Google and GSK to create nerve implant medicine venture in UK

The companies are to create Galvani Bioelectronics, which will research, develop, and commercialise bioelectronic medicine. Based on treating chronic diseases by harnessing and manipulating the tiny electrical signals that travel along nerve fibres, GSK has been investigating this phenomenon since 2012 and believes it could potentially help to treat conditions like arthritis, asthma and diabetes.

Galvani will be 55 per cent owned by GSK and will bring together the pharmaceuticals company’s formidable expertise in drug discovery, development and biology expertise with that of the life sciences division of Google’s parent company, Alphabet, which has recently been renamed Verily. Aimed at creating implantable devices that will attach to individual nerves implicated in these diseases, intercepting and interpreting the signals sent by the brain to the organs affected by the disease (for example, the pancreas in the case of diabetes) identifying the distortions to those signals that characterise the disease and substituting a corrected version, Galvani will also need specific skills from Verily’s side of the business; notable miniaturisation of low-pier electronics, device design and manufacture, and data analytics and development of software for clinical applications.