Two Seattle-area health and longevity startups are joining forces through Viome Life Science‘s acquisition of Circulate Health. The two parties would not share specifics but said the deal was valued between $15 million and $50 million.

The acquisition will allow the companies to expand their reach and offerings of diagnostics, wellness supplements and a blood-cleaning service called therapeutic plasma exchange.

Here’s what each brings to the table:

• Viome sells test kits for saliva, blood and stool samples for customers to use at home and send in for analysis. Based on the results, the company offers personalized supplements and oral care products.
• Viome has also developed diagnostic tools that analyze RNA biomarkers to detect disease, including a test for early detection of oral and throat cancer that has received FDA breakthrough device designation but not formal FDA clearance.
• Circulate operates machines providing therapeutic plasma exchange administered by its own specially trained nurses. The goal of the exchange is to provide a circulatory-system tune-up that removes inflammatory factors, microplastics and biological compounds associated with aging, returning clean blood cells with a replacement protein fluid.

Combining the services and expertise of the two companies could expand their reach and provide new insights into health and treatment, said Dr. Brad Younggren, Circulate’s co-founder and former CEO.

“We want to build the largest network in the world for plasma exchange to answer questions, to figure things out. We’re adding new diagnostics. We’re looking at different kinds of biomarkers and diagnostics in the chronic disease space,” Younggren said.

The merged company has 115 full-time employees, with an additional 10 consultants on staff. Most of Circulate’s workers retained their jobs following the acquisition. Younggren is now president of the newly formed clinical group, Viome Pro, which includes diagnostics, oral and throat cancer detection, and therapeutic plasma exchange. Naveen Jain is Viome’s CEO and co-founder.

Circulate operated in stealth mode for a couple of years and officially launched in January 2024. It raised $14 million prior to the acquisition. Viome was founded a decade ago and has received approximately $250 million from investors.

Circulate had previously operated in 40 health and longevity clinics, primarily in the U.S., with one each in the United Kingdom and the Bahamas, and had relationships with additional sites. Combined with Viome’s clinic partnerships, those connections could expand the company’s potential reach to 400 sites.

The expansion comes as both microbiome testing and plasma exchange face questions from the medical community about how well the evidence supports their claims of health benefits.

The microbiome health market is growing, though estimates of its size vary widely. Some researchers are wary of microbiome kit companies, criticizing a lack of scientific rigor and regulation.

Plasma exchange is considered medically effective for conditions including certain cases of multiple sclerosis and leukemia, Guillain-Barre syndrome, sickle cell disease, and organ transplants. The treatment has more recently been embraced by biohacking proponents who pursue cutting-edge and not necessarily scientifically verified strategies for improving mental performance and longevity.

In 2025, Circulate published a study of 42 adults in Aging Cell showing potential reductions in biological age following repeated treatments, though outside medical experts questioned the long-term significance of the findings. A separate 2026 study in the Journal of Clinical Apheresis showed its protocols helped reduce microplastics in the blood.

“We’ll continue to do research,” Younggren said. “We have new tools. We’re going to be doing a trial combining plasma exchange with all the technologies that already exist under the hood at Viome.”

Washington state has assembled the country’s deepest bench of quantum technology assets — including two major cloud platforms, a national lab and the first U.S. quantum computer factory — but has captured almost none of the federal money now driving the industry.

That disconnect is the focus of a report released Tuesday morning by the Washington Technology Industry Association, the Northwest Quantum Nexus and the state Department of Commerce.

Since a January 2023 assessment, Washington state’s quantum ecosystem “has grown denser, more visible, and physically larger,” reads the report, authored by Nirav S. Desai, CEO of innovation consultancy Moonbeam Exchange. “Yet the state has fallen behind peers on the coordinated public investment that converts assets into a resilient cluster.”

The report makes five recommendations:

• Use the governor’s office to convene a standing group — universities, the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, companies, investors and the Commerce Department — that decides which federal grants to pursue and assembles joint bids for funding.
• Pick one to three specialties to compete in, such as post-quantum cryptography or industry applications, rather than chasing all of quantum.
• Build the workforce at all three levels: developers first, then the missing undergraduate and technician programs.
• Position the Seattle region and Washington state as a landing pad for Japanese, Korean and Taiwanese quantum companies.
• Create a single point of contact for founders, and promote the quantum machine access the state already has but hasn’t advertised.

“This isn’t a resource problem; it’s a coordination problem, and that’s the good news,” said Nick Ellingson, WTIA’s vice president of innovation and entrepreneurship, in a news release.

Quantum computers, which have yet to be proven commercially viable, can hold multiple states at once and could eventually solve problems beyond the reach of conventional machines.

The report points to efforts by states including Illinois, Maryland and Colorado, which have committed $500 million, roughly $200 million and $127 million respectively to quantum campuses and research hubs.

In Washington state, Microsoft and Amazon are among the major tech companies leveraging their research to build quantum platforms and technology. Maryland-based IonQ’s Bothell, Wash., plant, the country’s first dedicated quantum computer factory, employs about 100 people, part of an expansion the report says could generate 1,200 to 2,000 jobs within five years.

Gov. Bob Ferguson vetoed $100,000 for a state quantum strategy in May 2025, citing fiscal pressure, while directing the Commerce Department to build industry partnerships and produce policy recommendations. Tuesday’s report was funded by a grant administered by Commerce.

In April, Ferguson steered $500,000 from the state’s Strategic Reserve Fund to IonQ’s Bothell expansion, Washington’s first direct investment in quantum.

Illinois, by comparison, has committed more than $500 million to the Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park, a campus near Chicago anchored by PsiQuantum and IBM.

Read the full report here.