Billionaire private investor Antonio Gracias, a close friend and longtime associate of psychedelic enthusiast Elon Musk, has taken control of Lykos Therapeutics.
Lykos Therapeutics is the largest, most recognised MDMA-assisted therapy company in the U.S. It is also the for-profit arm of the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS). In August this year, Lykos Therapeutics’ application for the use of MDMA-assisted therapy to tackle Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) was rejected by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). This was widely unexpected and threw MAPS into turmoil. Critics described both MAPS and, therefore, Lykos Therapeutics as a “therapy cult”, in which the use of psychedelics was not itself the issue, but rather the poor practices of the company itself.
MAPS founder Rick Doblin says the origin of the takeover was a chance meeting at Burning Man, where Doblin and Gracias discussed seeking a “white knight” investor to save the struggling company. Gracias subsequently led a $50 million funding round to stabilise the company and installed an entirely new board and leadership team.
The Guardian reports on Doblin’s approach to investment: “As Doblin sought out funding and support for Maps and Lykos over the past decade, former employees say he began looking to broader circles of investors. They included … big names in corporate finance and, controversially, the Republican donor Rebekah Mercer.” The Guardian piece adds, “One method was to court investors with invitations to parties where drugs were being used, according to [Ifetayo] Harvey”. Harvey, a psychedelic advocate who was Doblin’s executive assistant in 2015, said, “Definitely part of their fundraising strategy is ‘Meet rich people at Burning Man, do psychedelics with them and get Maps money.’”
Gracias is part of a growing number of Silicon Valley’s right-wing, who are heavily invested in the psychedelic industry. Gracias serves on the board of both SpaceX and Neuralink, further illustrating his close ties to Elon Musk. The takeover was being proposed in January of this year, when both Musk and Gracias were still heavily involved in the Doge project in the Trump administration. This throws up serious ethical concerns. Harvey describes the worrying situation: “I think the aim is to get MDMA-assisted psychotherapy approved by the FDA by any means necessary.”
Gracias’s unprecedented access to federal agencies has been cited as a serious conflict of interest by labour unions and ethics watchdogs. The FDA rejected Lykos Therapeutics’ application due to seemingly flawed science and inadequate data from the trials up to that point. This would require a new and extremely expensive Phase 3 trial to fully ascertain the effectiveness of the potential treatment. However, the new administration’s health experts appear to be considering a potential reversal of the decision or altering the stringency of the required follow-up trial. This would obviously be incredibly beneficial (possibly even necessary for its survival) to Lykos Therapeutics and the new leadership group at the helm.
The relentless drive for capital and the expectation of an exploding market appear to be leading to poor practices, and if not outright corrupt, then exceedingly murky collusion with government agencies. In all likelihood, approaching the psychedelic industry as the next investor bubble will doubtless only serve to hurt it in the long term.
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if we look past the tech bros it seems like we’re heading in a good direction!