worktoplay,
Whatever the rationalization of the statement spins up to, the bottom line is that the value of the classifier model has taken a significant hit.
Back when the talk of 'NASDAQ listing' and 'Fortune 500' was being bandied about as almost foregone conclusions, the classifier model was the totality of the DNAP stable of offerings. Statinome alone was going to propel us to "Da Moon".
For Frudakis to be passing it off now as a second tier goal would seem to indicate that the previous assumptions need to be discounted accordingly.
Using the platform to help create drugs that do not have the side effects in small percentages of the patients that use them will make classifiers unnecessary. Conversely creating drugs that are highly efficient and focused on the diseases that already target specific groups (sickle cell anemia for instance) while beneficial to the human race will still not require classifiers as the diagnosis of the disease itself will do the sorting.
That' laser guided' drugs will be a huge revenue source is a given. What is not clear is the path to such things. You very correctly point out the huge question that has gone begging with the announcement of the 24 drug trials. Who is paying for it? The reason such a question needs to be answered, is that according to the agreement with Moffit, the people who pay for the work reap the benefit for the work. If someone else is paying for the trials then what is DNAP's role? Are they just providing platform support? How will this get them closer to being a drug company?
If these are in some way the drugs in DNAP's future, how far away is that future? Clinical trials take years and only a minute fraction of drugs that enter clinical trials ever succeed to the marketplace.
