Swiss longevity start-up Timeline has been named a Milestone 1 Award Winner in the prestigious XPRIZE Healthspan competition. Selected from hundreds of international teams, Timeline is one of the Top 40 global teams advancing approaches to extend healthy human function by at least a decade. As a Milestone 1 Award Winner Timeline receives USD250k and will compete for a place in the final.
Global life expectancy has more than doubled in the last 100 years, but the quality of our health as we age has not increased at the same rate. In the U.S. there is currently a 12-year gap between life expectancy and healthy life expectancy, or the period of life free of major chronic disease or disability. Launched in November 2023, the USD 101M XPRIZE Healthspan is the first health-focused competition of its kind, incentivizing teams to develop proactive, accessible therapeutic solutions that restore muscle, cognition, and immune function by a minimum of 10 years, with a goal of 20 years, in persons aged 50-80 years, in one year or less.
From over 600 registered teams across 58 countries, the Top 100 teams are recognized as semi-finalists, with the Top 40 Healthspan teams selected as Milestone 1 award winners based on their proposed therapeutic solution, scientific rationale, supporting evidence, strengths of team and clinical centre, and proposals for clinical testing. Each Milestone 1 winner was awarded USD 250,000 to support their ongoing work and conduct clinical trials in the next phase of the competition.
Timeline is the only Swiss company among the Top 40. “XPRIZE is validating what we’ve believed for years—that the science of aging is ready to deliver real, actionable breakthroughs in human health,” said Patrick Aebischer, Co-Founder of Timeline and President Emeritus of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (EPFL). “This recognition highlights the importance of mitochondrial health as a transformative approach to extending healthspan and improving function in aging populations.”
Timeline’s award-win builds on its 15+ years of pioneering clinical research in mitochondrial health, including the discovery and development of Urolithin A, a natural compound that stimulates mitophagy—the body’s process for clearing out dysfunctional mitochondria and regenerating healthy ones. Mitopure, Timeline’s proprietary Urolithin A, is clinically shown to improve mitochondrial function, strength, and immune fitness in multiple randomized placebo-controlled trials in human.
All semi-finalist teams – Top 100 and late-registering teams included – will begin early stage clinical trials over the next year and will submit their data in April 2026 for the next round of judging in the Healthspan competition. Translating findings from the lab to clinical testing is a major hurdle for teams as it requires safety assessment, regulatory approval, testing partners, and investors or funders. In July 2026, XPRIZE will announce the 10 finalists selected to receive the second USD 10 million milestone prize. These teams will then advance to finals and must test their therapeutic solution for up to one year in adults aged 50-80 years in clinical trials, running from 2026 to 2029. The finalists’ trials will be supported by the University of Utah and its Data Coordinating Center (DCC), which will serve as the DCC for XPRIZE Healthspan. The competition will culminate in 2030, when the grand prize winner is awarded up to USD 81 million.
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