We have reduced our staffing levels in a restructuring of our workforce. This was a very difficult decision, but one that we felt was necessary to achieve 23andMe’s long-term business development goals and maintain our strength in the industry.

These cuts, which are a reflection of the current economic environment all companies are facing, will allow us to continue to invest in the growth of our Personal Genome Service and research endeavors.

23andMe was founded by Linda Avey and Anne Wojcicki back in 2006. Investors include biotech powerhouse Genentech, as well as New Enterprise Associates. The company also has close ties to Google — Sergey Brin (who is Wojciki’s husband) has loaned 23andMe $10 million, and Google also has a stake in the company.

Avey left the company in early September to start a new foundation dedicated to Alzheimer’s research.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll said it again: there’s little doubt in my mind that personal genomics will be a booming industry in the relatively near future, though it may be five years or a decade before this testing really catches on. The concept is still quite foreign to most people, and while there can be some benefits to this kind of testing (such as learning your risk factor for certain diseases), the science is still very much in its infancy.

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Avey notes that the foundation will be starting with the connection between Alzheimer’s and ApoE4, which helps in the breakdown of peptide plaques associated with the disease. The decision seems to be driven in part by personal reasons, as Avey’s father-in-law suffered from Alzheimer’s.

Avey sent the following Email to the 23andMe team:

Dear all-

As I trust you all know, 23andMe is very special to me. I also recognize that the company has reached a critical point in its growth where new leadership can take it to the successful heights we all think it can achieve.

I’ve decided that I’d like to focus my efforts on an area that is personally significant and will continue to have a huge impact on our healthcare system–Alzheimer’s disease. Effective today, I’m leaving 23andMe and have begun making plans for the creation of a foundation dedicated to the study of this disorder. The foundation will leverage the research platform we’ve built at 23andMe–the goal is to drive the formation of the world’s largest community of individuals with a family history of Alzheimer’s, empower them with their genetic information and track their brain health using state-of-the-art tools. We’ve always planned to include Alzheimer’s in our 23andWe research mission…I’m just approaching it from a new angle.

Some of you might be aware that my father-in-law suffered from Alzheimer’s and passed away last year. For this reason, Randy and I are motivated to do what we can to improve the understanding of what leads to the debilitating symptoms and what might prevent them from starting in the first place. The ApoE4 association is barely understood but gives us a great starting point.

I’ll miss working with you but will be excited to hear about the progress I know you’ll be making!

All the best,
Linda

Anne Wojcicki, who founded the company with Avey and is also noted for being Sergey Brin’s wife, sent out the following letter.

Team:

As Linda has told you, she will be leaving 23andMe to focus her energy on transforming Alzheimer’s research and treatment, leveraging the 23andMe platform. While I am quite sad to see her leave I am excited and hopeful as she takes on this mission. As Linda’s co-founder and partner over the last three years, it has been clear that revolutionizing research has been a primary passion. Our drive to change health care has always had roots in our personal lives and we have tried to structure 23andMe so that any individual or organization could actively participate in research. Linda and I have talked about doing research in Alzheimer’s since the inception of the company and the need for the Alzheimer’s community to have a strong leader. With Linda’s involvement, I believe that the APOE4 community could be the first asymptomatic community to successfully develop preventative treatments. I hope that going forward we’ll both be able to shake up and transform the health care space, making health care and treatments better for all.

Linda’s departure is also a sign of 23andMe’s maturation. When we started the company, the personal genetics industry did not exist; now it is a thriving and competitive landscape. Our company has grown and we continue to be an innovative industry leader. While our success has been exceptional, it is also clear we have a lot of work ahead. We have created a significant and empowering tool, but we must find new and better ways to promote the value of knowing your DNA. In the weeks ahead, we will outline a strategy for the company that we believe will make genetics a routine part of health care and will lead us to making significant research discoveries.

Linda has been instrumental in making 23andMe what it is today and we thank her for her passion and dedication to the company. We have many exciting opportunities before us, and I look forward to working with all of you to make 23andMe a spectacular success.

Anne

Worth pointing out is Wojcicki’s statement that 23andMe needs to find “better ways to promote the value of knowing your DNA”. That may be tricky — while there are some traits that are well understood, this is a field that is still in its infancy and the relationships between our genes and most traits are murky. At some point personal genomics will play a key role in our health care system, but I’m not sure we’re there yet.

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The genetic testing startup has agreed to donate $1 for each of the first 500 unique tweets that use the hastags #blamedrewscancer and #23andMe. These tweets will start counting after the site reaches its 10,000 person who has tweeted for the cause, which will be sometime tonight. The money will go towards the LIVESTRONG foundation for cancer research.

23andMe is also donating 5 of its new $99 research kits, to be raffled away to Blame Drew’s Cancer followers, also to benefit the LIVESTRONG foundation. Along with that, 23andMe is donating a kit to the namesake of Blame Drew’s Cancer, Drew Olanoff, to add his results to their Research Revolution project. And soon you’ll be able to buy the $99 kits through the Blame Drew’s Cancer site, with $5 of each sale going to LIVESTRONG, Olanoff tells us.

In addition to all of that, 23andMe has agreed to be the main sponsor of Olanoff’s 24-hour Blame-a-thon happening on 9-9-09, and being streamed live to the web.

This is another example of Twitter being used for charitable purposes. Last week, we wrote about TwitCause, a service that wants to spread the word about various good causes on Twitter — much like Causes does on Facebook and MySpace. BlameDrewsCancer is taking more of a grassroots approach, but it appears to be working.

Watch Olanoff in the video below.

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Update to last weekend’s breaking news about the creepy 23andMe zeppelin that’s been floating around my house. It was back again today. For all I know it’s been circling my house all week. What do you want, 23andMe zeppelin? I already bought a DNA kit. Go away.

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Still, it’s hard to really call 23andMe “affordable” for most people at this point. The price has come down drastically from the $1000 Michael paid when he tried it out in late 2007 (it’s now only $399), but that’s still pretty steep for testing that most people probably have a hard time wrapping their heads around in the first place.

Today 23andMe has announced that it’s launching a much cheaper $99 version of its product as part of a new Research Revolution, which is meant to help 23andMe initiate research studies on genetic diseases that would otherwise require major logistical hurdles and funding. The effort is part of the company’s 23andWe research arm, which has the goal of building grassroots studies from communities of members who are afflicted by various genetic diseases.

Here’s how it works: 23andMe has picked out ten different diseases that it’s looking to study first (the company plans to study more down the line — this is just a starter set). Users visit the site and “pledge” to one disease. The first disease to reach 1000 votes will be the first one studied by 23andMe researchers, though all ten will eventually be studied. Participants agree to complete a number of surveys, and users who have previously submitted their DNA to the service can opt-in and submit votes as well. Voting will run through September 2009.

Unfortunately, the cheaper price comes with some downsides: you’ll miss out on a lot of the analysis that makes 23andMe really cool, like the ability to see your ancestry data, some of the site’s community features, and the ability to download your raw genetic data (which you could theoretically have analyzed again at some point in the future). What you’re left with are the site’s research reports, a list of risks for 100 diseases, and “traits”, along with some basic sharing and community functionality. You can see a full list of differences here.

Finally, it’s not clear if this is going to work at all. This is a new approach to genetic research, and some science blogs believe that a 1,000 person sample size may not be enough to generate adequate data. Still, provided that 23andMe ensures that all patients are given adequate informed consent and the resulting data is considered valid by the scientific community, this could prove to be an efficient new way to conduct scientific research.

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Google is still tightly intertwined with 23andme, a company that helps consumers understand and decipher their genomes. 23andme has raised another $2.6 million from Google out of a total $24.26 million it is trying to raise in a Series B round of funding, according to regulatory filings. This brings the total amount raised from this round to $13.6 million, after May’s $11 million funding round. At the time, Mohr Davidow Ventures divested its stake in 23andme after investing in a direct competitor Navigenics.

The juiciest disclosure in the filing is that Brin loaned the startup an additional $10 million which is being converted into Series B preferred shares. Earlier in 2007, he had loaned the company $2.6 million which was repaid from the proceeds of Google’s subsequent $3.9 million stake in 23andMe in May, 2007. The debt was repaid after the Google investment. It appears that Brin once again had to dig into his own pocket to help keep the company afloat.

The filing also says one of the investors in the Series B round in May was New Enterprise Associates, which also invested in 23andme’s Series A round. And it mentions that Google has entered into a lease agreement with 23andme, possibly for office space, but it is unclear what exactly is being leased.

23andme, which was co-founded by Sergey Brin’s wife, Anne Wojcicki, raised $9 million in a Series A round of funding from Google, Genentech, New Enterprise Associates, and Mohr Davidow Ventures in 2007. The company maps consumers’ DNA and helps them find information about their ancestry and their risks of getting certain diseases (Michael tried it last year).

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23andme, a company that helps consumers understand and decipher their genomes, has raised a partial $11 million out of a $24.26 million B round of funding, according to regulatory filings. 23andme, which was co-founded by Google co-founder Sergey Brin’s wife, Anne Wojcicki, raised $9 million in Series A funding from Google, Genentech, New Enterprise Associates, and Mohr Davidow Ventures in 2007.

Now PEHub is reporting that Mohr Davidow Ventures divested its stake in 23andme after investing in a direct competitor Navigenics. Losing one of your main investors to a competitor is not a good sign. 23andme maps customers’ DNA and helps them find information about their ancestry and their risks of getting certain diseases (Michael tried it last year). Google ended up taking a $3.9 million stake in 23andMe in May 2007, after Brin had personally loaned the company $2.6 million. The debt was repaid after the Google investment. We’re curious as to how much, if any, of this round’s $11 million is Brin’s or Google’s money.

Also, we’d like to know why Mohr Davidow shifted its funds to a 23andme’s rival. Navigenics’ service is similar to 23andme’s with slight differences. For example, 23andme offers one package, priced at $399, to test your saliva. Navigenics offers two packages of testing priced at at $499 and $2,499, with the higher priced test including genetic counseling and testing for more health conditions. Most recently, California’s Department of Public Health issued cease and desist letters to 23andMe, Navigenics and 11 other genetic testing startups, mandating that the labs demonstrate that they have been certified by both the state and federal government, and, perhaps more importantly, that all genetic tests were ordered by a patient’s doctor, which is required by state law.

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Of course, it was the actual content of the second blog post (the one after the obligatory introduction one) that was the real story there. After all, an executive of a major, public company sharing his genetic predisposition to Parkinson’s disease is not exactly an everyday thing.

The unusual blog post, evidently hosted on Google’s Blogger service, garnered quite some press coverage, and made a lot of people curious about what other insights in Brin’s personal life would follow. After all, the first post said the blog would be reflecting the man’s ‘life outside of work’, and it allowed moderated comments (although none were ever approved after all).

But there never came a third post, and the blog quietly slipped out of the attention stream for lack of updates. Today, the blog is still online, but it’s as dead silent as it’s been for the past 6 months.

So maybe the real question is: why did Sergey Brin start blogging?

I think this excerpt from the blog gives it away:

As a customer of 23andMe, I have always been excited about the product. I have found what pieces of DNA I share with various relatives. I checked whether other Brins were related. I explored my various gene journals — learning, for instance, that I have one copy of the fast twitch muscle fiber. I also looked over the health related entries and found that my genetic risk for most diseases is modestly lower than average but for a few diseases it is modestly higher.

23andMe is the biotech startup that was co-founded by Brin’s wife Anne Wojcicki. The company can map customers’ DNA and help them find information about their ancestry and their risk of getting certain diseases (Mike tried it). Google ended up taking a $3.9 million stake in 23andMe in May 2007, after Brin had personally loaned the company $2.6 million. It’s always been a strange story, and I doubt we’ve heard the end of it.

So what I’m wondering: did Sergey Brin actually start the blog with good intentions, hoping he would find the time in his busy life to share tidbits about the personal part of it, or was this just a way for him to draw a lot of attention to his genetic mutation and – conveniently – how his wife’s new startup plays a role in it?

I guess we’ll never know for sure, unless of course he responds to this on his blog.

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In his first blog post, he explains the blog name: “Welcome to my personal blog. While Google is a play on googol, too is a play on the much smaller number – two. It also means “in addition”, as this blog reflects my life outside of work.”

In the second blog post, he gets a little more serious. He talks about how DNA startup 23andMe (cofounded by his wife Anne Wojcicki) has shown he has certain gene mutation that is tied to Parkinson’s Disease – G2019S. While the mutation is rare in people with Parksinson’s, in some ethnic groups it accounts for a substantial proportion of familial Parkinson’s. In other words, if you have it, there’s a good chance you’ll get Parkinson’s.

He says based on current available data he’s 20%-80% likely to get the disease. And he can now do something about it:

This leaves me in a rather unique position. I know early in my life something I am substantially predisposed to. I now have the opportunity to adjust my life to reduce those odds (e.g. there is evidence that exercise may be protective against Parkinson’s). I also have the opportunity to perform and support research into this disease long before it may affect me. And, regardless of my own health it can help my family members as well as others.

I feel fortunate to be in this position. Until the fountain of youth is discovered, all of us will have some conditions in our old age only we don’t know what they will be. I have a better guess than almost anyone else for what ills may be mine — and I have decades to prepare for it.

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The Switzerland-based company says they can use a $199 DNA test (compare to $1,000 for 23andMe) to help you find your perfect match, statistically speaking. They’ve analyzed “hundreds of couples” and have determined the genetic patterns found in successful relationships. Based on their algorithm and your DNA, they’ll determine the probability for a satisfying and long-lasting relationship between two people (color me skeptical).

What about romance? Chemistry? That certain je ne sais quoi when you meet someone and get a tingling sensation in your stomach? Forget it. The future of dating is DNA tests and buccal swabs, so get used to it:

A brush for collecting your DNA sample from your saliva – called a buccal swab kit – will be sent to your address. Following the simple instructions included with the kit you will gently collect the DNA from the inside of your cheek. Use the addressed envelope supplied for returning the brushes.

GenePartner is looking to partner with dating sites and have those services encourage users to see if they’re a DNA match.

Will they be able to avoid tough emerging U.S. laws around genetic testing? Well, they’re in Switzerland. My guess is they’re not going to be too worried about California and other state laws prohibiting their service.

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California’s Department of Public Health has issued cease and desist letters to 13 genetic testing startups – most notably 23andMe, which Michael tried out earlier this year. The C&D’s are mandating that the labs demonstrate that they have been certified by both the state and federal government, and, perhaps more importantly, that all genetic tests were ordered by a patient’s doctor, which is required by state law. 23andMe is going to have a little trouble with that one – Michael was never asked to consult his doctor before ordering his test results.

California isn’t the first state to take the genetics companies to task – earlier this year New York cracked down on the sites with similar complaints.

But what’s the big deal? Required state and federal certifications seem obvious given the sensitivity and personal nature of the data. But what about the mandated doctor’s note? It’s my DNA – shouldn’t I be able to read about it whenever I want?

Maybe not. The problem with this kind of casual DNA testing is that it almost trivializes the importance of genetic information. 23andMe considers itself as something of a novelty, providing lots of fascinating information that it says isn’t to be used to diagnose medical conditions.

Of course, the site still provides some probabilities of getting certain diseases. And while none of these sites are going to offer any life-shattering information (e.g. “You will die before you hit 30″), many health care professionals worry that any amount of genetic information could be misinterpreted. What happens when a patient finds out they have a lower-than-average risk of heart failure that leads them to neglect regular checkups? Then again, it’s my information – shouldn’t I be free to (mis)interpret it as I see fit?

The fact of the matter is that genetic testing will be commonplace within the next decade, and the outcome of these cases will be setting important precedents. New York and California may be misguided in their efforts to mandate a doctor’s approval, but we should remember that these are two unusually progressive states that don’t seem keen on hampering citizens’ rights. Regardless of the eventual outcome of these cases, there’s one important message we should take from their hesitation: tread lightly.

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I promised to post the results so people can get an idea of what 23andMe is offering (without paying that fee), and here they are. Also, as of last week 23andMe started allowing users to create free demo accounts. if you create one, add my username, TechCrunch, as a friend and I can share the data with you directly.

Results are below:

Genetic Traits

Once you have your test results in, you can view them in the Gene Journal. 23andMe is adding more information over time about your gene map (they added 30 more traits last week, including paternal ancestry). Here’s a screenshot:

Some of the information is just for fun – I have “wet earwax,” for example, and don’t have the “alcohol flush” gene that turns people’s faces red when they drink. I don’t detect odors as well as some people. Less usefully, 23andMe notifies me that I have brown eyes. I have a gene which makes people tall (I’m 6′4). I do not have a sweet tooth.

Then there is the more serious stuff. It turns out I have a gene that makes me substantially more likely to have lower back pain (something that has plagued my father all his life, but not me so far):

I have a higher than normal chance of getting Type 1 diabetes, but a lower than normal of getting Type 2. I have a lower than average chance of getting prostate cancer and Rheumatoid Arthritis. I do not have the genetic material that gives some people resistance to AIDS, although I do have a gene that makes it progress more slowly. I am not genetically resistant to Malaria. I have slightly increased memory performance.

Ancestry

On my mother’s side my ancestors come from Europe, Asia and North Africa. On my fathers side is a common European gene found in the Irish, Basques, British, French (I am mostly European and part Native American). I share, apparently, some genetic stuff with John Adams from my fathers side. My mother, by the way, is about as white as they come – but perhaps that picture is one of her ancestors.

There is a lot more information included in the results, and I’m happy to share this with readers. Just create a demo account and add TechCrunch, and I believe you’ll get access to the data.

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Anyway, after long minutes of negotiation regarding a refund since I could now get a kit for free, Linda and Anne agreed to give one more kit out, to give to a lucky TechCrunch reader. Just tell me in the comments why knowing your genetic background is important to you, and we’ll choose a winner. We’ll stop comments after 24 hours and choose then.

The company won’t say how many kits have been purchased, other than commenting that sales are “way above expectations.” Yesterday the company started selling kits in Europe and Canada. And they just recently launched their corporate blog, fittingly called “The Spittoon.”

I just recently got my 23andMe test results back. I’ll be posting highlights next week.

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23andMe

The service, which launched in November enables customers to search and discover whether their genes make them more predisposed to certain outcomes, such as cancer or other illnesses.

Michael signed up for a 23andme kit in December. You can read his experience with the service so far here and here.

No word as yet as to when the service will be available outside of Europe and North America. The full list of countries where 23andMe is now available: Albania, Andorra, Armenia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Canada, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Malta, Moldova, Monaco, Montenegro, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, San Marino, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine, the United Kingdom, the United States and Vatican City State.

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I spent a few minutes reading the directions and then did as I was told – I spent 5 minutes or so spitting into the provided tube, mixing in a chemical that comes with the kit, and sealing it up for shipment. In 4-6 weeks, they say, I’ll get the results back and will know a little more about my essential me-ness.

It’s clear that the concerns I brought up in the last post about taking a sample from someone without their knowledge won’t work that well with 23andMe. The volume of spit required to complete the test is just too much not to raise someone’s suspicions.

And as luck would have it, I ran into co-founder Anne Wojcicki at a holiday party just a couple of hours after the spitting session. She said the 4-6 week window was the longest it would take to get back results, and that some people get them back in just a week or two. I asked her if she could do me a favor and make sure mine got done quickly. She politely declined, saying something about how their privacy protections make it impossible for her to single my sample out.

I also asked Anne how many kits have been purchased. I ran the question by her perfectly – I asked a string of easy questions that she answered quickly and then I snuck that one in (this almost always works when trying to get sensitive information out of entrepreneurs), but she was on the ball and her media training clicked in. No answer.

23andMe is also a very expensive social network. Account holders can share their genetic information with friends (or anyone really) and compare that information with respect to inherited traits, ancestry and global similarity.

I’ll post again when the test results come in. More photos from the test are here.

Side note: I also ran into photographer Lane Hartwell at the party last night. Boy was that an uncomfortable conversation.

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On the one hand, I can’t wait to find out interesting things about myself, like:

• Do your genes help you sprint faster?
• How well can you taste bitter foods?
• Do you share maternal ancestry with outlaw Jesse James?
• Are you more similar to Mayans or Basques?

But I’ll also get all kinds of information about genetic diseases I might be more or less likely to get over time. Do I really want to know?

The massive terms and conditions agreement didn’t help to calm me. The section called “Risks” mentioned a number of things that I hadn’t thought of – like the fact that my dad may not actually be my dad. And that the information I receive may alter my life and worldview.

But what really worries me is that last sentence above, about social, legal or economic implications of discovering this information. What if this information becomes public? What if I can’t get health care because of the results? Call me a luddite, but this is a whole new class of private information that previous generations didn’t have to deal with. Our laws are waaaaay behind the curve here when it comes to protecting us.

The kit comes soon. After I spit and send it back, the analysis starts and in 4-6 short weeks I’ll be able to, as New York Times writer Amy Harmon said, “Google my DNA.”

23andMe has strong security features in place to keep my information fairly secure. But there’s a big hole in the plan – what if I simply send in someone else’s spit? What if it’s someone I’m thinking about marrying? What if someone does that to me? There’s no way to stop people from spending $1,000 and getting a full genetic download of ME, in all my flawed glory.

Anyway, no time to worry about that now. The future is coming, and I want to know. I just hope that there isn’t something horrifically genetically wrong with me that sends me to a futuristic version of a leper colony should anyone find out. Look for updates here – if I go strangely quiet, you’ll know somethings up.

And if a stranger (or loved one) asks you to spit in a cup, you’ll know to be more than a little suspicious.

By the way, if you want a play-by-play of someone who’s going to blog about his experience with 23andMe, check out former TechCrunch Intern Andrew Meyer’s new blog post “Help Me Decode My Genome by Christmas.” He’s asking for donations to get to the $1,000, and he promises to track his experience on his blog. Help him out, or just lurk for free and find out if Andrew has good marriage material.

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23andMe

23andMe will offer a genetic screening service for $999. The short story is that 23andMe will administer a test (presumably a swab or saliva test) that will take your DNA and screen it. In return you will be told your genetic history including whether you are likely to suffer from a range of diseases or similar life altering events, including heart disease.

I cant help but think of the 1997 Ethan Hawke/ Uma Thurman movie Gattaca where “during this time society analyzes your DNA and determines where you belong in life;” 23andme is the first step towards that vision. If you thought Google’s already considerable power was of concern, consider that Google invested $3.9 million in the company in May; I’m not suggesting that Google is about to commence an index of the planet’s DNA, but well…no one really knows why Google invested in the company aside from Brin’s marital relationship.

I’m sure we all want to know what diseases we might end up with in the future, and in the development of human knowledge the accessibility of 23andMe’s product is a step forward..but I still can’t help but feel a little concerned.

The below video is an interview 23andMe’s founders Linda Avey and Anne Wojcicki did with Wired. And the NYT has a first-person account of using the service this morning.

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The company is going to help people take DNA tests to get more information on their genetic health. The company will try to keep costs low and get information back to users as quickly as possible. We’re hearing this is a long, long way from launching.

23andMe is a privately held company developing new ways to help you make sense of your own genetic information.

Even though your body contains trillions of copies of your genome, you’ve likely never read any of it. Our goal is to connect you to the 23 paired volumes of your own genetic blueprint (plus your mitochondrial DNA), bringing you personal insight into ancestry, genealogy, and inherited traits. By connecting you to others, we can also help put your genome into the larger context of human commonality and diversity.

Toward this goal, we are building on recent advances in DNA analysis technologies to enable broad, secure, and private access to trustworthy and accurate individual genetic information. Combined with educational and scientific resources with which to interpret and understand it, your genome will soon become personal in a whole new way.

So what’s the connection with Google? No idea, yet, but these companies are now firmly in bed with each other (pun intended).

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