I recently sat down with Greg Alden, the CEO of Diagnostic Biochips (DBC), to discuss how he started with the company, how having Parkinson’s gives him a unique perspective on the company’s work, the state of progress in treating neurological diseases, and what’s next on the treatment horizon.
Gary Drenik: Thanks for joining me, Greg. To get started, tell me a bit about your background and how you came to DBC?
Greg Alden: My career really began about 25 years ago when I started as a manufacturer’s representative for networking companies, including Compatible Systems, where I worked with the first commercial Internet service providers. I found myself in the middle of the Wild West of the Internet. I then spent 7 years at Cisco, where, amongst other things, I led our efforts to build the US mobile data business. I was then recruited to a small company called Starent Networks, which built the access technology needed to do data on your mobile device. We went public in 2007 and were acquired by Cisco in 2009 for $3B. Then, in the fall of 2010, after noticing that my right hand was slower than normal, I was diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease a week before my 40th birthday.
I carried on and followed the standard protocol from my doctor. It seemed to work but had very unpleasant side effects. Two years after co-founding a new company, I began to notice that my cognitive processing was not as sharp, and I struggled to have that “edge” you need as a start-up CEO. I ended up leaving the company in 2015 and started a plan to get on top of my health.
I quickly learned that there is a vast amount that is not understood about the brain and how it works, which has led to substandard therapeutic options for patients, poor diagnostics, and drugs that were either old or repurposed from something else – some of which were dangerous, especially in combination. That’s when I decided to try and find a way to help. For me, that meant leveraging my 20+ years in data and analytics experience to try and determine how we can learn about how the brain communicates internally, and if the data that the brain generates can tell us how to fix it. This is how I was introduced to DBC, which had built world class technology to capture brain data in real time. Now, the team just needed to figure out how to capture, store, and analyze it.
Drenik: What has your experience with Parkinson’s brought to DBC and the work you are doing with these labs?
Alden: The problem is urgent – there are millions of people unnecessarily suffering, and I have the unique perspective of being able to connect my experience to neuroscience in a highly valuable way. By having Parkinson’s, I have a more concrete understanding of how things affect the people with the disease.
That experience helps DBC focus on the things that are most impactful from a patient perspective. As a patient, I have a better understanding of what efforts will create benefits and those that won’t. It helps us by guiding our product development to focus on areas with the most potential to have a massive therapeutic impact.
To me, the brain looks like a giant distributed computing infrastructure, and while brain matter is organic, they are both puzzles – and puzzles have lots of parts that need to fit together. My thinking prior to starting with DBC was, if you could get data from the brain with the right level of detail, and understand how it communicates, that we might better understand it and find new treatments for some of the most pressing neurodegenerative diseases. For example, according to a recent Prosper Insights & Analytics survey of Parkinson’s patients, nearly a third of respondents reported having problems with headaches/migraines, high blood pressure and high cholesterol, in addition to common symptoms of the disorder. If we understood the brain better, we could understand the cause and effect of how Parkinson’s affects other parts of the body beyond just the nervous system. Everyone has their own unique experience, so the only way to achieve true objectivity is with data.
Drenik: Can you tell me a bit about why we haven’t seen progress in the treatment of neurodegenerative diseases? Why is it so challenging to unlock critical brain data?
Alden: In short, we’ve hit a therapeutic wall. The drugs are very complex, and when new ones come along, there’s a high failure rate. Specifically for Parkinson’s patients who are often taking multiple drugs, the lack of advancement takes a tremendous toll on their well-being.
From my perspective, our inability to make significant progress in the treatment of neurodegenerative diseases stems from a fundamental lack of understanding about how the brain works at a basic functional level. We can’t “fix” something without understanding how it works. It is a multidimensional problem, starting with the fact that a brain is living – it’s not a straightforward thing where you can just start collecting data. However, building this understanding of how the brain works, the “plumbing level”, is paramount to advancement.
We are starting to see people collect much larger data because ever-advancing technology is enabling labs to download increasingly bigger files and, as a result, analyze higher volumes of information. As we push the boundaries of existing technology, we inch closer to unlocking the mysteries of the brain and revolutionizing our approach to these complex conditions.
Drenik: Why is it so important that these labs collect granular brain data and uncover affected cells to find better treatments?
Alden: There is significant value in brain data. I believe you need to build the data from the bottom up, or rather, the inside out. The more data you have at a very granular level, the better precision output you would get.
At the core, we’re on a mission to unravel these mysteries and address their various challenges. It’s not a walk in the park; we’re essentially trying to reverse engineer the workings of a complex organic entity. The bottom line is that more detailed information is our compass in navigating the intricate landscape of the brain.
Drenik: What are the latest developments in the treatments of these diseases? Do you see better treatments on the horizon?
Alden: There have been some advancements in pharmaceuticals, and there is also promising research on using stem cells from your own body and neuro-modulation devices, like deep brain stimulation. Most of the neuro diseases are very individualistic, so I think that, in the long run, precision personalized medicine will be critical – and that is all data-driven.
With the brain, there’s both chemical and electrical pieces that need to be addressed, and I don’t think we’re doing nearly enough on the electrical side of the brain. Things like, for example, vagus nerve stimulation are great and are providing notable therapeutic benefits, but all in all, we need to be able to collect more data from the brain with the least amount of disruption possible to the brain itself.
Beyond the scientific community, Parkinson’s patients themselves need to take control of their treatment. According to a recent Prosper Insights & Analytics survey, over 90% of Parkinson’s patients use an electronic device to monitor their health, with blood glucose monitors and Garmin smartwatches being the top two choices among respondents. On a personal level, I use both of these to monitor my health on a regular basis and would wholeheartedly recommend it.
Drenik: Thanks Greg for your insights on your career and the latest on finding treatments for neurodegenerative diseases.
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