consumer DNA testing service (priced at $99) is focused on helping people discover their family history. It predicts genetic ethnicity and helps people find new family connections, but it does not provide health reports. AncestryDNA says more than 15 million people have taken its test. 23andMe also offers a heritage test, at a price of $99.

The only way we're going to be able to truly extract the value of the genome for a healthier society is going to be analyzing millions of genomes that have been sequenced. And the only way we can get there is by reducing the price so that more consumers can sequence their genome. Rodrigo Martinez Veritas chief marketing and design officer

Proponents of genome sequencing are hopeful the technology will allow consumers to uncover medical conditions to which they have a genetic predisposition, leading the health-care industry to focus more on prevention rather than treatment. However, Robin Bennett, a genetic counselor at UW Medicine, is skeptical of how helpful insurance will be in covering these services. "[Health care] may be moving in that direction, but the payment for testing and for services, it hasn't moved in the preventive direction," Bennett said. "So unless the health-care system changes, these tests may not be as useful because ... the health-care system hasn't caught up to say, 'Yes, we support payment for this.'" To reach a point where genomics is woven into everyday life, a phase Veritas calls The Era of the Social Genome, the company is predicting the price of a whole genome will begin its decline to the $100–$200 price point and consumer adoption of 1 million in 2021. A key difference between the Veritas business model and the personal genetic health tests offered by 23andMe and Ancestry and others is that Veritas requires a medical professional to evaluate the results for individuals.

Human insights remain critical