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Entrepreneur Colin Hill has formalized his plans to create new data analytics startups with the launch of Via Science. The Cambridge, MA-based firm will serve as part holding company of Hill's previous two companies, GNS Healthcare and Fina Technologies, and part incubator for hatching new startups, Hill says.
Via Science is the corporate vehicle that Hill and his business partners will use to commercialize so-called reverse engineering/forward simulation (REFS) technology-first invented to streamline cancer drug development-through multiple startups focused on specific industries.
The firm is evolving the strategy previously used at GNS Healthcare (formerly called Gene Network Sciences) to spin off Fina Technologies, which is applying the technology to the financial trading world. Hill, the chairman and CEO of both Via Science and GNS, says he plans to announce the launch of Via today.
Via Science aims to operate on the cutting edge of "big data" analytics, which uses supercomputers and takes the huge amounts of data at our disposal today and create predictive models for different types of businesses. GNS Healthcare, for instance,has applied this technology to identify biomarkers that can predict how patients will respond to certain rheumatoid arthritis drugs for Cambridge, MA-based biotech giant Biogen Idec (NASDAQ:BIIB)-all without touching a test tube.
Now, Hill sees opportunities to expand the reach of the technology to build predictive models for improving such business activities as supply-chain management, insurance risk assessment, and consumer marketing.
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