Mark Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla Chan have donated $25 million through their foundation to a philanthropic effort organized by Bill Gates to explore new coronavirus treatments.
The Gates Foundation donated $50 million last week to what it’s calling the “COVID-19 Therapeutics Accelerator.” The initiative brings together life sciences companies to collaborate on the development of new vaccines, diagnostics, and treatments for COVID-19.
“The Therapeutics Accelerator will enable researchers to quickly determine whether or not existing drugs have a potential benefit against COVID-19,” Chan and Zuckerberg said in a press release. “We hope these coordinated efforts will help stop the spread of COVID-19 as well as provide shared, reusable strategies to respond to future pandemics.”
The two donations are the largest from tech billionaires since the coronavirus outbreak. Wellcome and Mastercard are supporting the effort as well.
The goal of the initiative is to either develop a new drug or adapt an existing treatment that it could help distribute alongside partnering pharmaceutical companies.
The 15 companies participating in the project kicked off the effort by sharing their proprietary libraries of molecular compounds that have some history of being tested with COVID-19.
The lineup includes big names in biotech such as Johnson & Johnson, Merck, Pfizer, Sanofi, and Bristol-Myers Squibb.
Notorious short-seller Carson Block and his equity research firm Muddy Waters has accused Chinese education company GSX TechEDU ($GSX) of fabricating student numbers through the use of bots.
Apple and Google on Wednesday released long-awaited smartphone technology to automatically notify people if they might have been exposed to the coronavirus.
Chris Soukup, CEO of Communication Service for the Deaf discussed with Cheddar the challenges facing the community with a lack of resources and much of the new normal stemming from stay-at-home orders.
Zipcar President Tracey Zhen talks about new features that fit into the current social-distancing world.
Director of the Rhode Island Labor Department, Scott Jensen discussed how Amazon's tech aided the state amid the widespread unemployment during the pandemic.
Chicago-based restaurant platform Tock has raised $10 million to help high-end restaurants offer services like “elevated carryout.”
Lingering health concerns about going out in public and interacting with others amid the coronavirus pandemic are forcing businesses to embrace e-commerce, a move not all of them are prepared for.
Bloomberg Philanthropies has announced that it's supporting states in helping them build and execute contact tracing programs to control the spread of COVID-19.
Twilio, the cloud communications program, is teaming up with ZocDoc, the online medical booking service, to power its new video consultation service.
With grim images of coronavirus frontline workers splashing across screens, the founder of the virtual support group Lyf decided to come up with new ways of helping those struggling during the pandemic.
