Genetic testing agency 23andMe cuts 40% of its personnel amid monetary struggles – Guardian

The genetic testing agency 23andMe mentioned on Monday it would lower about 40%, or 200 workers, from its personnel and pause extra pattern of all its therapies as section of a restructuring program.

“We’re taking these fascinating but the biggest actions as we restructure 23andMe and care for the lengthy-time interval success of our core particular person industrial and analysis partnerships,” mentioned the corporate’s CEO, Anne Wojcicki.

The corporate mentioned it changed into evaluating strategic choices, including licensing agreements and asset sales, for its therapies in pattern.

The corporate has been left with few alternate choices as its cost has plummeted in the aftermath of an enormous recordsdata breach. The DNA testing company is being investigated by British and Canadian authorities over the 2023 breach that uncovered 6.9 million users’ recordsdata, including ancestry recordsdata and other deepest info. The hackers first revealed that they accessed the guidelines in October 2023, after they attempted to sell the purported recordsdata of 1 million users of Jewish Ashkenazi descent and 100,000 users of Chinese descent on a preferred hacking dialogue board.

23andMe users in the US dangle since filed a class circulation lawsuit towards the corporate, alleging the corporate didn’t sufficiently enlighten users of Chinese and Jewish descent that their recordsdata changed into uncovered. Whereas the corporate insisted the guidelines accessed will no longer be “weak for any injury”, lawyers representing the plaintiffs in the case mentioned the ethnicity-explicit groups can also amount to a “hit list”.

Wojcicki, who has been looking for to carry shut the corporate deepest since April, goes by arrangement of a fascinating anguish finally of 23andMe’s board individuals moreover her resigned in September, after no longer receiving a ample have shut-deepest offer from the CEO.

“Whereas we continue to wholeheartedly toughen the Company’s mission and assume deeply in the cost of the personalised successfully being and wellness offering that it’s likely you’ll dangle articulated, it’s a long way furthermore obvious that we differ on the strategic direction for the Company going ahead,” the board individuals wrote in a public letter asserting their resignation. “Due to this of of that disagreement and as a consequence of your concentrated voting energy, we assume that it’s a long way in the very best interests of the Company’s shareholders that we resign from the Board.”

In July, the CEO and co-founder proposed to construct all outstanding shares of the agency no longer already owned by her or her affiliates for 40 cents each and each.

After Monday’s restructuring method, the corporate expects annualized cost financial savings of more than $35m.