Longevity: Can We Add Another 30 Years? | The Decade Ahead

**Bryce** (0:00)
A century ago, Australians were lucky to live past 50 Today, we're living to 84, and the push to go even further is creating one of the biggest investment opportunities of our time. Today, we're breaking down the science, the companies, and how to actually invest in it.
Welcome to The Decade Ahead, a 10-part series on Equity Mates unpacking the 10 themes that we think are set up for the next decade. My name is Bryce, and as always, I'm joined by my equity buddy, Ren. How are you?

**Ren** (0:29)
Very good, Bryce. Very excited for this episode. Very excited to kick it off with one of the biggest themes in markets today. It seems poised to only get bigger over the next decade, and that is biotech, and pharmaceuticals, and some of the incredible drug breakthroughs we've seen, that are all adding to this longevity story.

**Bryce** (0:51)
Yeah. I'm really pumped to get into this one.

**Ren** (0:54)
Well, you were saying off mic that you reckon you're going to live past 100 Yeah, I do. So we will get into that. Each episode in this series, we're going to dig into one theme in detail. We're going to talk about who's driving it, who's building it, the case for and the case against investing it, and it's all thanks to our partners, ANZ.

**Bryce** (1:12)
Yes, this episode is brought to you by ANZ Business Start Right. A massive thank you to ANZ for helping us keep all of our content free here at Equity Mates.

**Ren** (1:21)
All right, Bryce, well, let's get into it. This is all about longevity, and the companies and the breakthroughs that are driving it. And your hook started with how much lifespan has improved in the past 100 years.
So it's probably worth us dwelling on that for a second. A boy born in 1900 in Australia was expected to live just 51 years. A girl, 55 years. Today, a boy is 81 years and a girl is 85 years.

**Bryce** (1:49)
We've added 30 years.

**Ren** (1:51)
And what hasn't changed is that boys have that four-year gap between boys and girls.

**Bryce** (1:55)
It's crazy, isn't it?

**Ren** (1:56)
It's crazy. But just an pretty incredible story that's not just confined to Australia.

**Bryce** (2:02)
No, global life expectancy has jumped from an average of 46.5 years in 1950 to 73.3 years in 2024 In 1950, the country with the longest life expectancy on the planet was Norway.

**Ren** (2:19)
The Scandinavians.

**Bryce** (2:20)
Their life expectancy was 72 years. Now, if we look at the global average, it is above that at 73.3 years. So it's a great story.

**Ren** (2:29)
Yeah. Fun fact, quiz question. What's the country with the number one lifespan today?

**Bryce** (2:35)
Scandinavia?

**Ren** (2:36)
No, not Scandinavia. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

**Bryce** (2:38)
Japan.

**Ren** (2:40)
Japan consistently ranks at the top, but is, according to this website that I've just found, Worldometer. Fact check, fact check. It's actually number four.

**Bryce** (2:49)
Ooh, I don't know. What is it?

**Ren** (2:52)
Monaco.

**Bryce** (2:53)
Really?

**Ren** (2:54)
Eighty-seven years old. Money buys life, baby. That's what we're talking about today.
No, but that will be a theme that repeats, and Brian Johnson's name will get brought up in this episode.

**Bryce** (3:05)
Yeah. Brian Johnson being a guy who's massive on YouTube, who's now spending over $2 million a year to try and live as long as possible.

**Ren** (3:13)
Yes. Brian Johnson aside, these big jumps in life expectancy haven't happened by accident. It's been vaccines, antibiotics, sanitation, modern medicine, all of the precursors to today's modern biotech and pharmaceutical industry.
These were the breakthroughs that gave us penicillin and the polio vaccine and that have developed into a $1.6 trillion industry.

**Bryce** (3:42)
Huge.

**Ren** (3:42)
Massive. But Bryce, here is the wild thing. In the next 10 years, that $1.6 trillion industry is estimated to get to $3.5 trillion.

**Bryce** (3:53)
Yeah. Massive opportunity, Ren, but the number that I... Here's a big number for you.

**Ren** (3:58)
You're going to one up me.

**Bryce** (3:59)
I'm going to one up you. The longevity economy. Now, this is everything that services the over 65 bracket. You've got healthcare, wellness, financial services, so it's not just the space that we're talking about at the moment.

**Ren** (4:11)
You know, like aged care homes, like, oh, we're talking everything.

**Bryce** (4:14)
You name it. It is forecasted to be a $70 trillion company by 20...

**Ren** (4:19)
Company.

**Bryce** (4:21)
Yeah, massive.

**Ren** (4:21)
And what's its ticker code?

**Bryce** (4:23)
$70 trillion sector by 2030, in the next five years. Bigger than the entire US economy today.